Bathing thread got me thinking about the other end of the stick for what occurs from lack of bathing or having a job that pushes the bodies hygene to its limits.
Mike Rowe has nothing on some of the jobs I did over the years.
Grew up in a home with 7 kids and 2 adults. No shower. If you didnt take a bath at night you lost out unless you wanted to get up early and wake the old man up which wasnt a good idea. My first real job in HS was in a Seafood Restaurant. You stunk like fish after working a 6 hour shift. I couldnt even imagine what the other kids in school thought about me the days I worked late and couldnt bathe. Might have something to do with my issues getting on dates. A couple of us hitch hiked a ride to a bar after work one night. A guy we knew picked us up. We sat in the back and he had his girl friend in the front. After about 15 minutes thay couldnt take it anymore and rolled the windows down. We got the best spot at the bar by bellying up in a pair and the patrons made room by finding another spot to avoid the fish smell.
Painted a massive gymnasium addition at a private school when I worked doing commercial painting. We had to lay on a plank between two scaffolds that were 18 feet up. We sanded the rust spots every inch of structural steel in the ceiling over an area the size of two regulation basketball courts. Six weeks 7 days per week ten hours a day sanding red lead primer and touching up the spots we sanded. No ear plugs. Nothing but a dust mask with a white cloth over it and a white bandana from the same cloth type. I came home from work and my first apartment I shared with my wife and daughter had no shower. I took 3 baths consecutively to get all the pigment out of my skin every night. I volunteered for that assignment so I could get overtime pay for Christmas.
I worked in a shop as a welder fabricator for 4 years. I built vacuum furnaces. The shell of the oven was my assignment. It was like a 5 foot wide 8 foot high cylinder beer can. I would spend weeks in there welding, cutting with a torch and plasma cutting. Then I would work the assembly of all the components to a finish product including the insulation and heat shield panels which I would fabricate. The shop provided us with a blue heavy cotton uniform. They used so much starch on the pants I would get a half inch groove in my crotch that would wear raw. You could put your finger into the groove as if it was cut with a grinding wheel. After a week it would start to smell like rancid hamburg. I eventually got an industrial strength salve from my doctor that would heal the wound up in a matter of a couple days. I would save my sick time and mental health days to go sit in my canoe for the time it took. Then I would repeat the process. After a couple years the insurance company refused to pay for my script for that product. The stuff they gave me to replace it was useless. Didnt exactly improve my love life. This was another volunteer job that I took. I was a finish carpenter by trade. The welding job offered steady work with full benefits. My daughter was reaching the age for college and I needed the job to along with my wife foot the tuition. After the 4 years she opted to hold off school and my wife opted to be done with my ass which prompted a divorce. She was going to tag me to the income at the weld shop for child support on my youngest daughter. About that period I was suffering from severe asthma from the work conditions. The tearing down of the rehab furnaces required breaking down carbon fiber materials that had seen heat over 2000 degrees for 30 years. The dust and fibers were worst than asbestos. I cut my own throat and quit the job before the divorce proceedings. I worked my way back into stair building so I didnt screw my health completely and I also afforded the divorce settlement.