I found myself doing one of the things I hate this weekend. (I’d already done two loads of laundry and mowed the lawn, so it wasn’t that). I met someone who said they were moving to Hanford next month, and the words flew out of my mouth before I could stop myself: “Really? Have you heard about the water?”

I couldn’t help it, honestly. Let’s just say it was a gag reflex. But luckily, before I could extricate my foot from my mouth, the person to whom I was speaking saved my bacon.

“But it’s such a beautiful town,” he exclaimed, and I was happy to agree with him, extolling the many virtues of the city I call home.

I couldn’t believe I had turned into “one of them.”

Standing in the Fresno Apple store as we chatted, I had a flashback to nearly three years ago. That was when I had told friends and fellow church members that I had taken a job in Hanford.

“Are you crazy?” they asked incredulously. “Have you heard about the stinky water??” I had, but I sure wasn’t going to let them know that. As it was, I didn’t appreciate them acting so shocked and appalled that I was considering this exciting relocation. I’d show them, I thought.

Fast forward to my first night in my new home, several months later. Yes, I’m not ashamed to say I gagged as I took a shorter-than-normal shower that night, holding my breath for as long as I could.

For me at least, the problem of Hanford’s stinky water was short-lived. I quickly shelled out $3,000 for an in-home water filtration system designed to take out the rotten egg smell using something as simple as household bleach. Yes, chlorine; the chemical the city would use to treat the entire water system if folks wanted to pay for it.

But here’s the rub: it seems most don’t want to pay for it. Surveys over the past 20 years have shown that residential water bills would increase by little more than $3 a month if the city installed the super-nifty-doo-dads needed to filter out the hydrogen sulfide smell. That, it seems, is too much for folks to handle.

Yes, I know, longtime residents don’t mind the smell; in fact they say they prefer it to imbibing harmful additives. The water that flows out of our faucets is basically the way Mother Nature intended. Pure and simple, no chemicals. Bummer.

Regardless �” and because I could �” I decided to do the math and figure out the cost difference if the city had installed a chlorination system when I first moved here (because they’d do that for me, I know).

Let’s see: $3,000 for my in-home unit, $5 worth of bleach every month for the past nearly three years vs. an extra $3 on my water bill per month. I figure I’d have to live in my house for about 80 years before I’d break even.

But what worries me about our water �” yes, the arsenic levels are right up there with the smell �” is that it’s how some people define Hanford. Would we be a thriving metropolitan area of several hundred thousand if it weren’t for that pesky hydrogen sulfide smell? Maybe. And who knows, if we solved our smelly water problem, maybe we’d eventually get an In-N-Out Burger.

Now that sounds like a win-win solution all around.