The nose knows

My workplace is a size of a really great closet. Seriously. I DO have the benefit of 12 foot ceilings and a wall of windows which makes it seem larger...but, at one time many years ago it was a storage closet for the third grade teachers. Actually before that it was a teacher's lounge where the teachers would go and smoke and I SO wish I would have been around to see these teachers with apples embroidered on their jumpers tokin off their cigs. But, I digress.
I had five first grade boys in my room and we were reading a story (that's my gig at school...reading). All of a sudden I smell cat urine. The kids are trying to read while I'm smelling my armpits, my pants, my shoes. Is it me?! Did my cat pee on an article of clothing? NO! It's not me. It has to be one of them...one of these six year old boys.
"So...does anyone have cats at their house?" I casually ask. And--with first graders you can casually ask anything...there is no "getting off the subject" because they ALWAYS are doing that on their own.
I hear about frogs, dogs, lizards, and rats...and then...one boy says "I have a new kitten!" Bingo. Then I casually say that I think the room kind of smells like a cat (again...nothing is awkward with first graders) and can I smell his jacket?
So, if you would have walked in at 9:36 AM into my class/closet room you would have found my nose smelling all over this kid's clothes. But you know what? I did it. We bagged that jacket and kept it out in the hallway that smells like cigarette smoke from the kids jackets that are scented with their parent's nicotine habit on the way to school. The nose knows.