Five Years Ago

I was still smoking cigs but had about 80 pipes that saw a fair amount of action. I only smoked Vanilla Cavendish from CVS or Walgreens although I had tried a few exotic blends.
When I got a bad case of pneumonia in 2004, I ditched the butts and went to a pipe only. That's my story.

Since I've been pipe-smoking since April 1966, most changes have been slowly coming, though fatefully toward narrowing choices and types of tobacco. Probably, I smoked more varied blends years ago. My legs were impaired by surgeries starting in late May 2003. Since my mobility was limited to a walker, I depended almost exclusively on e-tailers and my long time relationship w/ C&D to get me through the next 2 years. By 2003, I knew that I only enjoyed OTCs and burleys, and why fool myself that something else could work for me. Consolidate and simplify. It still works for me.

I was in the last year of my first phase in pipe smoking. Having smoked pipes for 3 years by then, I had a set of about 8 pipes, mostly cheapos (including 4 Stanwells, which you can thank or blame for me still smoking pipes) and was smoking Semois exclusively. It was also the time that I first started to think about perhaps trying something other than Semois, but it would still take until December before I made my first inquiry about that online.

4 years ago, pretty much to the day, I was planning my first pipe show.

Well, I've been at this for nearly 11 years now. As best as I can remember 5 years ago I was in my Samuel Gawith stage. Oh man, for months I smoked tons and tons of Full VA Flake and Best Brown Flake. Probably much more BBF at that time. I also had just stumbled upon MacBaren Navy Flake which was love at first puff.

Zowie ... I haven't enjoyed a bowl of BBF in a long time. Hmmm. Maybe it is time I popped a tin huh?

Freshly divorced at the age of 30 and a hardcore cigar smoker. I had a ton of sticks on hand at home (still have a huge inventory) and had a locker and was a regular at the local cigar bar in Wichita, KS. They even had a way of preparing the spicy Bloody Marys called "Sean hot." ("Would you like that Sean hot?" . . . I like things dangerously spicy.)

Funny thing is, before I got into cigars (or at least past the Dutch Masters stage of my smoking), I had a bent Kaywoodie that was passed down to me (i.e., stolen from my Dad's pipe rack) from my grandfather. I had no idea what I had at the time, but I do remember smoking cheap-ass aromatics out of a bent billiard with a stem that screwed in and had a drinkless attachment. The sad part is that one night I was at a party and after a smoke, stuck the pipe in my breast pocket. The next thing I knew there was a huge fight. This was not unusual for me and the crowd that I hung out with, but that is beside the point. At the end of the evening, I was bleeding profusely from a cut above the eye, filling out police reports, and missing one bent Kaywoodie. I never got back into pipe smoking until just recently.

I was just re-starting to smoke a pipe after a 5 year hiatus. I bought a little cheapie on a whim, and realized what I had been missing all that time. Seems like yesterday.

Five years ago I was merely playing with the thought of smoking the pipe. It would be another year plus some months before I finally got around to buying a pipe and all the necessary accessories.

At the time I was smoking the hookah on a regular basis while spending a lot of time in community sites. The hookah is a fine smoking vessel, but it's a bit too much work for me, so after having smoked the hookah for a year or so, I simply abandoned it.