I am reminded by Humph's disclosure in a Motoring thread that he stashes snouts and stogies around his car in case of sudden need that I myself am going through a period of 'giving up cigarettes'. Having a large supply of old snuff I am once again toffee-nosed.
'It's a bit toxic and nasty,' I said to herself. 'So is smoking,' she replied sensibly. It's certainly a bit different. When you snort some it stings your nostril quite painfully, if a big snort making your eyes water. But you do then get a short, very concentrated head-clearing tobacco hit. It must be less carcinogenic than smoking. But you get to feel you smell of snuff all the time.
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My history teacher at school used to take it during lessons and then blow his nose on a khaki handkerchief. It always seemed to me that the 2nd action made the first one pointless.
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Tense issue here AC.
"Hid" rather than "hides" please by way of a point of order.
;-)
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I still have, though unused since his passing, my father's snuff box which is wooden with a silver hinge and is carved in the shape of a Turkish slipper. It has his initials on it. Come to think of it, I never saw him use it for its intended purpose though he claimed he did once or twice upon a time. Probably became unfashionable, or difficult to do while driving.
Still have some of his cigarette cases too. One of them has a petrol lighter built in.
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>> "Hid" rather than "hides" please by way of a point of order.
Apologies Humph. It had slipped my mind that your body was a temple once again. May it last!
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Ecclesiastical buildings can be somewhat boring though don't you find?
I might attempt to become a secret smoker if I felt confident I could manage not to rely on the things again.
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Nah don't do that. I gave up twice and thought after 6 months I'd be OK with the odd one. I now need to give up yet again...
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Snuffboxes ought to seal more or less hermetically when closed, but few do and most leak.
Addictions are a great nuisance although some are fun in a way, up to a point. Tobacco though is one of the most inexplicable, because it is apparent right from the start that it's doing you harm and isn't making you high or cheerful, or enabling you to work faster.
I suspect I was addicted in utero, before I was born. My poor little mother was a lifelong chain smoker and there was no nonsense about not smoking when you were pregnant in those days. Anyway I seem to find it harder to stop than most people do. I'm not blaming her you understand. Wouldn't claim to have the sort of willpower others say they have.
I've had too much to do with tobacco in my life. Most of the respectable jobs I had were in the tobacco industry or working for it in advertising and market research. My mother died of lung cancer during that period, and the horrible irony of it all wasn't lost on me.
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I gave up 20 years ago, but know that it wouldn't take much to see me partaking again ....
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>> I gave up 20 years ago, but know that it wouldn't take much to see me partaking again ....
>>
I gave up 45 years ago, I can't imagine that anything would make me partake again.......
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I've given up three times so far this week... Seriously. Want to pack 'em in, but can't/won't.
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E-cigs have done it for me. Haven't had a "proper" cigarette for over two months now, and that was a one-off cos me battery went flat. Well worth a try.
They don't suit everyone; as an ex pipe smoker it's possibly easier for me cos I'm used to the faff of poking, prodding and refilling, and the feel of the tank-type e-cig that i use is similar to a pipe.
Biggest unintentional downside to giving up; being out in the lorry overnight and realising that I didn't have a lighter to ignite my gas stove in order to brew up!
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>> E-cigs have done it for me.
So you moved to a product that is just as expensive, just as addictive, health concerns not yet known, only now it makes you look like a complete plank as well
Where is the progress?
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>> >> E-cigs have done it for me.
>>
>> So you moved to a product that is just as expensive, just as addictive, health
>> concerns not yet known, only now it makes you look like a complete plank as
>> well
>>
>> Where is the progress?
>>
Cheaper, and if you think a bloke with a big beard who wears dungarees and rides old Harleys is bothered if someone thinks he looks like a plank, you're mistaken. :-)
I don't dispute the addiction bit, although I have noticed that I am gradually using it less and less. As I said earlier it's very much like smoking a pipe, so you tend to enjoy it most whilst relaxing with a pint in the sunshine or in front of a nice log fire.
Health concerns? Well I'm breathing better, seem to be less susceptible to colds, I'm not coughing up lumps of catarrh, can smell and taste my food better and wifey's more inclined to kiss me. That's healthy enough for me comared to what i'd be like if I'd stuck to the weed. You probably inhale as much noxious vapour in pursuit of steam trains as I do with this thing.
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When I started in the 'hot metal' printing trade nearly 50 years ago a lot of the old comps (typesetters) I worked with used to take snuff. I tried a bit from time to time - the only tobacco product I have ever used. Hill's Mentholyptus, I think it was called.
The old boys used to say it was effective against colds - and lead poisoning.
The legendary Adge Cutler, my brother-in-law's brother-in-law's brother (a very Somerset relationship) swore there was once a snuff mine near Yatton, between Nailsea and Clevedon, but I never found it.
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Once when I was at Skool I tried a Consulate Mint/Menthol Ciggy thing. Must have 'smoked' about half of it and that, to this day has been it. 'orrible stuff.
Best Bitter is of course.......another issue.
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Am I the only one left here who's still on the real thing?
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>> Am I the only one left here who's still on the real thing?
>>
Seems like it. Do be a good chap and stand outside will you? ;-)
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>> Am I the only one left here who's still on the real thing?
No. So you can stay inside.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Fri 3 Oct 14 at 00:34
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Nah but by Christmas I'll be stopped.
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No RR, I shall stand along side you to the bitter end.
Having just been for my HGV medical I was told what I've always suspected.
Having smoked since I was 14 years old any damage will have already been done, is too late to be undone, and I should carry on enjoying it at my age.
He added that he is a libertarian, and when told how much red wine I drink, he told me I should drink more!
I asked about my decision not to go on Statins and he agreed given that my cholesterol is 0.1 above the average they would be a waste of time and money given my history of smoking.
It really does make a refreshing change to be away from an NHS 'box ticking' doctor who is trying to reach targets and waste money, in this case.
My NHS Doctor wanted £125 for a 10 minute medical, this one charges £40 privately to do the same thing.
Pat
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"Having smoked since I was 14 years old any damage will have already been done, is too late to be undone, and I should carry on enjoying it at my age."
Not sure that that is 100% true but I guess he told you what you wanted to hear. Do you really enjoy smoking Pat? As a non-smoker its always been incomprehensible to me especially after watching a couple of relative die painful and nasty deaths as a result of its consequences. It is curious to me how people can be so careless of their health and I include over eating lack of exercise and drinking excessively in that. Still, it's a matter of personal choice I guess.
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I've just watched an old friend die a peculiarly drawn out and horrible death, blamed (by the medics) on smoking. He didn't have lung cancer either. I didn't realise gangrene was so common.
Anyway, just lately I've seen signs in bars and other places around here, banning the use of e-cigarettes. And I read somewhere the other day that the French government, which of course has the monopoly on tobacco supply but now also sells e-cigarettes in its 'tabacs', is considering banning 'vaping' in all public places.
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>> I've just watched an old friend die a peculiarly drawn out and horrible death, blamed
>> (by the medics) on smoking. He didn't have lung cancer either. I didn't realise gangrene
>> was so common.
Yup, Mrs B's aunt who smoked from 14 to well over 70 lost a leg and then her life to its effects.
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>> Yup, Mrs B's aunt who smoked from 14 to well over 70 lost a leg
>> and then her life to its effects.
If you are in perfect health and very fit, smoking may not be the one that gets you. If however you have any underlying health or medical issues, smoking will get in there and dig away at it and do for you. Every time.
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Googled gangrene and took a look at picture on Wikipedia entry. I'd try to to avoid that if I could.
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To be fair, its not just caused by smoking. Plenty of other ways you can get that.
Last edited by: Zero on Fri 3 Oct 14 at 10:45
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Pretty dreadful disease though. Quite put me off my cornflakes..
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>> Pretty dreadful disease though. Quite put me off my cornflakes..
Good job it wasn't prunes.
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>> Anyway, just lately I've seen signs in bars and other places around here, banning the
>> use of e-cigarettes. And I read somewhere the other day that the French government, which
>> of course has the monopoly on tobacco supply but now also sells e-cigarettes in its
>> 'tabacs', is considering banning 'vaping' in all public places.
>>
The Welsh Assembly are also making noises about it, and Wetherspoons do not allow vaping in their pubs either; nowadays when I visit a pub I usually ask at the bar when I order my beer, it goes without saying that those who are happy to allow me to enjoy my habit get much more of my custom than those who don't.
I've noticed a small growth industry though. There seem to be a growing number of coffee bars, for want of a better name, where beverage consumption is a sideline to social enjoyment of e-cigarettes and customers can try different flavours whilst enjoying a brew. This to me is a positive; it means I can relax in good company with like-minded people whilst avoiding the necessity of leaving the group when the desire to "smoke" takes me, and also avoid the over-emphasised coughings and harrumphings of the terminally miserable anti-smokers who, before the outright ban, used to persist in sitting on the edge of any smoking area in order achieve maximum offence. I fully expect ASH to attempt to ban it soon.
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As a non-smoker its always been
>> incomprehensible to me especially after watching a couple of relative die painful and nasty deaths
>> as a result of its consequences. It is curious to me how people can be
>> so careless of their health and I include over eating lack of exercise and drinking
>> excessively in that. Still, it's a matter of personal choice I guess.
>>
Indeed it is. One could also add drug abuse, which seems nowadays to be more common than cigarette smoking if one includes all the so-called "legal highs" which seem to multiply daily.
One could however counter that the excessively healthy bring their own problems with them. It's reasonable to assume that they will live considerably longer, and are therefore more likely to require more long-term geriatric care especially where dementia cases are concerned. Add to that the cost of replacement joints as these are worn out by jogging, cycling etc over and beyond what the body was designed to do and all of a sudden they don't come across as quite so virtuous as some are wont to portray themselves, especially as they'll be drawing a state pension for far longer than those of us who've indulged in less healthy pastimes when they've only paid the same amount in as those of us who will not benefit for so long from it.
Last edited by: Harleyman on Fri 3 Oct 14 at 12:54
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'I've often said to meself, I've said,
Cheer up Cully, you'll soon be dead:
It's a short life and a gay one!'
Never mind 'legal highs'. Proper drugs are far better, believe me. Not that they're necessarily good for you of course.
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You'r only here a short while.)
Hit me yesterday, I like to go once in a while to a small boat marina in a town about twenty miles from me.Got talking to a chap painting a narrow boat.We got on about age me thinking he was in his seventies.Couple months younger than me.I feel tired today do good and bad days.
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>>Cheer up Cully, you'll soon be dead<<
Sometimes, if I'm very bored or the weather is very bad, I turn on the TV and find France 3 (the local station) is running 'Inspecteur Barnaby' - Midsomer Murders to you.
As well as worrying that the French will believe that England is really like that, I can never understand why his daughter is called Cully.
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Fri 3 Oct 14 at 14:09
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>> Googled gangrene
Why does that remind me of a traditional Boy Scout song? Answers on a postcard please. First correct answer will earn its author jeers from all sides.
:o}
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My network of snouts tell me that Cully was called Cully 'cos she was conceived in Cully....a small village half way twixt Caen and Bayeux.
I knew we should have called our eldest daughter ' TentinEdale ' !
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Toffee-nosed again - John Boy
