Why did you start smoking?

[drhowarddrfine]

Spinning off from the other thread.

I never smoked but was enticed in my younger years. Not any peer pressure but some other kids were pretend smoking, ie, not inhaling. I liked sucking on it and blowing the smoke. I wondered if I looked cool but never went beyond sucking in a mouthful of smoke and blowing it out.

I once found a cigar and gave that a few puffs. Made me sick.

When I was 19, I went out with some co-workers who all smoked. I told them how the smoke always made me cough. They said you had to start with small, short drags and breathe it in. I did so and my lungs felt so stuffed up I vowed never to do that again. And I haven't.

As a side note: I know 10 smokers I worked with who died from lung cancer or throat cancer.

 

[Holger]

I never smoked. But — amusingly — I can somehow precisely identify the moments I would smoke, if I did (for example at the bus station).

This shows me that I am highly susceptible to smoking, although I don't do it (luckily).

 

[PMc]

Don't really remember, probably some in-group thing. But what I do remember is an important lesson: when I was doing military service - that was basically spending nights just waiting - waiting for the cruise missile dispatch order, to finally kill the Russians - but it never came. It was very boring, obviousely, and having nothing else to do, I finally figured that one could not only smoke, but actually inhale the smoke!

That was a very important lesson, because now I could also smoke ganja and have an effect.
And that was again very important, because that habit then brought me into contact with people who would tell me about the really interesting drugs - those which alter reality, and give us a clue about a lot of things being wrong with what we think is supposed to be reality...
And only then I started to get some idea, about mysticism, the allegory of the cave, relativity, religions (all of them) or quantum physics.

Nicotine addiction is probably a side effect of such endeavour, just like damaged eyesight is a side effect of understanding computers. These are trade-offs, caused by the fact that our temporary mortal incarnation in space-time is basically a throw-away unit.

Question then is, do you want to actually understand something about why we're here, and pay the price accordingly, or do you prefer to just strive for the contemporary ideal of clean sterility of the obedient consumer NPC?

 

[astyle]

Never smoked myself, but I did discover that sometimes people smoke to cover the stench of something else - like poorly ventilated bathrooms or formaldehyde in biology labs - or even both offensive BO plus formaldehyde (plus a few other chemicals) in a clinical setting... And I have to admit, I sometimes found smell of secondhand smoke preferable to offensive BO or formaldehyde.

Sometimes a fresh coat of paint would smell so strongly that a bit of cigarette smoke brought a bit of a relief...

My personal experience was opposite of drhowarddrfine : I once tried a cigarette, tried to puff it, but my lungs could not take it, I started coughing, and I realized that it's something I just can't get used to... But then I tried a cigar my freshman year in college (fall of 2000), and was surprised that it was not bad. That experience ended up being a one-off thing, it did NOT motivate me to try more, though - I was discovering a bewildering variety of beer and other booze at the time. And booze smells better without presence of secondhand smoke...

 

[LkderS4KGc2bFd63rM]

Because it helps with malaria?

 

[astyle]

Because it helps with malaria?

That's what smoky campfires are for... people researched burning stuff like wet/young wood, different species of trees (like cedar vs. pine) or something else that humans can tolerate but mosquitoes hate... these days, you can buy special candles for camping to help with mosquitoes... And maybe live somewhere drier...

 

[LkderS4KGc2bFd63rM]

Like Mars.

 

[nxjoseph]

I was tried smoking when i was a kid because of my circle of friends but thought inhaling it is bad and never attempt smoking after.

 

[kent_dorfman766]

I found that a nice la-flora-dominicana ligera goes well with a couple fingers of neat 1792 small batch bourbon. then I noticed how much I was spending on cigars and bourbon but still occasionally want/need the nicotine so I keep a pack of marlboro menthols around to puff on when the mood strikes me.

The cigar and bouron are much less frequent than they were during the COVID lockdown. There was also some anecdotal evidence from europe that tobacco smoke use lessened the likelihood of becoming infected with COVID, but no need to go down that rabbit hole in this discussion.

 

[hitest]

I was a light to moderate smoker in my late teen years up until I was 25 years old. I'm glad I quit that habit(40+ years ago). I quit drinking May 23, 2015. I do eat too much though. Heh. You can get addicted to anything.