December 04, 2003

Female Celebrity Smoking List Possibly the most intense and creepily detailed website that I have ever seen.
  • That is an odd page. You can find out more about its author if you try, but I don't get the impression that he wants his professional career to interface much with his private predilections. Neither this nor his personal page answered the only question I had though, which was "Why care?" Any Smoking fetishists here want to speculate?
  • I think you'd have to ask him why he's so interested. And, why brands are important.
  • Who wants to email the guy? I was surprised to see how many pro-smoking sites there are out there. After being bombarded with anti-smoking propaganda for years, it's sort of nice to know there's another side to the whole argument. (And I'm a non-smoker.)
  • Sorry, there is no other side to the argument. Smoking causes cancers, emphysema, and heart disease. If you smoke, the best possible thing you can do for yourself is to cut it out. A little short-term irritation will yield huge long-term results. And you can also stop wondering about what your real motivations for shovelling thirty death sticks a day into yourself while you say you want to be healthy and live for a long time are.
  • As a smoker, I can tell you why brands are important. Different brands taste different. Worst cigarettes in the western world, for example are 'Boots' which taste much as they sound. Made in Texas, sold in Mexico (elsewhere I assume, but I can only report on experience). They are nasty pronounced with a long 's' and longer 'taaay'. Beyond taste, the brand preference goes deep into smoking culture. My favorite anecdote is about Marlboro Reds which started the 20th century as a luxury brand for women. By the 1950s they had fallen out of fashion among the ladies so Philip Morris remarketed them with the manly man (first a 'average joe' tough guy, then the cowboy) and revitalized the brand. The landscape is pretty well established at this point: (All this is based upon a combination of anecdotal evidence and perception, please don't take very seriously. also don't get offended if you smoke one of the below brands and aren't fairly described by my broad sweeping categorization) Marlboro Red: New smokers who don't know what else to get and 'Manly' smokers who think everything else is for wimps. Camels: Smokers who might feel self-conscious about smoking "their fathers cigarette" (see above). Marlboro Lights: Safe for women who don't want to be percieved as 'heavy smokers' and quite popular among gay smokers. Parliments: (see above) Anything Menthol: Ghetto smokes Chesterfields, et al: Hipsters Unfiltered Pall Malls: The truly hardcore, Kurt Vonnegut. (On preview, everything Wolof says is true. Don't be like me.)
  • Temple Bar: Egyptian carpet salesman.
  • I do not understand what that means.
  • Gudang Garam: hippy or Indonesian (usually easy to tell apart). Peony: orientalist.
  • I do understand that different brands taste diffent (I am a smoker), but I don't understand why they're important to the guy who has the site.
  • I think Shotsy hit the nail on the head with the word "fetish".
  • I realise smoking is a pretty silly thing to do for all the well-known reasons. I like hearing other sides of arguments as much for entertainment's sake as for educational purposes. This is why I constantly find myself reading and rereading pro- and anti-gun ownership debates. That and the petty namecalling they always devolve into.
  • sorry path, didn't quite read you right. i certainly have no idea what this dude's deal is.
  • Shotsy - not a problem, just thought it might be an interesting point of discussion. On the other hand, since hardly anyone smokes anymore, how likely is that to happen?
  • Shermans: Birkenstock Lark: Studebaker Kent: State
  • ... since hardly anyone smokes anymore teehehhehhhe hahahahhbwahahahahah! Sorry. I'm being a snot. Living in LA makes me sometime think that hardly anyone smokes anymore, and then I go to other states and BAM! There it is. And then there's Europe and Asia.
  • Kimberly - I understand. When I've lived in another state, traveled in other states, and visited Europe in the last ten years, it's been in the company of Californians, so it was kinda like still being in CA. On the other hand, I felt like I was really getting away with something when I was on my own in a Spanish airport a few years ago and could smoke at will. Kinda like being a teen-ager again. I don't regret smoking, but am not entirely insensitive to those who don't smoke.
  • Okay, I'm taking a break now, honest.
  • HEY! GET BACK TO WORK!!! These tours don't run themselves, you know!