A SURFEIT OF PIPE TOBACCO

SMELL THE LOVE, BABY, SMELL THE LOVE!




As I was leaving the building for my morning sojourn at the tobacco store today, three coworkers swung around the corner in unison, pipes stuck out of their mouths at a jaunty angle. They had been lying in wait for me, with freshly boughten dime-store pipes and a pouch of tobacco as their concept-props.

It cracked a smile on my face.

I have, apparently, made an impression.

So, to mark the occasion, and opportunistically persuade you to revisit some of my previous posts, I will paste some links here, and then gibber a bit about pipe-tobacco. I used to sell tobacco, did I mention that?

Links:

http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/10/drucquer-sons-ltd-pipe-tobacco-blends.html
["DRUCQUER'S PIPE TOBACCO - Brief description of Drucquer & Sons Ltd pipe tobacco blends: Royal Ransom - slightly more than half Latakia, with Turkish and Virginia (including black Virginia..."]


http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/10/standard-english-balkan-blends.html
["Three decades ago, Rattray's Red Rapparee, Balkan Sobranie (white tin), Dunhill 965, and John Cotton's were the standards by which all other English and Balkan blends were judged."]


http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/03/pipe-tobacco-some-g-l-pease-blends.html
["G. L. Pease is one of the few bright notes in the pipe-tobacco field, appearing a few years ago with some stellar blends at a time when it looked like the industry was fading."]


http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/04/pipe-tobacco-some-dunhill-mixtures.html
["PIPE TOBACCO: SOME DUNHILL MIXTURES REVIEWED"]


http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2006/03/new-book.html
["I really should clean up my apartment. I realized this the other day when I came home, pleased as punch about a new book (whenever I'm blueish I buy reading material), and, while looking for the last tin of Sasieni Balkan Mixture, found the EXACT SAME BOOK!"]




As you can see from the above, pipe tobacco is one of my favourite things.

Now, I understand that non-smokers are not able to fully grasp this (and if you've read this far with a quizzical expression on your face you might by now have realized that this posting is not for you), but for people like myself the aroma and ambience of fine tobaccos are a major part of life, a comfort and a joy. Tobacco is art. Tobacco is life. Tobacco is the fragrance with which the Sabbath bids adieu on Saturday night.


I have six opened tins of tobacco on my desk at present.
As follows:

G. L. Pease Kensington - A medium full Balkan mixture from a Bay-Area master blender, smoky and buttery. Has an herbal tone to it that reminds me of the forest after summer rain.
G. L. Pease Samarra - A medium full Latakia mixture with a complex base of Virginia tobaccos, and a small touch of Perique. Something in this reminds me of a tobacconist on the Grote Berg in Eindhoven..... Something about the smell. Plus having some genever and coffee around the corner near the old carriage stables on the Kleine Berg.
Dunhill 965 - One of the old-time standards. An even balance of Turkish and Virginias with Latakia. A godsend in otherwise nasty and barbaric places. Carry several tins with you when you go to France.
Dunhill EMP - A light English blend, with a Virginia nose. Lipman smokes this, and because he mentioned it, I tried it again after an interval of two decades. It is very nice. Like some of the stuff I smoked in spring of 1974.
Dunhill Durbar Mixture - A blend well-loaded with Orientals, richly Turkish. If that is the quality you liked about Balkan Sobranie, you will like it here as well. Reverie-inducing.
Dunhill Standard Mixture (Medium) - A nice spicy product with a good balance of Latakia, Turkish, and Virginias. Slightly mellower than the 965, with a little bit more Turkish. Zesty and slightly naughty, like a young mistress.


Longtime readers may remember that last year I was obsessively hamstering tobacco in expectation of proposition 86 passing. I was pleasantly surprised when it didn't.
However, I now have over three hundred tins of Dunhill tobacco, thirty plus tins of G. L. Pease mixtures, about two dozen tins of Samuel Gawith, two dozen tins of Germain, a few dozen McClelland, and more than a hundred tins of various other tobaccos. Mostly English style blends, of course. But also including some odd fish. Altogether over five hundred tins. Enough for the next decade.


Savage Kitten has not said anything about this. I guess she feels that we all need our little amusements. But what she did say is that the gates of hell will open up and savage daemons come roaring out if I make her teddy bear smell like smoke. She has asked me to kindly go stink in the kitchen behind the closed door with the window open.
Which, of course, I do. Crazy I'm not.

TOBACCO INDEX


==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================