Favourite smells

I have blithely stolen this idea from the lovely Earthenwitch. They come in no particular order, and I've referred to some of them before.

1 Wet earth when it's been raining after a long dry spell. Indeed, after a long dry spell everything smells lovely, including tarmac. And new-mown grass of course.

2 The inside of a Morris Minor. Any leather-seated car smells good, but an old Morris is the best.

3 The toasty smell of a maltings. I know I've said this before - there was a maltings a couple of roads away when I was a child and it's one of those childhood smells. Other ones are of flowering currant - people say it smells of cat pee, but not to me. Norwich used to smell of chocolate before the chocolate factory was closed (the Chapelfield shopping mall was built on the site).

4 Smoky things - Laphroaig whisky, Lapsang Souchong tea, kippers, wood fires.

5 Dog's feet. It has to be a dog I love though or it's too personal to do and doesn't smell right. It's only been since I had a blog that I've admitted to the outside world that I cuddle up with my dog and sniff her feet. Mind you, if you really love a dog then it smells good generally. Ears and ... um, actually ... armpits. Sorry. And then there's puppy-breath, which is wonderful.

6 The smell of a ripe melon when you go into the greenhouse, and you have to sniff your way round until you find the one that has ripened overnight. The roots of a young cucumber plant smell of cucumber and when you tip it out of its pot to put it in a bigger one, the smell is an anticipation of what's to come. However, the roots of Mimosa pudica, the Sensitive Plant smell weird and unpleasant, in a way that makes you want to keep checking it to see if it's still as odd as you thought it was.

7 Horses. You know the Barbara Woodhouse thing, when they breathe at each other? Horses and I do that to each other. I love the smell of stables. Cowsheds are also good.

8 Broad bean flowers. Many flower scents of course (I've got a pot of hyacinths in here right now, which is wonderful), but that sudden and elusive scent in the spring has me winding the car windows down, sniffing the air to find the field of beans. My daughter thinks I'm annoying when I do this.

9 A baby, of course. I know I'm not the only woman who surreptitiously sniffs babies when given one to hold. They don't always smell good of course. Sometimes they pong mightily. But the smell of the clean baby is wonderful.

I may add a tenth. Of course, I've cheated and put a lot more than nine down already.