1117 days ago
As Angela Rayner has discovered, being a smoker in 2021 marks you out as something of a pariah among the liberal elites. It is a sin. I write as a man who used to chuff my way through 20 a day so I am an ex sinner. But the facts are often forgotten as our betters try to stamp out this evil habit. There was, this week, a suggestion that Nanny state should charge wicked smokers a levy to deal with the inevitable healthcare issues that their habit will cause.
1127 days ago
When Angela Rayner termed the Tories “scum” she was attacked for her language and then the papers snapped her having a crafty cigarette outside the Labour party conference. That was the picture then used because, in 2021, all smokers are deemed stupid, ignorant and just rather dirty. Truly: smoking is the new evil.
2726 days ago
The snake patio is not to be confused with the snake veranda. The latter was the flat surface on the (illegally constructed) concrete roof above the rat room. It was surrounded by (illegally constructed) concrete blocks which have now gone. We did meet a snake there on our second visit to the hovel hence the name. It was where i killed an adder a few weeks ago.
3023 days ago
What made me give up smoking was playing soccer with my nephews and nieces on February 14 at a family get together. Within five minutes my lungs were burning as if I was suffering some sort of gas attack. I ended up playing largely in goal but even so at the end I felt miserable. I vowed to quit the next day and did just that. No patches, gum or e-fags just cold turkey.
Okay
3091 days ago
I've been nicotine clean now for three months and three weeks exactly and the urge to have "just one" cigarette is now really pretty rare. But I must admit to having such an urge just now.
3112 days ago
I know I have been banging on about this all week but today I wake up having not smoked for three months and I am fecking proud of myself. It did it via cold turkey so there is no legacy nicotine in my body from vaping, gum or patches.
It was playing soccer with a range of nephews and nieces aged 7 to 16 on St Valentine's Day that made me quit. My lungs were burning after just a few minutes. I wanted to run but could not. Being outpaced by a 7 year old is just not on. Enough was enough.
And so today
3200 days ago
As you might expect from a man on cold turkey in the nicotine department I am not in a good mood. Send me an ars-ish tweet and you are blocked, call me with a daft conspiracy theory (flip flop take note) and I curse you. I comment en passant on the Horse Hill ramping and it is ramping by David Lenigas and others. I comment on 88 Energy (88E) and on Tertiary Minerals (TYM), on Frontier Resources (FRI), Outsourcery (OUT), GTS Chemical (GTS) and Magnolia Petroleum (MAGP). And I discuss a prediction by a Nomad that 250 of the 1000 companies on AIM will disappear by Christmas so allowing me to retire which I shall do.
3421 days ago
I am in the open air on a roof terrace at the hotel Adonis here in Athens. I always choose to stay here as the view of the Acropolis is spectacular and I can tap away at my PC and smoke at the same time. There is an ash tray on my table and I grab a fag getting ready to light up. At the next table a Frenchman says “do you mind not smoking”. I rely “yes I do" and light up defiantly. He says “but there are children here”. I counter
3609 days ago
The normal routine at the Greek Hovel this summer was that I would go for a short run first. Not being the fittest of fellows the run would indeed be short. At best I would make it to the bottom of snake hill, have a brief rest staring at the pond at the bottom of the valley and then walk back up snake hill – bitterly regretting having gone down the steep slope in the first place as I looked our carefully for wildlife diversity. I would then jog back along the olive groves and arrive back at the hovel a sweaty and topless wreck.
My guest would make no comment on the brevity of my run in distance terms. For I had been away a good while and so she naturally assumed that I had managed a reasonable distance. She would then trot off spending about the same time away but managing to make it to the village of Kambos and back. That means climbing two steep hills and covering twice the distance. By the time she returned I would have had time for a restorative cigarette or three and for a naked shower. I would then hide inside the hovel while she showered.
You will remember that my shower at the Greek Hovel is a hosepipe draped over the vine. The water has come up the hill in metal pipes and so is just the right temperature. It is the best shower in the world in summer. My guest said that the shower is “better than sex”. Well it is good but not that good. I suppose that it depends with whom you are having sex with.
But one day my guest went running first.
3769 days ago
Malcolm Stacey is a very good man. He is an ethical operator in every way. But when looking at the nest of snakes that is AIM that is not perhaps the greatest attribute an investor can have. The Vipers lure you with a line about ethical investing but 99% of the time it is just so much cock.
And so Malcolm today explains why he has invested in a cancer cure company – HERE. A commentator (Mr Wildes) says “quite right switch out of tobacco stocks into ethical stocks” I disagree.
The reality is that when you are buying or selling shares on the secondary market you are not providing fresh capital for a company so you are not funding the development of a cancer cure or of a new brand of cigarette. You are not assisting these projects in any way at all.
As such your only ethical duty as regards your investments is to make as much money as possible. If
4022 days ago
I arrived back in Bristol at 2 AM Saturday morning and very deliberately had a last cigarette of the day. Then I scrunched up the packet and threw it and my lighter away. That is the sort of gesture I have made many times before.
I think my longest without a fag was five years. But then the mother of my daughter Olivia then ran off with her graduate trainee ( naturally not mentioning this when filing for divorce, that was down to my unreasonable behaviour, blah, blah, blah), and just to show the old health Nazi I took up smoking again. Sensible move. That really showed her.
Anyhow I am trying to quit again. I have been smoking far too much. It inhibits my ability to run up stairs and is making my cold last longer than it should. It is an expensive habit and makes me smell.
No doubt I shall fail to quit again. Christmas brings with it many temptations. But I do want to quit. This is not the Mrs bullying me, she never does although she’d like me to stop. And right now, although I feel terrible as I write, I really do want to quit.
