Can't smell cat piss

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I discovered something interesting when I stayed at a blind woman's house last year: I can't smell cat piss. She said that she could smell very strong cat piss and wanted me to help her find it, but I told her I didn't smell anything. Then I thought about it, and realized in the past I have failed to pick up on cat piss. We have a house cat named Charlie (pictured sleeping in my avatar) and one time, when my sister was away in the Marines and my parents had gone on vacation and I was by myself in the house, apparently Charlie went to the bathroom upstairs on the carpet, and I spent a lot of time upstairs, which is where my bedroom and the computer room were, but I had no clue. It wasn't until my parents came back that it was detected and they detected it instantly.

Is it just cat urine that you can't smell, or are there other odors you can't smell?

Also, you might want to check out this Wiki page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anosmia

I have a very poor sense of smell, but some things I can smell. I can't smell skunk, gas, and many other odors. However, I can smell some kinds of flowers, some fruits, meat cooking, blood, peppermint, other mints, and menthol, and certain other aromas. I like the smell of the fruits I can smell, except bananas. I hate the smell and taste of bananas. I really like the smell of mint, too.

I know for a fact that I can't smell skunk. I've never been able to smell the dead ones whenever passing them in the road. Also, I had a dog that had two run-ins with skunks. I was the only one in the family who could stand to be near him until after his tomato baths. For those who don't know--tomato juice neutralizes much of the skunk smell, so people or pets that have been skunked need to take a tomato bath, and then rinse off with soap (or pet shampoo) and water afterward. Just using the soap or shampoo without using the tomato juice first won't get rid of the stink. Skunk stink is very strong and long lasting, and can't be easily removed by other methods. There is something in tomatoes that is able to kill most of the stink, so that is what you need to use. If you are out of tomato juice, but have other tomato products on hand, like tomato paste, tomato puree, whole tomatoes, etc., you can use a blender and some water to juice them, and then use that for skunk destinking baths.

I think my smell issues may be hereditary. One of my aunt's was unable to smell gas. A neighbor saved her life once when she stopped by for a visit, and smelled gas that my aunt had not noticed. At my current home I had a stove with a gas leak that I didn't know about--I didn't smell any gas. I just happened to have the gas man over to do some work on my crummy furnace, and he thought he smelled a little gas, so he checked the stove, and found the leak. He turned off the gas to the stove, and I had to replace the whole unit--an oven/stove combo. After a number of repairs, the furnace died, and I was told I'd need to replace the crummy thing. I checked prices, and it would take between 2 and 3 thousand dollars to replace it, depending on how energy efficient a model I want. I decided to get room heaters instead. I have four now, and will be getting one more. Overall, that will cost around $500, which beats a new furnace by at least $1500. Granted they run on electricity instead of gas, but I no longer have to pay for gas, except for cooking, and I can keep them turned way down or off in unoccupied rooms, so it won't cost more to heat with them. And none of them sound like they are going to explode. The old furnace made terrifying, loud booms all the time.

Sorry I drifted off topic. Happens sometimes. I think we must have different smell sensors in our nasal passages, for different types of smell, just like we have different taste buds for different tastes. A problem with some of the sensors, but not with others would explain why I can smell somethings, but not others.

My sense of smell kind of sucks too, I dunno why. I've always figured you get use to a smell so you don't notice it anymore.

Do you know this saying? "Throw a frog into hot water and the frog is going to jump off. Put it into cold water and heat it slowly - the frog is going to cook itself to death."

Thats the same with your smell. You have a cat, probably unsterilized male. You are used to its smell, just like people who smoke are used to smell of cigarettes and won't feel that someone stinks cigarettes. Someone who doesn't smoke will know it right away.

It's also not unusual for people to not realize a smell that is slowly surrounding them. I often wont realize my parents burnt something in the kitchen because the smell goes to my room slowly and gradually. If I enter my house from the garden I will feel it instantly. But if I stay in house I won't feel it at all.
It has nothing to do with actual smell. Just the slow change.

That's a Polish expression, right?

Not being able to smell the ammonia in cat piss is a symptom of toxoplasmosis, a single-celled parasite that cats carry that quite often gets passed on to humans. A relatively huge percentage of the population has it, actually. You can get it from feces contamination (which is easy, cats put their butt on everything when they sit down, lol), or ingesting a flea that has fed on an infected cat. I probably have caught it myself, I can't smell it anymore either, and I used to be highly repulsed by it....

I do see this article, however, where someone says that the smell center of the brain may be damaged in mice so that the urine of cat smell can no longer be detected:

Consider yourself lucky if you can't smell cat piss lol