Kicker: Putricia’s perfume

NICK EICHER, HOST: Romeo’s Juliet once said, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” But Shakespeare must never have met the flower appropriately named “Putricia.”

Brett Summerell is chief scientist at the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney, Australia. Here's how he describes the “corpse flower”:

SUMMERELL: I’ve always thought it smelled like a dead possum in the roof. I’ve had the experience of both and fairly consecutively.

Tens of thousands of brave souls lined up in person to catch a snootful of the extraordinarily stenchy bloom, while millions more tuned in online—just to imagine it.

Putricia wafted her signature stink for just 24 hours. And if you’d like a whiff? You’ll have to wait another seven years, or visit your nearest garbage dump.

It’s The World and Everything in It.

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