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| The Meaning of Leaf |
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| Oct 11, 2006 at 08:59 AM | |
 From the journals of Lucille Satan Elizabeth Samuel Part Two in a semiongoing sortofseries In which your (hopefully) favorite forum vagrant explores the intellectual,pseudointellectual, and simply psuedo geeks of the world, in particular those who ingest into themselves the smoke of a lush leafy plant from the south of the americas; properly and excessively prostletizing his point. ----- Foward: In the effort and support of the revolutionary idea of [i]media synergy[/i], Luci recommends that you procure and listen to the following songs while reading and pondering this article:
Dean Martin - Come Back to Sorrento
In further [i]tactile[/i] synergy interests, Luci reccommends that you
smoke any cigar you might have at hand. Indeed, he recommends you eat a
nice steak with a side ceaser salad, pour a glass of chianti, and find
a CAO Italia "Fato" for this occaision. This of course is optional.
Veal will work in place of steak.Dean Martin - Memories are Made of This Dean Martin - I Love Paris Dean Martin - Come Back to Sorrento (reprised!) Dean Martin - Blue Moon Dean Martin - That's Amore Dean Martin - Arriverderci Roma Bobby Vinton - Blue Velvet Frank Sinatra - Witchcraft Frank Sinatra - The Best is Yet to Come Frank Sinatra - Young at Heart Charmillionaire - Riding Dirty (seriously.) John Coltrane - Lush Life (To purify you from last track) Musings - Part Two of Whoknowshowmany: In our last segment, I conducted a stream of conciousness attempt to decode the psyche of the tobacco professional, aruguably the most geeky of tobacco geeks. Needless to say, it failed in a miserable fashion, and I couldn't help but think I understood them *less* with my further followup digging. As such, undeterred by defeat, I decided to join forces with this dark alliance - I have since forayed into their very realm by becoming such a monster, in a minor way. I will, in this article, explore this avenue breifly, and then proceed to examine traditional computer geeks who enjoy smoking - a group that esteemed disappearing artist Ivan Davidoff terms the "Man of Letters geeks". In late february of this year, I entered into a shady business pact with another tobacconist and friend in the general west coast area. His tobacco shop has a rather large upper area that he really had no use for beyond his store security camera stuff and some office supplies, and so he and I put our senior citizen cahoots together and started, shall we say, an extensive remodel. By march, we had our own speakeasy, if you will. I had tired of not being able to smoke in most of the area coffeeshops, and wanted a place that he, I, and a few choice friends could sit back and have espresso, beer, wine, scotch, light foods, and smoke to our hearts content, maybe play a bit of poker Free of tax. So, we made our dream a reality and I leaped in to the small business arena with vigor: a full bar, about 48 regular customers, a full kitchen with panini press (vital), all manner of coffees and teas, and a modest counter of cigars that may or may not make the excise man shake a finger. After I had figured out the whole wireless thing, and figured out how to work a cash register, I was set! There were of course the normal business foibles - keeping everything in the black, maintaining customer service, assuring protection for my little racket, etc. The procurment, needless to say, was one of the more enjoyable points. I started out with about 20 guys who I wanted as regulars, and polled them all on their favorite cigars, pipe tobaccos, and fine cigarettes. I assembled a list of domestic cigars: CAOs, Padrons, punch, H Upmanns, Cuestra Rays... all the finer things. A resounding choice in the cigarette field was Nat Sherman Naturals, Camel Wides, and Djarum Super and Black clove cigarettes. Popular selections from the Island South of Miami included the ever enduring Cohiba, Bolivar, Partagas, Diplomaticos, and Juan Lopes. The pipe tobaccos were many and varied, and more often than not I had to hunt for flavors or blend my own to get their satisfaction the perfection. In the end, I decided to keep in stock 3 boxes (20-25 per is the box average) of about 130 different cigars, 40 pounds of pipe tobaccos, and 5 different cigarette brands (Camel Wides, Lucky Strike Unfiltered, Nat Sherman Touch of Cloves, Havana Ovals, New York Cuts, and Classics, Djarum Supers {blacks were just *too* youthful for me to tolerate. Damned kids and their black cigarettes. Looking all young...}, and the Dunhill line). I try to throw in a good broad selection of sample packs of cigars, and cigarello boxes as well. I've had a great time of it, 4 days a week when I'm in the area I get to play shopkeep, bartender, and dirty old man all rolled into one. As such, it didn't take long to figure out the mystery behind the tobacco geek - it's about socializing. Sure, tobacco is a drug. It's addictive! But, there is something more addictive about the whole experience: sitting down, takin life a little slower than what we're accustomed to in this day and age, and chatting it up while enjoying a simple and for all the bloviated health warnings, relatively harmless pleasure. For one thing, you can't complain about second hand smoke when literally *everyone* is lit up! In the context of such blatent laziness, you can't help but conjecture that surely there exist particular tech geeks who also inhabit the realm of the tobacco geek. These are the geeks who don't simply sit in a dark room or brightly lit cubicle typing away while sipping coffee and redbull, simultaneously (though they may do that as well). No, these are those rare and treasured men and women who sit back in their decidedly comfortable chairs, if they have any say in the matter, think in a slow and concise manner, perhaps have some Thelonious Monk playing behind them, and can somehow smoke a pipe without even having touched such a thing all their lives. They carry this relaxed aura with them in all their patient, collected actions. If they are at home, they may indeed light up a pipefull of tobacco and slowly work away at their specialty; at work, they may count the hours until they can take a slow puff of a favored cigar. The man of letters geek, that sort of fellow who may be found humming "If I Were a Carpenter" instead of the latest techno beat, can be found even among us here at the Geekery. Noted scholar and man of dubious gentleness Ivan Davidoff had more than a few enlightnening things to say on the issue, and among other interviews and insights, these await us in the next segment of these musings. For now, I bid you adieu. Eternally not yours, but rather my own thank you very much - LS             |
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