What’s the word for the smell of rain? It’s petrichor. For years, scientists referred to this evidence of rain as argillaceous odor because it was particularly noticeable near soil with a lot of whitish clay called argil. Then, in the early 1960s...
You walk into a used bookstore, or pull down an old volume at the library, and there it is: The smell of old books. If you detect notes of vanilla in that intoxicating scent, there’s a reason. Also, why some people think the word awesome is...
Nothing like that old-book smell. And if you open up an old volume and think you detect notes of vanilla, there’s a good reason. That intoxicating scent is the result of lignin, a chemical compound in plants used for making paper. It has a molecular...
This week, we’re going through the e-mail bag. Here’s a savory, sensuous one. It’s from Stacey in Boulder, Colorado.
foiler n.— «Note that Blair won’t be an only child for long if Cyrus does marry Eleanor. His son Aaron (the artist now dating Serena) would become Blair’s step-brother, just like in the books. Oh, and just a warning to anyone searching for “Gossip...
charreada n.— «A growing number of middle-class Mexican-Americans spend lazy summer afternoons at the charreada—part rodeo, part fiesta and one of Mexico’s most revered sporting events, dating to the 17th century.…At family-owned arenas, where the...