If smoking weren't dangerous, would you do it?

No. It would have to not be addictive, too.

It stinks and is expensive. Maybe once or twice a year.

Most definitely. When I've smoked I love the taste, smell and feel. The only reason I don't do it so for the health reasons.

Be careful! Next you will be mainlining smack while sleeping under a bridge.

R3 - and prostituting yourself for half-smoken cigarette butts. It could happen!

Smoking is gross but I loved it.

If only it were a health tonic!

No. Gross. The smell. Yuck. It surprises me though how many people still smoke.

I was 50 pounds lighter when I smoke. I miss those size 31 jeans.

It smells bad, and makes your clothes smell bad.

Of course.

Smoking: The taste is unbeatable!

No. It makes you really stinky and your teeth yellow. Why would I want to cultivate new bad habits that don’t have much upside?

"Dangerous" be damned. I smoked for more than 60 years, and despite my current condition, still had a career bigger than Dylan or Cohen, on a par with van Gogh and Edison and Picasso.

And I loved my cigs too.

[quote]No. It makes you really stinky and your teeth yellow.

That's not what I'm saying. I mean occasionally social smoking. One or two per week. The effects of that have to be less serious than a life of full-time smoking.

I still enjoy up to three per day. I drink, eat meat, and engage in other hazards which may have dreadful consequences (including living in the US). I live to enjoy my life.

I do. Once a week I smoke a two pack of cigars.

It's how I gave up cigarettes. If I bought a pack of cigs, I smoked them til they were gone. So I made a deal with myself, a cigar pack once a week.

I love the smell, the taste, the blue smoke. Love it, love it, love it.

I love the ways the smoke curls.

No. It took me forever to quit, but I'm so glad I did. It will be 20 years next February. It's so nice not to have an addiction and not to stink like smoke. Plus, I don't honk up snot when I laugh anymore.

I was always a very light smoker. Quit in my 40s for over 4 years. I went on great trips where they were all smoking and had a few. It's always a temptation. I won't live forever and do enjoy it. No one ever told me I smelled like smoke. I actually enjoy walking behind a smoker. It's a tough one to beat. I asked a gal in Istanbul to blow smoke in my face because I just wanted to feel it. It's so seductive and sexy and, I guess ,wrong.

Smoking is fun. Shaking the cig out of the pack is fun. Offering someone a cigarette from your elegant cigarette case is even more fun. Lighting it is fun. Tapping off the ashes is fun. The smoke curling in the air (R16) is fun. Stubbing it out can be fun, although the stubborn ones that don't want to go out are annoying.

You get used to the smell. Ask anyone who was around in the '70s. In every gay bar, at every private party, the air was blue with smoke. I'm sure it was even worse in the '60s and before. The smell was so ubiquitous, you didn't really notice. (I'm sure non-smokers noticed, but they managed to live with it, mostly without complaint because complaining would have been like complaining that water was wet.) After parties, people opened all the windows to air out the smokiness. Your clothes smelled of smoke, but so did everyone else's, and, anyway, you washed or dry-cleaned your clothes regularly.

Also, smoking was something to occupy your hands and yourself. If you're not an outgoing person, you could occupy yourself at a party by standing in a corner smoking and looking glamorous. If you were depressed, you could sit and stare out the window, smoking and listening to sad music.

Unfortunately, smoking is very bad for you, so I quit some years ago. I don't have cravings for cigarettes, except occasionally when watching an old movie, but I'd start again in a second if it magically stopped being unhealthy.

It's not dangerous, so I do it.

I always loved pealing off that cellophane string when opening a pack of cigs. It doubled as dental floss too.

Yes, I'd smoke, if it weren't dangerous and, now, so damn expensive. Used to smoke 20 to 25 cigs per day, depending on whether I was drinking or not (an extra 5 cigarettes or so if drinking).

Well, I smoke around 6 cigs a day and have never smoked more. I am 78, have arthritis, hip replacements, 6 surgeries. I am sure not to last more than 20 years so I am definitely not doing any more sacrificing. I like wine and cookies also. Hate lettuce and gave up eating it. Keep ice cream on hand. I am not fat and enjoy life, as unpleasant as it has become. I find most people boring. I fortunately do not have to put up with bores to make a living. Cancelled my cable and have barebone local news and reruns. I am a big reader, TV pay for view is low on things I wish to watch. I have Netflix for free.

I can tell you that whenever I see someone smoking, I immediately cross them off my list as a potential friend or lover. I don't know that it's only once a week; for all I know, they smoke in the shower.

Most non-smokers feel the same.

"Kissing a smoker is like licking an ashtray" - that was one of the slogans used in Australia in the 1970s the try to get people to stop smoking.

No, I gave it up after my Mom died (emphysema), and I don't miss it. I avoid any situations where I might encounter it, but it's impossible to avoid in some cases.

Fuck, no. It smells awful, gives me a headache, and makes my throat and mouth burn. I wouldn't mind getting back to size 31 pants, but not so much that I'd pick up smoking again.

No. It's still gross and stinks.

You DO understand that you have to smoke even when you don’t have time, right?

This is self medication for poor people. I don’t want you to understand it.

What's so.great abiut smoking? Everything! I like the way a fresh firm pack feels in my hand. I like peeling away that little piece of cellophane and seeing it twinkle in the light. I like coaxing that first sweet cylinder out of its hiding place and bringing it slowly up to my lips. Striking a match, watching it burst into a perfect little flame and knowing that soon that flame will be inside me. I love the first puff, pulling it into my lungs. Little fingers of smoking filling me, caressing me, feeling that warmth penetrate deeper and deeper, until I think I'm going to burst! Then - whoosh! - watching it flow out of me in a lovely, sinuous cloud, no two ever quite the same.

Thanks r30. That was one of my favorite Frasier episodes every.

Speaking of which, you’re stuck with having sex with other smokers. Non-smokers do not understand mid-sex smoke breaks.

R32, they also don't understand the sophisticated joy of smoking in the dark, side-by-side with someone you've just had amazing sex with.

If I live to 80, I will give myself permission to take up smoking again, *if I want to.*

And drinking Scotch too. Again, if I want to.

I might not want to to resume either vice, but knowing I can if I want to is a comfort.

I’m saving opiates and cocaine for my seventies.

Does anyone remember Frasier's agent speech about the joy of smoking? It was amazing. Nevertheless smoking is horrible for your health and destroys your skin. Plus the smell is a clear sign of "intellectual concerns".

R36, see R30

No, OP, because it is unpleasant and it stinks.

r19 our post brought back memories. When I was a kid in the 1980s, my non-smoking parents kept ashtrays in the house for guests who smoked. Back in those days it would've been considered rude and kind of tacky for a host/hostess to order a guest to go outside and smoke. EVERYBODY smoked indoors. That didn't start to change until the 1990s, when smokers started going outside.

If I were at a party today and somebody just lit up a cigarette indoors, it would look very strange and out of place.

No just quit. It's terrible.

I smoked 4 cigarettes yesterday for the first time in years. Alcohol was involved. I cannot get addicted to cigarettes.

Smoking offers so much joy. We should all do it.

To quote Stanford Blatch, "Smoking is fabulous!" Just ask my parents; they were die-hard smokers til the very end. I owe everything to smoking.

Loved it too. I used to say to people you can sit and stare at a wall and be bored out of you mind but do the same thing while smoking and you don't mind it at all.

I'm a former smoker and if cigarettes were not unhealthy I never would've quit, I would've just kept puffing away for the rest of my life. I LOVED smoking and miss it, but I wasn't getting any younger and decided I needed to quit because of all the horrible things smoking can do to you.

No because the time it sucks and the energy it depletes. Christ I'm so glad I quit. It took about 50 times.

Can't stand the smell so no.

Even if I wanted to, I could afford to start smoking again...How much is a carton of cigarettes these days! $100?????

You may as well just cut out the middle man and burn banknotes - at least you don't have the smell.

R45, yes, exactly! Smoking was also great when listening to music.

It burns my eyes.

God I want one now!

I have a method for smoking and not smelling. Sit on a chair in front of the stove, which has an exhaust fan. Blow smoke directly in fan. It polutes the air outside, but the apartment is clear and so are my clothes and hair. Brush teeth after, have a couple of mints and get rid of the cigs in an airtight container. Most people don't know I smoke as I don't do so in public. My dirty little secret.

You bet your ass I would. I haven't smoked in 8 years, but lately I have wanted nothing more than to go out onto the back porch, light up a lovely cigarette, and smoke it.

I quit 5 years ago this month. I had tried so many times and thankful I finally succeeded. I know if I had just one cigarette I would be back to smoking a pack a day in no time. As others have stated there is more to smoking than just the health consequences. Is smoking worth premature aging? Is smoking worth the stench? The addiction alone was worth quitting. Thing of all the anxiety because you are at a place and can't smoke. No matter how interesting the people, the movie or whatever was, I was still thinking about getting out and enjoying that cigarette. There are just too many negatives to ever go back to smoking.

Slightly OT, but are those "this is a smoke free building" signs posted at entrances really necessary anymore? How many fucking years has it been since smoking was banned in office buildings and stores and such? Even hospitals still have those signs FFS.

Quit years ago but my motto is, if I go to the doctor and he gives me bad news, the first place I go after his office is the smoke shop.

I always think of poor Carrie Bradshaw sitting on the curb in NYC, smoking a cigarette she fished out of the gutter. I'd never want to be that desperate.

No. It smells disgusting.

I would do it especially these days.

Fuck no. It stinks. It's even worse than being a Bump Bitch like r60.

I wouldn't. I sometimes smoke weed through a vaporizer when I can't sleep and I hate inhaling it. I can only do a couple of puffs at a time.

In France where I am, they have designated tobacconists as essential services, and they remain open, along with supermarkets and pharmacies.

I despair of this country.

I recall the days when a lot of people smoked before the huge anti-tobacco campaign and regulation changes (no smoking in restaurants, etc.). So many teens and adults smoked! I’m glad it isn’t like that anymore in the U.S., but I keep noticing in movies and when European actors are out in public, a higher number of Europeans seem to be smoking than in the U.S. Is this true? It sort of reminds me of the days when smoking was seen as sophisticated and wonder if it’s still seen that way there?

I've never stopped smoking, not even for a day.

I wouldn't fly for a year when they banned in on planes.

Love it. In Virginia, so a pack never runs more than $6.

Such a deal, r66. When I quit, Marlboros were $1.75 in machines, $10 for a carton.

[quote]When I quit, Marlboros were $1.75 in machines, $10 for a carton.

Well, it ain't 1932 anymore, gramps.

I love the taste of tobacco, real tobacco not the packaged shit, so yes I would smoke again if there were no adverse health concerns attached.

I LOVE smoking. Love it. I resumed a very light top-secret habit of a few a day/none for days, and this corona shit has forced me to stop again. Now I have to reduce carbs drastically to get the extra pounds off.

R64, people smoke with no shame whatever in the Mediterranean countries. American students are thrilled to join them.

But surely you don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure out that smoking reduces your chances of surviving a respiratory virus.

If you can keep it to 1-3 a day and forgo them when necessary, no big deal. But most smokers aren’t like that. Most smell and have discolored teeth. Also, it’s really unattractive and pathetic when a regular smoker needs a smoke and everything has to stop to allow for that. Or they try to engineer things so it’s not obvious. “Oh, let’s not take a cab, let’s walk. The sleeting midnight rain in this borderline neighborhood so delightful!”

I smoked intermittently in my 20s and early 30s, but usually only when I drank (that’s my vice). I never got really addicted to cigarettes. I could probably smoke 2 or 3 a day without it getting out of control, but the thought seems gross now. And I’m fat. I’d rather be fat than smoke a few cigarettes a day.

I don't know any "moneyed" people who smoke. The smokers I know are all white trash from hell.

Absolutely not. I put in far too much work in keeping my teeth clean and white to do something that turns them yellow and brown. Nothing says trash like neglected teeth.

R73 Simon Cowell smokes He's pretty rich.

He also has very white teeth R74.

But it isn't dangerous!

Enjoy smelling like an ashtray. Seriously gross habit.

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The Olsen twins have competitions where they see who can smoke the most and eat the least in a day. At one's wedding, she had big bowls of cigarettes.

Hell, no. Absolutely no appeal whatsoever.

R79 Did you hear Ashley got lyme disease?

I hope Elizabeth Olsen doesn't die of cancer due to secondhand smoke from the freak twins.

No. I used to like it but now I really despise it. It killed my Mom. I used to light up a cigarette ever now and then just to mess with my BF, and he'd always slap it out of my mouth. God, I love him more than life itself.

I quit smoking, but if I ever got a terminal illness, the first thing I would do would be buying a carton of cigarettes and a lighter.

They're so amazing.

I stopped 10 years ago and it still remains the best temptation of all. They were my best friends.

I can't be too critical as my father smoked into his 60's. He lived to be 92. I would give anything to have him back, even for just one day. I could never stand the odor of cigarette smoke. I wouldn't be tempted to start smoking. even if you grew 6" taller and developed ideal symmetrical muscle mass.