The Slippery Elm Gazette
The Crisis of Hyperactive Olfactory Overreaction to Random Aromatic Hydrocarbons (HOORAH)
January 30, 2025
By Orville Lemuel Henshaw
Published by The Slippery Elm Gazette
Slippery Elm, Nebraska
In a stunning revelation that has left the scientific community baffled and the general public largely indifferent, a new disorder has emerged from the olfactory trenches, wreaking havoc on those unfortunate enough to have an overachieving sense of smell. Hyperactive Olfactory Overreaction to Random Aromatic Hydrocarbons, or HOORAH, is reportedly afflicting a growing number of hypersensitive individuals, forcing them to flee grocery aisles, abandon public transportation, and, in extreme cases, renounce civilization in favor of scentless isolation.
Dr. Mortimer Elwood Peabody, an olfactology researcher at the Nebraska Institute of Questionable Science, describes the phenomenon in terms so convoluted that they barely clarify the issue: “What we’re seeing here is a direct response of the olfactory receptors experiencing an escalated state of perceptional awareness, leading to an exacerbation of interpretive scent analysis. Simply put, noses are freaking out.”
Opposition to the disorder’s legitimacy is equally loud, if not slightly more incoherent. Dr. Ophelia Maude Tuttle, a professor of Skeptical Neuroscience at the Upper Dakota Academy of Reasonable Doubt, dismisses HOORAH as “nothing more than a cleverly disguised excuse for people to claim emotional trauma when confronted with the real-world consequences of modern perfumery.” She adds, “Next thing you know, we’ll be diagnosing people with ‘Sudden Aversion to Loud Colors’ or ‘Acute Discomfort Around Moderately Irritating Textures.’ At some point, we must ask ourselves: Have we gone too far in making every minor inconvenience a life-altering condition?”
But for those who suffer from HOORAH, the struggle is real. Slippery Elm resident Mildred Prudence Wicklow, 67, recounts a particularly harrowing incident at her local post office: “I walked in, and I swear on my mother’s good China, the entire place reeked of three-day-old licorice and somebody’s desperation. I had to leave immediately. My nose felt personally attacked.”
Another victim, Randolph Clive Dobbins, 43, shared his plight: “I had to quit my job at the hardware store because the smell of PVC piping triggered what can only be described as an existential crisis. One minute I was restocking shelves, the next I was questioning my entire existence. How can I function in a society that smells this strongly of synthetic polymers?”
Despite growing concern, efforts to find solutions remain sluggish. Some scientists suggest that HOORAH sufferers undergo rigorous desensitization therapy, which consists primarily of sitting in a room full of competing odors until their brains surrender to nasal exhaustion. Others recommend a strict regimen of plugging one’s nose and pretending nothing is happening.
For more information—or absolutely none at all—readers are encouraged to contact The Missouri Shoe Cobbler’s Almanac, The Tulsa Trombone Review, or The Greater South Dakota Guide to Unusual Fish Behavior for further guidance on this matter.
Orville Lemuel Henshaw is an award-winning journalist, best known for his groundbreaking exposés, including The Great Pudding Conspiracy of 1974, Who’s Putting the Holes in Swiss Cheese? and An Alarming Increase in Left-Handed Squirrels—Coincidence or Government Plot?
