*Never really considered myself to be a smoker until always making sure l had some on me (otherwise end up tapping).
There are many things that make me want to stop - morning 'dog-breath' (nothing beats it more than another fag), being out of breath on the football pitch if l've overdone it too recently, the cost in my impoverished state (extradoubly guilty when monies are owed) but the kickback came when signing on at my new doctors' surgery.
Amongst other questions were - how many cigarettes do you smoke?
At a guess 50-100 a week, but l don't really count.
This was viewed with some alarm by the practice nurse who went on to inform me that l would be a burden, particularly as l got older.
I was mildly apoplectic with this. Considering my own injuries (l'll spare you a full blokeish account) then they are all through work, sport and misadventure but likely par for the course and significantly less than what older generations put up with. For instance, there are very few people walking around with couldn't-stop-a- pig-in-a-ginnel legs or bent double retired binmen of yore. Ergo despite all the gripe we are doing quite well.
ln our productive lives and fag taxes we contribute plenty and on the whole don't mind doing so.
Further - l actually enjoy a fag. Not always, but then do we always enjoy football, sex, food, work or the company of our friends or family?
Fags are a small but significant part of my life - night out, breaktime, when writing this stuff and as offering to the god of late buses. They are an icebreaker in social situations; in fact, the most sociable people l know tend to be smokers - in the smoking carriage on trains there was a genuine easy-going camaraderie; almost a bond. This particularly now as we stand (huddled outside stations, etc) enjoying a defiant puff or two with anyone from scabby youth to old ladies, and my favourites - healthworkers, catering staff and, actually, business types. All of 'em really, and now semi-united in tacit recognition that we may be a dying breed. FKoff!
Band of smokers.
Smoking performs a variety of small tasks, often it seems to do with connectivity -
a last request and penultimate act of humanity at the firing squad,
troops in squalor making tabs out of teabags,
a peace offering after a petty squabble or run-in with a perp,
a sole light for an ex-inmate from a long term institution.
The fagtapper, friend-in-need-pain-in-the-arse or easy going bonhomie, sharing yours with those who are closest to society's arse-end, merely asking someone for a light - 'you hev fire?' of the immigrant worker, 'thanks, love' from the doll uptown, the please and thankyou, cheers and ta of it all - Smoking! the musical, perhaps.
Other people aren't all that bothered either by the scourge of the smoker. Sure, some have taken on their privilege to play oneupmanship, others recognise its use as a disciplining tool and many go along with the prevailing climate and succumb but people on the ground and in many pubs and clubs aren't all that bothered about the smokers evil habit.
Actually, when asked, as is the polite thing to do these days, people are quite civil (maybe always are but never really noticed - could be a sign of the times) and don't mind. Especially, for instance, when bus stops are cold, cramped and uncomfortable. One lady told me that she has never smoked but likes the smell which brought some ironic cheer.
l'd be happier if we smokers didn't leave our detritus everywhere but in amongst the rest of the trash, poor facilities, boarded up and degenerated social fabric then it's nuisance and odd charm is lazy rebellion.
What is perhaps more annoying is the continual barrage of public service broadcasts - truly antisocial and a pet hate. Uncomfortable stations with piss-poor toilets (alright when new but inadequately ventilated and disgusting in summer and aged. See Dewsbury bus station for details of the 'old' and Wakefield ought take note for the coming years).
What about accepting that people who occasionally smoke are actually civilised and provide ventilated areas? And proper ashtrays.
Some of the hardest working, get-on-with-it type people l know are or have been smokers - no big deal.
Of course not all the best people are smokers and smokers themselves do other things - there is no community of smokers, it's just that smoking is the easy target in the ongoing health war.
Smoking is stupid, irresponsible, a waste.
Smoking leads to the big C . .
. . smokers are cunts.
You can't say that.
It wouldn't surprise me if some environmentalist fag-hag or govt thinktank linked cigarette smoke with climate change. Factor in all the industry involved, alleged co2 emissions from growing plants and transport, etc. then it's enough to create an industry around or at least commission an audit.
l'd wager though that could be more than offset by the cumulative effect of various health and safety concerns output - itself a runaway monster of self-fulfilling function, a gold mine for the legal and advisory professions and a brake on forward motion in the wrong hands.
l've said previouly that we generally don't go about life or work attempting to injure ourselves and in our normal activies encounter what could, if broken down, become a health and safety nightmare of Matrix proportions . Ooh, all those hazards!
Butt stupid as we are we to tend to make our way through them, indeed, oblivious to the harm, potential trauma and terror around us, absorbed in our selfish, consumerist fug.
See -
Hmm . . .
Smoked
The smoking ban is shit
Pfff . . .
* Don't think so - some of the smokingest people come across are shag merchants. Though by no means all.
Pfff!
Smoking makes little sense when analysed objectively. Obviously physically unhealthy and not pleasant for the non-smoker in a smokey environment - tears used to stream from my eyes on the odd occasion visiting my Dad's Navy social club, ameliorated only by the then rare treat of ice cold lemonade and crisps. My first ever puff on a cigarette, from an uncle at Christmas time, left me puking up and brought forth howls of laughter from assembled relatives - 'that'll learn 'im!'.
And so it did. Like olives, sprouts, sex, alcohol and many others the youthful mind meets many a stepping stone in progression to adulthood. Once you get to find out that your bits are for more than pissing out of and a source of crude humour then all manner of things fall by the wayside. Alcohol, no longer the liquid sustenance of necessity, became a socialising brew of choice. Initially distasteful but perhaps a preparation for all the other rites of passage to maturity and things that are alien to the youthful mind.
There are of course modern fixes to smokey or other 'poor air' environments -
www.purennatural.com
www.truveo.com
www.tornex.com
www.sharp.ca/products/ion/video.html
www.smokefreesystems.com
www.guardiantechnologies.com
Info provided by Bill Gibson of freedom2Choose
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