13 hours ago, Harrisfan said:

If I'm in a dusty environment it makes me sick yet smokers chuff down 20 to 50 a day. How can they enjoy it?

Back in the 80s I used to work with guy who on arrival at work would put his cigarettes on his desk that he would smoke that day. There was more than one packet. Now be my memory is hazy but I think it was 3, 4 or 5 packets. This was back in the days before smoke free environments.

But I haven't mentioned the worst bit. This wasn't a 9 to 5 job. He would bowl in about 10 and sod off at about 3.30. Probably smoked in the car and at home as well. Oh and when he left the job they re-organised the office and I got his desk that I then had to fumigate.

Just reminded me of another job. I worked in hospital doing estimates for building work including re-painting wards. One job was the rehabilitation unit. People coming odd addiction etc. So I went to do a measure up. And in the day room noticed the dark brown ceiling. Except is was actually meant to be a white ceiling.

I'm smoking a pipe right now. I won't smoke anything that goes into my lungs directly but I like the taste of the different kinds of tobacco and the act of smoking and holding a nice briar pipe in your hand is enjoyable. It occupies the mind and can be relaxing too.

10 hours ago, Harrisfan said:

Some researchers argue that nicotine alone may not be as addictive as once believed, suggesting that the habit, ritual, and other chemicals in tobacco smoke (like acetaldehyde, pyrazines, and monoamine oxidase inhibitors) significantly enhance its addictive properties. The act of smoking itself—including the hand-to-mouth motion, flavors, and social cues—may be a key driver of addiction, with nicotine acting more as a "vehicle" than the primary cause.

You’re right, pyrazines are added to make nicotine more addictive. Tobacco industry moved into the food industry and added additives to fast food to make it more addictive. Nicotine on its own has actually some quite positive influence on the brain as in helping you to focus better. We also have nicotine receptors in our bodies! Some veggies contain small amounts of nicotine, eg eggplant, potatoes etc.

Vaping is a cleaner way of delivering nicotine, since there is no combustion and no tar generated by burning tobacco, less harmful additives included too. Many cigarette smokers have been able to quit cigarettes thanks to vapes. Yes, still harmful, but very much less so. Furthermore, no mess, no dirty, smelly ashtrays, no discarded buts, and many of the flavours are odourless and no second hand smoke.

Once and for all it must find acceptance: Smoking is not a "bad habit". Nicotine is highly addictive. Nicotine is as addictive as Heroin. It is time to stop calling smoking a "bad habit".

The only way: NEVER START SMOKING !

Growing up, smoking was everywhere. My parents smoked. Saw smoking in movies and it was glamorized. Advertising of smoking everywhere--tv, magazines, etc. You could smoke everywhere, even on airplanes--which seems so ridiculous now--wha were they thinking? Most of my siblings and friends started smoking in our teens--and it was so cheap then. When I smoked, I enjoyed it. Finally quit around age 30--and now I can't stand the smell of cigarette smoke.

Why ask a silly question? People are different. Why are some vegan, and why do people drink? Why do they like heat or cold?

1 minute ago, still kicking said:

Why ask a silly question? People are different. Why are some vegan, and why do people drink? Why do they like heat or cold?

Smoking causes heart and lung disease. Your comparisons are null and void.

My dad and I quit the day Neil and Buzz walked on the moon.

On 2/7/2026 at 7:39 AM, Harrisfan said:

I smoked for 2 years. You keep making silly comments for some reason.

if you smoked for two years then you must have some idea why smokers enjoy smoking? Why are you asking a question to which you must already know the answer?

7 hours ago, Suetape said:

My dad and I quit the day Neil and Buzz walked on the moon.

and? don't tell me your father is still alive as a result?

10 hours ago, Harrisfan said:

Smoking causes heart and lung disease. Your comparisons are null and void.

many people enjoy dangerous activities, I think it's part of being human,

11 hours ago, swissie said:

Once and for all it must find acceptance: Smoking is not a "bad habit". Nicotine is highly addictive. Nicotine is as addictive as Heroin. It is time to stop calling smoking a "bad habit".

The only way: NEVER START SMOKING !

apparently not as the OP smoked for only two years and then stopped

On 2/7/2026 at 7:10 AM, fredwiggy said:

That nicotine addiction has killed millions, including my dad, who smoked up to 3 packs a day for 60 or more years, until it caught up to him at 79.

Personally I would settle for 79 after a 60 /day 60 year habit , its a bloody good innings, many non smokers do not last that long, are you sure it was the nicotine that killed him?

18 hours ago, Harrisfan said:

Its not tough. Climbing Mt Everest is tough. Running 200 miles is tough. Maybe they just lack the desire. Its not rocket science. Stop buying them. Find a new hobby.

if people want to smoke can you not just butt out and stop interfering

16 minutes ago, Bday Prang said:

Personally I would settle for 79 after a 60 /day 60 year habit , its a bloody good innings, many non smokers do not last that long, are you sure it was the nicotine that killed him?

Lung cancer that was there awhile he wasn't diagnosed for. He fell while staying with my brother, went to the hospital, and passed away that week. Yes, I thought he had a long life especially seeing he smoked so much, and the fact my brother died at 67 from a heart attack brought on by diabetes and not losing weight. My mom never smoked but passed from bladder cancer at 84, likely brought on by second hand for over 30 years, but who knows, as bladder cancer does happen after years of smoking.

3 minutes ago, fredwiggy said:

Yes, I thought he had a long life especially seeing he smoked so much, and the fact my brother died at 67 from a heart attack brought on by diabetes and not losing weight.

yet its considered quite acceptable to hurl insults and villify smokers yet reminding the obese of the dangers of their life style , even politely, is considered "unacceptable" , there is even a name for it "fat shaming"

In what sort of society is commenting on a thin person negatively considered ok but calling out the salad dodgers is almost a crime lol

2 minutes ago, Bday Prang said:

yet its considered quite acceptable to hurl insults and villify smokers yet reminding the obese of the dangers of their life style , even politely, is considered "unacceptable" , there is even a name for it "fat shaming"

In what sort of society is commenting on a thin person negatively considered ok but calling out the salad dodgers is almost a crime lol

People should always bite their tongues, as karma does come around, and everyone gets older and falls apart in time. No one knows when their time is, and those that look down on the elderly haven't the sense they'll be there soon enough. Life has taught me you get older a lot faster than you think.

All seems very gay for a man to smoke.

They really enjoy to put their lips in a rounded position, stick a cylinder into their mouth and suck on it...

On 2/7/2026 at 2:47 PM, NanLaew said:

Or the frosted glass walled smokers lounges at Narita. The sliding door opens to reveal grey-looking people, hunched over while sucking desperately on a 'gasper'.

Last time I was in Narita the who;e lounge was a smoking area with a glass room where the clean air freaks could sit and look down on everybody outside.

Ahhhh! First we burned whitches at the stake. Then we beat up homosexuals. Then we criminalised smokers (the modern day lepers)..,

Whats next? I can tell you: People that eat meat, burning them at the stakes. Wait and see.

2 minutes ago, swissie said:

Ahhhh! First we burned whitches at the stake. Then we beat up homosexuals. Then we criminalised smokers (the modern day lepers)..,

Whats next? I can tell you: People that eat meat, burning them at the stakes. Wait and see.

Go easy on the drinking

Old U.K. black n white films have the actors all puffing away so that encouraged people to smoke .

4 minutes ago, Harrisfan said:

Go easy on the drinking

Alcohol CAN become addictive. Nicotine BECOMES addictive.

5 minutes ago, 3NUMBAS said:

Old U.K. black n white films have the actors all puffing away so that encouraged people to smoke .

...........and in my youth, half of medical doctors were smokers.

28 minutes ago, 3NUMBAS said:

Old U.K. black n white films have the actors all puffing away so that encouraged people to smoke .

Yes watching channel 82 in the UK Talking Pictures TV which concentrates on 40s/50s and 60 films and programmes you would think it was against the law NOT to smoke. Time and time again two people meet up and the first thing one of them does to to offer the other one a cigarette. So blatant. As you say I assume the programme makers were sponsored by the tobacco companies.