Cigarettes, Whiskey and Wild, Wild Wo/men

Cigarettes, Whiskey and Wild, Wild Wo/men
by
Robin Hall

Let me digress first. Its easier to follow if you don't digress later.

There is nothing about whiskey OR Wild, Wild Wo/men here. I just like the title. However, I will ponder whiskey and Wild, Wild Wo/men later. Today's piece is about cigarettes more or less.

I am happily reminded of an extrodinary stand-up routine by Bob Newhart about Sir Walter Raleigh.

I wonder who was the very first person to smoke a cigarette? What was s/he thinking about? Were there folks who were paid by a huge conglomerate of the era to do this experimenting? Did some of these subjects die from smoking the wrong plant like poison oak or ivy? Who picked the plants to experiment on to begin with?

One question at a time. Let's just use our imagination for a while. Get comfortable, close your eyes, relax. Imagine...

You are walking down a beautiful forest path and spy a plant off to the side. Thinking quickly, you run over to the plant, whip out the day's newspaper, tear off a 3" strip, roll up the plant leaves, light it and inhale. COUGH.

Maybe that is not the scene. Instead, you are in some den of iniquity smoking a pipe of opium. Some other fools have already determined that tobacco is a better choice than say, dandelion leaves, as a follow up to opium, so you are offered a pipe of tobacco and you think, "Man, I sure wish I could smoke without all this pipe business what with the tamping, cleaning and all. And I really don't like these dens of iniquity either. The opium is good however." Maybe I will ponder this another time. Its tobacco now.

So, being the bright person you are, your mind floats through the ether pondering what to do. "Aha !! I will put the tobacco in some paper. That way I can walk around easier, get out of these dens of iniquity and into the sunshine. It will be more portable and maybe I can sell them to other hip folks."

So you start rolling your own in different kinds of paper. Newspaper is around but burns too hot and fast plus the newsprint tastes nasty. There is toilet paper but it really won't hold up in the rain. So you go to the paper makers, explain your problem, they develop cigarette paper and you are off to fame and fortune, Mr. Reynolds.

Well, let's return to reality for a moment here. Just breathe deeply if you can, slowly open your eyes and think, "WHY WOULD ANYONE SMOKE? Its simply stupid."

So forget about it, go outside for a walk instead and have some fun. We will discuss whiskey and Wild, Wild Wo/men soon. Uh, where's my lighter?