Sniff, sniff...WHA!?

For all of you fellow pet lovers, how well we know the feeling of coming home, opening the door, and as you walk through the house...<sniff, sniff...SNIFF?>  What is that smell, and where the heck is it!?!  Okay, we have animals in our house, but you did NOT have that smell when you left.  You walk around, with your nose in the air and you make like a dog.  You sniff in this room, then you sniff in that room.  After awhile, you drop to your hands and knees, and start sniffing the chairs, the walls, the books, the rugs, the corners, the drapes, the shoes by the front door.  You even sniff around the litter boxes, checking for anything that may have 'overshot' there.  Sometimes you find the source of the smell; sometimes you wish you had NOT found it!

Recently, it happened to us.  When I got home after work, I smelled a litter box smell IN THE KITCHEN.  I sniffed and sniffed, but could not find the source.  Then the hubby said HE smelled it too!  UGH!  NOT THE KITCHEN!  We started pulling things off the shelves; putting our faces into the sink, around the refrigerator, and where we store old newspapers.  Then...heart thumping here...we zeroed in.  The dish drying rack.  WHA!?!  How is this possible?!?  I was just about in panic mode, thinking we had a kitty with a bladder problem, while the hubby kept sniffing...and discovered a small cutting board he recently used to mash garlic, that simply REEKED of smell, and it was pretty darn close to a urine odor.  And it was in the dish rack!  He then scrubbed and washed and bleached and sanitized, but that little bit of plastic did not give up that smell.   So it's now in the recycle bin, and our worries about a cat...um...doing...well, you know...have disappeared.  WHEW!!!!

"Told ya it wasn't me!"