Stop Smoking NOW

[AlanHo]

This is a slightly edited version of Giles Coren's column in todays Daily Mirror newspaper. I suspect he is trying to encourage you to give up smoking.

Dear Giles,

Did you see the state of poor old Alex Higgins before he died? I'm 35 and smoke two packs a day and I don't want to end up like that. But I've tried everything and can't seem to kick the habit. What should I do?

Jay, Leeds

Dear Jay,

To be honest, I think you should ignore all advice to the contrary and just carry on smoking and die a truly horrible and painful death, well before your time.

It was good enough for Hurricane Higgins, Humphrey Bogart and my father, so what makes you so special? It's only death. You cough a bit, they pump you full of morphine, the lights go out, and they then cart you off in a box.

We are now probably not far off from a time when nobody will smoke at all. The balance has been tipped, that war has been won. So nobody gives a damn what self-pitying thickoes like you do any more - you don't affect us. You're just a sad statistic from another age, like Neanderthal man and victims of the Black Death. You've disappeared up an evolutionary blind alley and we will manage very well without you.

If you want to drag out your habit against the trend until your lungs shrivel up and go black, your tongue falls out and you cough up lumps of rotting flesh - then that's fine with me. It's a free country, people are allowed to kill themselves any way they like. Suicide has been legal in Britain since 1961.

But don't give me "I've tried every¬thing to stop smoking", because you haven't.

"Addiction" is an illusion, a crutch for the vain, weak and stupid. You smoke because you like it.

Me – I stopped 10 years ago. The trick is to not put any more fags in your mouth – it’s hardly rocket science.

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

Who is Alex Higgins? (Or 'was' probably?)

Anyway, I like to smoke - the "trend" hasn't changed yet here in Japan! (Visiting friends from foreign countries are always surprised when I light up as soon as we are seated in a restaurant. What a nice thing to have a cigarette with your apéritif!) (Or with the coffee, for the matter.)

P.S. Sorry, I am not trying to start a heated discussion here...

[bludgard]

Price is $5 a pack where I'm at.

$10 a day for me and Nid,My wife.

What is that,$300 dollars a month?

It's an exspensive vice,yet it could be worse.

Sounds like a horrible demise.

What to do?

[bludgard]

Ohhhh....I think I get it now;

"The trick is to not put any more fags in your mouth." :0 ...

[-pops-]

Be aware that in the USA, "fag" has a different meaning to that in the UK.

[bludgard]

I didn't know whether to take this as a double entendre or not.

I oppologize if I have offended anyone by my post above.Nothing malicious was intended.

By the way,was the original post supposed to be a joke?

I am sincerely unsure.

EDIT:Nevermind.I just reread AlanHo's thread.

Again my appologies.

[AlanHo]

Who is Alex Higgins? (Or 'was' probably?)

In his day, he was a brilliant and entertaining snooker player. Recent photos of him published in the newspapers shocked people - due to throat cancer he was a walking skeleton.

Wiki Details here

[bludgard]

Who is Alex Higgins? (Or 'was' probably?)

In his day, he was a brilliant and entertaining snooker player. Recent photos of him published in the newspapers shocked people - due to throat cancer he was a walking skeleton.

Wiki Details here

Seems like a fellow I could relate to.

[AlanHo]

I didn't know whether to take this as a double entendre or not.

I oppologize if I have offended anyone by my post above.Nothing malicious was intended.

By the way,was the original post supposed to be a joke?

I am sincerely unsure.

I started the thread because the newspaper columnist used satire to make a point. Smoking kills and you are a mug if you think otherwise.

It is no joke - but in my opinion an effective message to encourage you to stop smoking.

It is a subject near and dear - I lost my late wife to lung cancer 6 years ago that was almost certainly caused by smoking. I was a professional smoker for many years - eventually peaking at 4 packs a day. I smoked in bed, at the breakfast table, all day at the office, in the car and all evening at home. My late wife smoked too - but not nearly as many. We both gave up overnight 28 years ago - but by then the damage had been done.

The following text is jocular.......

THE PERILS OF NON SMOKING

About 20 years ago I gave up smoking, having smoked 40 per day for many years. Since then I have been a compulsive and campaigning non-smoker which I am currently trying to give up for health reasons.

Starting smoking is not as easy as people might think – the high cost of cigarettes is a deterrent and society at large subjects you to all sorts of social pressures because smokers are now seen as an undesirable minority. Being a realist I realised from a reality check that I could possibly not get back to my old habit overnight and that I should first reduce the number of cigarettes I didn’t smoke each day by a gradually increasing amount I didn’t smoke until I was able to get back to not non smoking 40 a day.

Despite this realisation - I initially tried to stop suddenly by cutting out not smoking completely – but my addiction to not smoking was too strong and it gave me major ‘drawal symptoms. I therefore resorted to the original plan and tried to reduce the number of cigarettes I didn’t smoke gradually, by cutting up a few each day. This worked for a while and I managed to reduce the number of cigarettes I didn’t smoke to approximately 10 per day. One unfortunate side effect was that I lost weight and felt much more energetic due to reduced appetite – which my doctor and the combined resources of the NHS was not able to resolve. On the positive side, my cough returned and I again smelled like a user of ‘Au De Bonfire’ aftershave.

However, social pressures took their toll and I found myself slipping back into my former bad habits by not smoking at least 40 per day again which caused me to get back to my former plump and unfit state. This pleased my doctor because he has lots of pills and potions he can prescribe for such conditions. Legislation today prohibits you from smoking in a public building and the better pubs provide an outside smoking area suitably deep pile carpeted with squashed nub ends giving off that healthy and indulgent aroma to help you not non-smoke. As an habitual non smoker, it really is embarrassing to stand furtively in a smoking section in the pouring rain outside a restaurant and have complaints from smoking addicts alongside you about your non smoking. Not only that, I really miss not being able to not non smoke after a nice meal with my coffee and brandy. My breath and clothes have developed a strong lack of odour and the absence of nicotine stains on my fingers has definitely got worse.

I have tried hypnosis and acupuncture to reduce my non smoking without much success. I have also tried not wearing a nicotine patch, not chewing nicotine gum and not sucking on a nicotine impregnated false plastic cigarette, which have proved to be equally ineffective. I am currently avoiding not smoking the occasional cigar and pipe to see whether this will help.

Hence my advice to all smokers is not to give it up in the first place – if you do - you could have serious difficulties in starting again.

[bludgard]

On a side note:I have reread the Lounge Rules.

[andsome]

Packed it up in my mid fifties.:)

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

In his day, he was a brilliant and entertaining snooker player.

Thank you for enlightening me - now what the hell is "snooker"...? (Sounds like something slightly frivolous to me...)

[CurlyWhirly]

In his day, he was a brilliant and entertaining snooker player.

Thank you for enlightening me - now what the hell is "snooker"...? (Sounds like something slightly frivolous to me...)

/>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snooker

[AlanHo]

In his day, he was a brilliant and entertaining snooker player.

Thank you for enlightening me - now what the hell is "snooker"...? (Sounds like something slightly frivolous to me...)

I reckon you are having a laugh. Snooker is a game played on a large felt covered table with holes (pockets) at each corner and mid way down each side. Coloured balls are placed on the table and two players take it in turn to hit a white ball with a stick such that it bashes into one of the coloured balls and knocks it down a hole. At professional level the players wear waistcoats with a pocket for a cube of chalk which they rub onto the end of their sticks before hitting the balls. There is a referee who wears an evening suit and white cotton gloves whose job is to call out the score and rescue the coloured balls from the holes so they can be bashed yet again. At amateur level - it helps to smoke and drink lots of beer whilst you are playing.

The Americans adopted the game years ago but they were never any good at it so they polluted the game with garish multi coloured balls, made the table smaller and the holes bigger to make it easier for them. They renamed it Pool.

[bludgard]

The Americans adopted the game years ago but they were never any good at it so they polluted the game with garish multi coloured balls, made the table smaller and the holes bigger to make it easier for them. They renamed it Pool.

True that.We bastardize everything.

[andsome]

Here

[AlanHo]

Here you are Pat to further your education

Japanese Snooker Championship

[andsome]

The Hurricane

And more

[-pops-]

Higgins used to live near here - a house called the Blue Dolphin and go to the local pub, The Mill Tavern, Shottermill. He would sit alone in a corner smoking himself silly, lighting one fag with the nub end of the previous one.

James Stewart, film star lived in the same house but not at the same time.

[AlanHo]

Higgins used to live near here - a house called the Blue Dolphin and go to the local pub, The Mill Tavern, Shottermill. He would sit alone in a corner smoking himself silly, lighting one fag with the nub end of the previous one.

James Stewart, film star lived in the same house but not at the same time.

Be aware that in the USA, "fag" has a different meaning to that in the UK........... :lol: Gocha................

[Gandalph]

Just off topic for a moment.

Alan, could you kindly remove your Avatar and replace it with your old one. You are making andsome and I look ugly.

[AlanHo]

Alan, could you kindly remove your Avatar and replace it with your old one. You are making andsome and I look ugly.

Sorry if I am upsetting the apple cart - but it is a bit unfair of you to accuse me of making you and andsome look ugly. Why not take the credit yourselves...?........ :lol:

[andsome]

Just off topic for a moment.

Alan, could you kindly remove your Avatar and replace it with your old one. You are making andsome and I look ugly.

How dare you?? I am gorgeous.

[Gandalph]

Just off topic for a moment.

Alan, could you kindly remove your Avatar and replace it with your old one. You are making andsome and I look ugly.

How dare you?? I am gorgeous.

Because I live miles away and you don't know my address. :lol: :lol:

[andsome]

Just off topic for a moment.

Alan, could you kindly remove your Avatar and replace it with your old one. You are making andsome and I look ugly.

How dare you?? I am gorgeous.

Because I live miles away and you don't know my address. :lol: :lol:

If I find it it would be worth a ride up there to break your windows.:lol: