Originally Posted by QualiTcare:
true, i wouldn't think everyone would be like, "man, you smell like smoke!"
but if people you are close with and are near every day (especially when they consider themself to be able to smell smoke a mile away) tell you they are shocked when they find out months later when you've been doing it all along -it's pretty safe to assume you don't smell.
my mother is one of those people who hates smoke and says she can smell it "a mile away" but she never said a word about being able to smell it UNTIL she "caught me" smoking one day. now, i was never what i would consider a regular smoker and def. not a heavy smoker. at one point, i was smoking regulary, but it was maybe 4 a day. anyhow, after she found out i had been smoking, every time i came around it was "ugh, u smell like an ashtray" even though she never noticed before she knew.
i think it has a bit of a placebo effect. there was one time i straight out told her, "you're full of crap!" because i went to the mall, bought my daughter an outfit, put it in the trunk of my car, and then took my daughter to my mother's house to stay the night. when i picked her up, she complained about how her outfit (that went from JCPenny's into a bag, into my trunk, and spent ten minutes there before going into her house) smelled like SMOKE! You should've seen her stutter when I told her I had just bought it and brought it over. Of course, she couldn't say she was wrong. 
Not to mention my daughter or her clothes had never smelled like smoke either before D-day (when she found out I had smoked).
I don't even smoke now. I just think it's funny how my experiences played out.
This is pretty funny. And you are probably so right about the placebo effect! There is a difference between hating the smell of something and being allergic to it though. With a person who is truly allergic, their body will react to it whether they can actually smell it or not.