It smelled of death in the house. I noticed it immediately upon entering. I knew the smell, it reminded me of my mother's house when she was dying of lung cancer. It is distinctive. I suspect the dying do not smell it or they would never laugh. I dread the tech heads figuring out how to market "virtual olfactory images." Last night I knew, once and for all, that my friend is really dying. He has looked bad, but the editor in my mind sees the old friend, the one who laughs, the one who is always ready to abuse the new meat and see what they are made of. The editor in my mind hears the bad news masked by carefully designed cheerfulness. But, the editor doesn't have the techiniques to edit odor. These days the tech heads have made it impossible to believe what you see and what you hear. they digitize and manipulate and nothing is necessarily real any longer. You can add or delete voices and you can add and delete images from photos and videos. But for now, the smells, the olfactory evidence, the undiluted tincture of life, or death, is real and it is not subject to manipulation. You can hang all the air fresheners you want, but it is still there, lurking in the very midst of the hazelnut-vanilla world you want to believe in.