Re: Hot, steamy...smoke
- From: "rkzenrage" <rkzenrage@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: 20 Mar 2006 09:14:59 -0800
G. L. Pease wrote:
Okay. I've read numerous reviews referring to some tobacco or other asI have gotten that a few times and have smoked the same blend in the
"gassy," a term that, apparently, indicates a hot, relatively tasteless
smoking experience, devoid of much that is pleasurable. We've all had
those. It's been a while for me, but, it has happened in the past, and
it's happened again just this afternoon. Today, I got gassed.
It's not the tobacco. I've smoked this stuff on and off for years, and
this tin, recently opened, has provided several wonderful bowls, even
though it's a tiny bit too moist as packaged. It's not the pipe. It, too,
has been a consistent performer, even with this tobacco. No, it's not the
obvious things.
There are a few possibilities that come to mind. Most likely, I packed
the pipe poorly. That's not too surprising, considering the general lack
of attention I generally apply to this important phase of the experience.
Usually, it works out, perhaps, today, it didn't.
It could be that I've smoked the pipe too often in the past couple days,
and it's a little wet. This is entirely possible, but not really likely,
at least not as the single cause. While I do find that successive bowls
in a pipe without some opportunity for a little rest will usually not be
as good as those that come before, the result isn't the same as this
gassiness.
It could be the weather. It was warm today, almost hot in comparison to
the past few days, and perhaps the environment was not conducive to the
optimal smoking of THIS tobacco in THIS pipe.
Perhaps it was what I'd eaten for lunch. Food certainly has some
influence over our sense of taste and smell.
Most likely, it's some combination of all these things, plus cosmic rays,
sunspots, a butterfly flapping its wings in Asia, and any number of other
possible and impossible factors.
There's no real point to this, apart from the following:
If this was my ONLY experience with London Mixture in a Castello, I might
conclude either that the pipe was not good or that the tobacco was no
good, both of which would be incorrect. Even something as simple as
smoking a pipe is more complex than it seems. Early on, I was taught that
it's folly to attempt to really understand a tobacco until several bowls
have been smoked. Today, this was once again proven to me.
There are certainly tobaccos that I don't like almost instantly, and
getting to know these any more intimately would be a waste of time and
effort. But, for all the blends that I've taken the time to understand,
there are rewards aplenty. In other cases, a blend that I thought pretty
spiffy based on an early experience has failed to hold my interest for
any length of time.
Tonight, as I type this, I'm smoking a bowl of that very same London
Mixture in a different Castello, packed carefully, and the smoking
enjoyment I'm getting from this bowl is immense. Carl Ehwa said that it
takes a tin of any blend before one should judge it. I think he was
right.
One final thought, of a somewhat political nature: If something as
seemingly simple as smoking a pipe can be riddled with variables, and
difficult to comprehend fully, how the hell do the antis think that a few
flawed "studies" of a FAR more complex system, with no reasonably
demonstrated causality - hell, I'm being generous there; there aren't
even any reasonably demonstrated correlations - are sufficient to
conclude that a whiff of ETS will kill them on contact?
-glp
--
In Celebration of Briar - A Gallery of Pipe Photographs
http://www.glpease.com/Photos/PipeGallery
Updated 13 March, 2006
same pipe later with a different effect by taking more care not to get
any air pockets in the pack.
Namaste'
Robert
.
- References:
- Hot, steamy...smoke
- From: G . L . Pease
- Hot, steamy...smoke
- Prev by Date: Re: A Mouthful by Ian Rastall
- Next by Date: Re: pipe rack for large pipes
- Previous by thread: Re: Hot, steamy...smoke
- Next by thread: Re: Hot, steamy...smoke
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
