"It Just Keeps Getting Better"!

     What's up!  Well, quite a few folks have asked why did I stop the blog, and the answer is, well there is no answer, so I'm back at it.  As I pondered what to blog about, I looked at my vast collection of cigars, pipes and pipe tobacco and realized, "it just keeps getting better"!  Many years ago (35 plus now), when I started enjoying the wonderful world of cigars and pipes, the scene was quite different than what it is now.  What I mean is, yes, folks gathered at the local brick and mortar, purchased cigars and pipes and hung around, but the creativeness wasn't nowhere near what it is now in this game.  Cuban cigars were the thing everybody wanted, every other word was "have you tried this Cuban", or "hey I have box of Cubans coming in from this guy I know", or "man, I can't wait until the embargo ends so I can stock up on Cubans", etc.  But now, with places like Nicaragua, Honduras, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica and many others, Cuban are almost an afterthought.  A lot of the "old heads" in the cigar game figured it out and started blended tobaccos from different countries, TOGETHER!  Then, they called upon their children, to find out what the next generation was looking for, and how to get that product out to them, and even had the young guns take an active roll in running the family businesses. 

    We now have some cigars with as many as ten, count 'em, TEN different tobaccos in them, ie., the Alec Bradley Fine and Rare, for one.  Complex blends, and very creative names and ways to market them.  Facebook, Social Cigar, Cigar Dojo, the Montecristo Social Club and more.  Online stores are in abundance, and although there are few brick and mortars, those still around have added big name lounges, Diamond Crown, Burn by Rocky Patel, Club Montecristo etc.  There are Podcast, YouTube videos and countless magazines about the cigar and pipe lifestyles.  And, brick and mortars have change the way they do business by adding fun things like,  tastings, herfs, movie nights, one joint I used to frequent has "Man Cave Monday" where every Monday night its either movies, Monday Night Football, gamer tournaments and more.  Then liquor companies and beer companies realized they could contribute.  They started creating libations to enhance your smoking enjoyment, and they haven't stopped.

     Unfortunately, one thing remains constant, the "pleasure police".  Yeah, the folks who want to infringe on our enjoyment of 100% totally legal products.  "You can't smoke in here", "no smoking in the park", "stay 100 feet from entrance ways", yada yada!.  They try to tax the hell out of tobacco products in efforts to try to stop us, but we keep coming and growing by leaps and bounds, and "it keeps getting better"!. They keep using junk science about the perils of second hand smoke to try and stop us, they use kids in television adds and rhetoric to attempt to twist the public's views on smoking, and how bad it is. No one ever put a gun to my head and said "smoke or die", it was a choice I made when I was of legal age. In order to continue our passion we have herfs at each other's houses, our smoking dens at home are some of the most creative places I've ever seen, there are cigar RV's, cigar Safari's, cigar cruises and more. 

     With all of that being said, this hobby is still one of the most relaxing hobbies you'll ever find.  I'm not saying its for everyone, nor am I recruiting anyone to start smoking cigars and pipes, but if you indulge or think you want to (it's a free country after all), now is the best time to be in the game. There is also a lot of education garnered in the game, because many of you had NO idea, where most of these cigar producing countries were, but now we read and talk to people from those places, we not only learn about the tobacco from those places, but we learn about the people, their cultures, their economies and some of us have even visited many of those countries.  Much was learned from the "boom" of the nineties, many companies came and went, and others learned valuable lessons on how to make their products better (cigar leaf blended in pipe tobacco, say WHAT?).  Something for all, from the extremely mild tobaccos, to the knock you on your ass tobaccos, if you want it, it's available. 

     So with al of that being said, grab a magazine, a libation and your choice of smoke and have at it.  By the way, nothing against cigarette smokers, but when was the last time you were invited to a cigarette tasting at the 7-11?, I'm just saying.  Stay tuned, I'll try to do a better job of writing, although it get tough with a cigar or pipe in one hand and a shot of 20 year old scotch in the other. Just remember, "it just keeps getting better"!  Until next time, CLP (clip, light and puff).

Greg