SOME DANES ARE MEAN BASTARDS

Good lord, I do not know what possessed me. Perhaps it was a previous venture into degeneracy which went well, or maybe just a perverse desire to tilt against windmills. Possibly even early onset dementia, but whatever the cause or reason, it is NOT ever to be repeated.
Utterly a failed experiment.

It was unimaginably nasty.


A few years ago MacBaren mounted a two-pronged assault on the North American market. Untapped pipe-smokers, oh boy!

At the high end, stellar products under the HH line.

At the low end, the Seven Seas tobacco mixtures.


I did not realize quite how low they were aiming.


Just after finishing a splendid teatime repast at one of the cheap but stellar snack counters I favour in Chinatown, I lit up a bowlful of an aromatic pipe mixture from that estimable company. Yes, I gave it the old college try.
But holy crap! Whatever that sh*t is, it's vile!

The Danish foray into low-end American preference pipe tobaccos is quite possibly the worst comment on the average American smoker that can be imagined. After one quarter of a bowl I gave up. Emptied the soggy shreds into the gutter, and resolved never to venture down that path again.
I'm just glad nobody saw me. I must have looked green.

Green white men in Chinatown are sufficiently a rarity that comment would have been excited. Don't need that. Not after putrid dank fumes from a swamp infected with vanilla butterscotch pus.
My pins wobbled.


7 SEAS ROYAL BLEND, BY MAC BAREN
An aromatic mixture of Black Cavendish, Burley, and Virginia.

Whoever came up with this idea should be severely chastised. Draw blood, and please leave scars. Rancid butterscotch?!? Good frikkin' grief! Thank heavens it was a sample, just a small quantity of miserable pipeweed.
As a cheapskate penny-pinching Dutchman, it would have pained me to throw out more. Such a waste!
You Danes must be absolute spendthrifts.
And gamblers to boot.


I had in previous weeks actually ventured into headhunting heathen territory, by smoking several bowls of 1-Q, a modest little stinky whore by Lane Limited, which is one of the three most popular bulk-bag "house mixtures" in America. Mild, not objectionable, with a high level of honest satisfaction if you overlook the "bang-me-bubba" perfume. Along with BCA, and RLP6. Both of which are also unloathsome, if not actually to be taken seriously.
All three smoke moist, due to gloop.
That being a technical term.
Signifying 'gloop'.

Decent.

Seven Seas is not like that. It is quite disgusting.
And yes, it too is sodden with gloop.
I shall have nightmares.

Please note that whenever one smokes American-preference aromatics, it is advisable to nuke them six or seven times for eight second increments in the microwave to dry them out. Otherwise it's like handling soggy sphagnum. Because of the gloop.


Tea consisted of a steamed chicken bun, three little pork siu mai, and a jin deui, with a cup of coffee. Self-administered medical treatment following the experiment with the Danish daemon-weed was a hot cup of HK-style milk-tea and a 糯米紅豆沙燒餅 in a pleasant environment to calm my jangled nerves. Sometimes I am a very sensitive person.
A bowl filled with flake medallions after that.
A modest man of simple tastes.


臘味荳角煲仔

Dinner, which is on the stove now, will be a slow-simmered claypot dish consisting of yard-long beans ("kouseband") with fried tofu chunks, chilies, abalone sauce, preserved meat (臘肉), pinch of curry, pinch sugar, small dash sesame oil, chopped scallions, plus sautéed garlic and ginger.
It's a very simple preparation, which with minor modifications to render it quite tasteless, would appeal to Buddhists and vegetarians as well as many other Bay Area white people.

I'll probably smoke some Capstan before bed.
And stroll around the neighborhood.
I need to coddle myself.

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QUITE NICE WITH A SILLY LABEL

Late lunch: lo mai kai, charsiu sou, and jin dui. Plus a bowlful of Russ Ouellette's imitation of Balkan Sobranie 759 (Black House Pipe Tobacco, marketed by Hearth and Home).


糯米雞
Lo mai kai

Glutinous rice and chicken chunks, black mushrooms, and lapcheung, wrapped in a lotus leaf and steamed. The flavours meld magnificently, and the chicken-infused sticky rice is a comforting and hearty meal.
Very good with hot sauce.


叉燒酥
Chaa siu sou

A small flaky pastry filled with barbecued pork. Delicious, and available at dimsummeries and coffee shops all over Chinatown. Tourist do not know what it is, and consequently look at it without realizing that it is edible.
Very good with hot sauce.


煎堆
Jin deui

A glutinous rice flour dough ball filled with sweet lotus seed paste, rolled in sesame seeds, and plonked into a vat of hot oil. A mysterious fried object which any Dutchman would instinctively love. Except he would almost certainly call it onde onde, and buy it at the toko.
Not so good with hot sauce.
You knew that.


BALKAN SOBRANIE 759
An imitation of, acclaimed.

There was a competition in 2011 to duplicate, if possible, a legendary pipe tobacco blend which is no longer made. Personally I think such events are remarkably silly, as people's nasal-memories always shift over time, and consequently within only a few years each person remembers something different about a tobacco.

Black House Pipe Tobacco, by Hearth and Home

Like another praiseworthy contender ('Blue Mountain', by McClelland Tobacco Company of Kansas City), this mixture barely resembles the target, being not even faintly recollective, and barely even in the same ball park. And like that other one, it is a very enjoyable smoke, which is worth buying for its own sake. Whatever the heck goes on in Russ Ouellette's subconscious -- or his nose -- is a disturbing and profound mystery, and sometimes yields interesting and strange results.
I like it. But if I ever tell Greg that, he may think me queer.
So I shall keep diplomatically silent.


For some reason, many things I like go well with hot sauce. I'd go out on a limb and state that pipe tobacco probably doesn't, but before or after the hot sauce is fine. Many pipe smokers like hot sauce.
Those that don't are likely perverts.

Lo mai kai, charsiu sou, jin dui, hot sauce, and pipe tobacco.

If you like four out of those five you are probably great to hang around with, a remarkable person, and lovely company.
We can work on the fifth.

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AUTUMN FRAGRANCE

For the past few weeks, summery September has faded into a brisk and brittle October, and lately it is chilly from dusk till dawn in the city. No, there will not be many crunchy leaves underfoot; this is the Bay Area, we do not have the classic four seasons, and we are far from a forest in any case.
The ginkgo trees will turn yellow in a few weeks, though, gilding those streets lucky enough to have them -- down near Battery on Sacramento, or up between Leavenworth and Jones on Clay, as well as in front of the projects in Chinatown on Pacific. There may still be quite a few warm days, but they will be punctuated by sweater weather, till at last the rain comes.

Whereupon people will say stupid things.

"I don't mind; we really need the rain"

"It's not the cold, it's the humidity"

As well as:

"Why does everyone smell like wet dog?"


Truth be told, San Franciscans always bellyache about the weather.
Just shut up and be glad we have some.
This isn't New York.


From late summer all the way to early winter is the perfect time to enjoy certain Virginia compounds from our friend the Lat Bomber.
Otherwise known as Greg Pease.
And, unresisting, I have fallen into open tins of two of his blends.
There is immense pleasure among the leaves.
Life is very good.



TELEGRAPH HILL
Virginia and Perique

Spicy, bold even, but not a tobacco that will bash you around on the school yard. It's a mostly flue-cured ribbony mixture that makes itself known without bullying, and might in some ways remind you of Dunbar by Esoterica. There is Perique in here, behaving gracefully rather than thug-like as it so often does. From personal experience I know that several bowls of this can be smoked in quick succession while high as a kite on caffeine, and amidst a social crowd of cigar smokers. We dare not get up and go to the bathroom, because there are vulgarians behind us who will steal our seats. So we light another bowl, and wait for them to eventually leave.
Oh Thomas, one more whisky please! Thank you.

Grassy in the tin -- that's the lighter Virginias -- but I suspect that there is also more than a touch of fire-cured leaf. It hints of toast.


UNION SQUARE
Virginia Flake

Oh yes! This is a classic. The grassy notes shade into a tangy fruitiness, and if this were aged a couple of years you would never share it with anyone, but hide in your basement far away from other pipe smokers.
Go away, I am not home! You don't hear me! I am invisible!

But there is no need to wait. It smokes fine without prolonged maturity, providing a rich soothing medium flake experience, brights and browns with a touch of red. Mid-afternoons wandering around Chinatown are made lovely by this, the time spent lost in thought near the back-end of the Four Seas on Waverly was remarkably productive in consequence. This tobacco is perfect and sweet and enchanting and just dreamy after a charsiu turnover and a hot cup of Hong Kong milk-tea at Hang Fook.

I wonder if that rowdy teenage girl is a delinquent.
Or just likes hanging out with the boys.
She's got a laughing eye.


秋香

It's been a good weekend. I restored several Dunhills and Charatans, plus a Barling Ye Olde Wood Canadian and a Becker & Musico black sandblast military mount. Dinner on Saturday was chicken and vegetable over rice (菜遠雞球飯 'choi yuen gai kau fan') and a tall glass Vietnamese ice-coffee (凍咖啡 'tong ka fe'), on Sunday night I had a petite baguette with Italian meats and peperoncinis, and a latte.


BTW, the title of this post rendered into Chinese to caption the afterthought, is also the name of the bright young missy (秋香 'chau heung') courted by China's most famous middle-aged perv: 唐伯虎 ('tong paak fu' - old uncle Tang). There's a sprightly and entertaining comic opera about that. This is neither here nor there, being absolutely irrelevant to the subject at hand.
Just a happy coincidence.
A fortuity, if you will.

Despite what you may have heard, I am not a middle-aged pervert.
I am, in fact, still quite young.

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EXHAUSTED ROOSTER

Cornell & Diehl are known for their sometimes whimsical naming conventions, having sent several tobacco mixtures with oddball appellations into the depths of the pipe-smoking universe.

Not all fine leaves need to have English images or British-sounding nomens; the Danes, Germans, and Yanks, all manufacture some fine traditional products, and at this point in time there are more splendid Oriental mixtures and pressed Virginias than what Blighty still produces.

The use of traditional bog and sod and teatime and empire jingoism is a rather stale reminder of the glorious era of London between the 1890's and 1960, when all the legendary tobaccos were still put out by respected eccentrics operating shops for gentlemen and factories adhering to mediaeval production codes.

Rather than exposing you here to a selection of Cornell & Diehl's rebellion against stodge, I would rather direct you to their website: Cornell & Diehl, Inc., where you can explore their world at your leisure.
Alternatively, there is a list of all their tobaccos reviewed (*), on Tobaccoreviews.com, which should always be in your flip file.


I will, however, offer a brief description of a product of theirs which I recently revisited.


EXHAUSTED ROOSTER
Pressed Virginias, fire-cured leaf, and Perique.

Presented in a flake form.


Fruity, tangy, and altogether good. This is a lovely product; Cornell & Diehl hit it out of the ballpark on this one. No, I do not know what a ballpark is or why hitting something out might be a commendable thing, I got that from a book.

I had rubbed-out a handful of flakes to air, then jarred them once the correct moisture level (nearly dry) had been reached. Letting it sit for a day or two in its glass tomb allowed the remaining moisture to redistribute and equalize, as well as an aroma to develop.

Mighty fine stuff. If you like VaPers with a blondish touch and just a hint of naughtiness, get yourself some. Life will be sunnier, your mornings will be exciting, and the fact that the big-breasted amazon took off with your credit cards, cuff-links, and the Ferrari will escape your mind. And that is a good thing. You didn't really need the cards and the car anyway, did you?

I do not have a multiplicity of cards or a snazzy crimson convertible. But smoking Exhausted Rooster made me forget entirely that I never picked up a crazy sex-bombe in an East-German dancehall. Nor have I ever worn tailored shirts with diamond cuff-links, or rafted down the river Oder wearing nothing but leopard skins.
Why, it could have happened!

I am not a big muscle-man, and my chest is not excessively hairy. Nor do I shoot elephant seals for fun and profit. But this excellent straightforward flake tobacco pushes all that into the background.

I am NOT an 'exhausted rooster'.
But sometimes my tobacco is.
It is mild on the Perique.
Attracts fruit flies.


Good smoke.


Dinner this evening will be curried chicken.

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DANES, DARKNESS, DEPRAVITY

Two weeks ago I purchased a tin of Mac Baren's Old Dark Fired. The tin blurb frightened me off, initially, as it promised "a bold flake of dark-fired burleys in a well balanced unity with Flue-cured Virginias."
Sounds simple, and somewhat threatening.
Nicotine mania.

Burley has a high nick content, Virginias are medium-high.

Blithely, as if all was well with the world, the tin blurb continued: "this flake is Hot Pressed, meaning that during the pressing, heat is added by steam to the tobaccos which causes the tobacco to intensify the marrying process giving us a bolder tobacco."

Being a bachelor going on four years now, an intensified marrying process is not what I'm about. Television shows like 'Bridezilla' give me the willies, and the typical white wedding with orchids and groomsmen and bridesmaids wearing lilac makes my gorge rise.
Frankly, the American fascination with train wrecks is obscene, and no amount of envious feeling regarding two young people making the social mistake of their lives diminishes the nausea that big vulgar affairs like precisely that engender.
Affairs should always be small, discreet.
NEVER let her parents know.
I digress.

Bugger marriage, it's for Hello Kitty.

The tin blurb ends with: "the robust, earthy flavour of the dark-fired burleys shines through in the taste, and you will experience a deeply satisfying smoke indeed."

Sounds much better. She got out of her virginal whites and put on an old pair of dungarees. Now she's ploughing the field out back.
The appeal of that image melted my resistance.
Bronzed girly biceps and ruddy cheeks.
It is indeed deeply satisfying.
I've bought more tins.

Just to be fair in my estimation of this delightful Danish farmer's daughter, it behooved me to do a comparative tasting of two other similar products: Peterson's Irish Flake, and Samuel Gawith's Bracken Flake.
Both are considered nicotine bullies.

All three products are reviewed below.


HH OLD DARK FIRED
By Mac Baren Tobacco.

A rich and fecund reek as soon as you open the tin, and neat narrow strips of dark flake are presented to view once you peal back the gold foil. This stuff smells luscious.
A little rubbing to render it suitable for the pipe, a slight dry, then stuff and light up.
It is surprisingly mild. Easy on the tongue, renders down without complaint to a fine powdery ash, which is pale grey-white. It is such an easy smoke that one finds oneself reaching for the tin several times a day, rather than dimsumming one's way through the smorgasbord on top of the books near the bed.

Soon I'll have to crack another tin.


IRISH FLAKE
Made exclusively for Peterson of Dublin.

Those damned Irishmen have hair growing inside their mouths, and this blogger is more aware than ever of his own balls. Or is that my own mortality? I'm presently on the floor. And quite naked.

I bought over four dozen tins of this stuff back in 2008. This is the first tin that I've opened in ages. I had forgotten that it left me weeping for my mommy five years ago July.

Normally I do not review tobacco while in my birthday suit; it isn't dignified. This nicely matured dark flake smells like a superior aftershave: profoundly masculine and butch. I'm used to strong tobaccos, but this stuff is for truck drivers.
Enjoyable, though. Just not something for every week. It may take a while before this tin is finished.


BRACKEN FLAKE - RICH & DARK
A product of the House of Samuel Gawith & Co.

A tin from 2010. Stinky and rich, like a peat bog. Good thing I'm naked.

Approach this flake, and the nudist smoking it, with caution.

This is remarkably smooth and sweet-tempered for such a complex and disturbed tobacco. Rich, musty, earthy, and rather unpleasant at first whiff of an adventurous nose over the open tin. It reminds me of my gym bag decades ago at high school. After an entire week of sitting in the locker.
But it improves. No, the tin odour never ends up smelling like roses. However it is beguiling stuff to smoke. It has a wonderful velvety mouthfeel that seems sweeter than it is, mesmerizing and therapeutic. Probably not a good tobacco before breakfast, but I don't really care.
The world seems sunnier while smoking this.
It has a goodly nicotine whompus.
I think I'll remain nude.
Itzsscomfy!


AFTERTHOUGHTS

Quite likely all three tobaccos are topped, in the case of the Gawith near-definitely so. Not unlike St. Bruno, and similar blends.

The Mac Baren product is the most girlish of the three, almost innocent and maidenly. A very nice smoke.
The Gawith is a bit more knowing, but remarkably clean. A stout woman of sensible sexual habits.
The Peterson is a flirtation with someone who may have whips.
You might not want to go home with her.

No, I do not regret acquiring so many tins of the Peterson flake. It's a good product despite being a hairy dangerous old fruit, and in a few more years I may wish to get naked again.
Except this time, I'll eat breakfast first.
Depravity requires a sound meal.

I've got enough Gawith of various types to last me a very long time. It gives me a feeling of profound satisfaction to know that. Several tins of Bracken.

The HH Mac Baren Old Dark Fired is lovely stuff.
I shall smoke it fairly often going forward.
Probably several 100 Gr. tins a year.
Thank you, Danish freaks.
I like your sister.

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THAT VICTORIOUS MORNING SMELL

Sometimes you sense that people are looking at you funny despite no one else being around. And it must be stressed: no. one. else. around.
Empty apartment. Not another person.
I hear no breathing under the bed.

Probably the stuffed animals. Their cotton-filled brains disapprove. Glass eyes glare in judgment.


No, I'm not Douglas MacArthur. But that IS a corncob.

Burley mixtures are excellent in cobs.

First smoke of the day.


No. 107 - HAUNTED BOOKSHOP
Cornell and Diehl, Inc.

Burleys, with a little red Virginia, touch of Perique. Not for folks who don't like Burley blends. Darn good product, wonderful tobacco. That's it. What else do you need to know?


There's was no well-photographed landing on the beach at Leyte this morning. And besides that, I have no clue what the general smoked. I'm guessing shoe-leather and drug-store syrup, he was that kind of man. The big Missouri Meerschaum he huffed was probably more a personal advertisement, much like Napoleon always sticking his right hand into his armpit before he greeted someone, or Wellington being secretive about his coming and goings. The quirk or foible by which the man may be known.

I do not have any quirks or foibles. Being a humble and realistic man myself. The corncob is a smoking tool, hardly an affectation. Burley blends are purely excellent in cobs, that's all there is to it. Haunted Bookshop is ALSO excellent in a regular briar pipe. My right hand smells of Burley leaf far more often than of left armpits; never of French oxster.

Burley stimulates, as it has more nicotine that most other tobaccos. Consequently it goes well with that first cup of coffee. The entrance to my apartment mate's room was firmly shut by 9:02 AM, and windows were open for ventilation. The tin aroma is of wine, of vegetation, and of villages in Autumn. Coffeeness and herbs.
Malty, cidrous, and lushly reproductive.
I am by no means crazy.


There's a fruit fly in the apartment.


NOTE: My schedule has changed. Baby-sitting the cigar smokers all weekend now. Mondays have opened up again.

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THE GLOW OF DISCOVERY

This blogger is a severe puritan. I disapprove of other people's perversions, bad behaviour, and absolutely horrible taste. Though not, of course, of my own. Of which there hasn't been any.

In particular, I loathe public displays of affection (and groping). There has been no affection (or groping) in my own life for so long I would probably throw stones at it if it were to happen, and when other people do it, they lack the sheer panache and sparkiness that I believe is necessary.
So much for perversion and bad behaviour.
I do both of those much better.
Or at least I did.


Now for the bad taste.

I do not smoke perfumed tobaccos. Aromatic pipe blends -- mixtures with strange fruity fragrances and syrup-sauces added, thus bollixing-up what would have been perfectly decent leaf -- are utter anathema in my world, indicative of bestial tendencies, moral turpitude, and a complete lack of manners, standards, sound judgement, and a value system.

Disgusting, horrible, depraved..... never touch them.

This, then, is a review of two such products.


BORKUM RIFF
MIXTURE with Honey & Orange
Made in Denmark by Scandinavian Tobacco Group

"The orange & honey recipe consists of 30% Black Cavendish from Africa, India and Europe mixed with 70% Virginia from Argentina and Africa. On top of that sweet orange flavour is added.
Flavour: sweet honey combined with orange notes."

Why?

Once lit, the smell combines with the actual taste of the tobaccos to remind one of an excess of low-grade bottled bee-bottom and cheap perfume, in a way that is strangely reminiscent of horrible blends one smoked as a child when one did not know any better.
I cannot describe the room-note, as the first time I puffed this was in a cigar store, and the next several times were at home with every window open for ventilation and my apartment mate off at work and not due home till long after I had gone out for an evening's stroll with some real tobacco.
Other than the absurd additives, it's not a horrid product. Seventy percent Virginias dictate slowness lest it bite, and it stays lit fairly easily. A perfect choice for utter degenerates and other Northern Europeans, and dumpy hausfraus will probably think that it smells just ever so nice, much better than that crap from Niemeyer that Jurgen or Olaf used to like.....
It's not that bad. Decent tobacco.
A bit too nauseating.
Odd soap.


BORKUM RIFF
MIXTURE Special No. 8
Made in Denmark by Scandinavian Tobacco Group

"The special no. 8 recipe consists of 40% Black Cavendish from Africa and Argentina which is mixed with 60% Virginia from Brazil and Europe.
Flavour: hints of nuts and vanilla."

Nuts?

To start with, Vanilla is a fairly traditional inclusion in tobaccos as well as perfumes and bakery products, and it duplicates in some ways the effect of maturing the leaves. So it isn't as objectionable as it sounds. The tobacco itself is high quality, and the percentage of Black Cavendish contributes mightily to the smokeability of this blend. The aroma brings back very pleasant half-memories.
This is not something in which I would indulge on a daily basis, but it performs nicely, and I don't mind it at all.
The bowl is over a bit too soon.



'THE GLOW OF DISCOVERY'

Neither of these blends will spur me to test the rest of the Borkum Riff line. But I will probably finish my pouch of the Special No. 8 within a month or two. It may take me over a year before I've smoked even half of the Orange and Honey thing.

Both of these pouches were freebies, I spent no money.
I shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth.
But this horse is a fruit.


If I were stuck on an island or in the middle of Kansas, special number eight would be a more than passable option. In all likelihood I would probably smoke less, though.


I wonder what a blend of 35% Black Cavendish, 60% Virginias (mostly flake with a little red ribbon), and five percent Perique would be like.



AFTERWORD

The title of this blogpost is taken from the handsome pouches in which these tobaccos came. In golden script right above the brand name Borkum Riff is the phrase "the glow of discovery".
I've always been keen to explore new things.

Curiosity killed the cat.

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JUST AN OLD-FASHIONED DEGENERATE

Lately I've been indulging in a mixture which Keith at Cornell & Diehl recommended back in early January. It is probably one of the most disturbing things to which I have ever been exposed.

Regular readers know that tobacco blends, by their particularity and unique nose impressions, are memory sparkers of no mean magnitude for this blog.
What something smells and tastes like often reminds me of times, places, and people from my past.
Which is very useful, and great fun too.

Plantation Evening (No. 416) does none of those things.
Leastways, none of them well.

But it is exceedingly addictive.

No, not the way that the usual sour-old anti-tobacco agitator or rabid Berkeley do-gooder imagines. There is nicotine in the blend, naturally, but what I mean is that after each pipe-full I have an urge to promptly light another, because it tastes so good.


PLANTATION EVENING
By Cornell & Diehl, Inc.
Morganton, NC
800-433-0080

"A smooth, reasonably light blend of aged Virginias, Latakia, Perique and a little Turkish. An outstanding, middle of the road English blend with a delightful flavor. "


Mild, mellow, musky, and with a smoothly intense velvety smokiness from the Latakia. Like many Cornell & Diehl blends it is at it's seductive best if you wait a while to open the tin -- they ship soon after compounding, before the tobaccos have had a honeymoon -- and it does need a bit of air after the components have married, but the reward is worth the wait.

The sun shining in through the backroom window, the sounds of construction on a luxury condo complex a few streets over, wild parrots squawking overhead............
And this intoxicating smoky fragrance wafting around.
Jayzus, this is sinful good.

The pipes I've been stuffing it into are a Comoy Grandslam Liverpool (shape no. 30) that may be several years older than I am, a Parker Russet straight billiard which is also ancient, a Sasieni Royal Stuart squat bulldog (shape no. 95) from a by-gone era, a Peterson Canadian shape stamped 'Dublin & London' and 'Made in the republic of Ireland' -- so definitely quite old -- and a Sasieni bent bulldog with four ivory dots.
It's like having historical relics in my mouth.
Positively worshipful.


Possibly even worth killing for. Definitely worth bashing an anti-tobacco agitator or rabid Berkeleyite over. But then the world has so little use for such people anyway.


Thank you, Keith.
Great recommendation.


If we ever meet, breakfast is on me.

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Post Scriptum: Yes, I really am up this early on a Sunday morning. Can't figure out why. Found out on the BBC news site that an important military facility in Damascus had been blown up by Israel. It looks like the Alawite dictatorship is banking some of its materiel in Lebanon with the psychopaths of Hezbollah. This indicates that regime change is getting closer.
On a different note, according to Dutch newspapers the Amsterdam soccer team Ajax has become the national champion third time in a row (5-0). Excellent news! Congratulations.

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GUARANTEED WOMAN REPELLANT

Once in a while I light up a bowl of Sam's Blend by Cornell & Diehl, Inc.
This is against my better judgement, because both during the smoke and afterwards the chances of women running away from me screaming hysterically are pretty much a safe bet.
Not that this has happened yet, but I know it is only a matter of time.
And seeing as I am still trying to lure a woman into my net ("come here, sweetie, you wanna smell like an off-shore oil-rig?"), you will readily understand that setting fire to a pipe-full of a tobacco mixture which is composed of all the foulest things in Christendom is not a good idea.

Certainly not a bright thing to do.

But it's very good indeed.

Weird man's tobacco.


SAM'S BLEND
Made by Cornell & Diehl, Inc.
Morganton, NC.
800-433-0080

A smooth blend of Cyprian Latakia,
Perique and unsweetened black
Cavendish. An all day smoke.

Yes, it is nice. Sooty, tangy, and sweet. An entirely black compound that includes absolutely nothing for the fairer sex, though the idea of a nice young thing smoking this in secret tickles me pink. She's no doubt blushing fiercely as she puts flame to the bowl. It's so delicious! But what will she tell her classmates? How will she explain the pronounced reek of burning tire?


"I fell into a smouldering garbage dump on the way to school..... nurse said that it will dissipate within hours, and it will probably NOT damage your DNA."


Rich, intoxicating, semi-full, and over all too soon. If this were my all-day blend, it might quickly pall. But as an occasional delicious perversion I can highly recommend it. It's a bit more brash than Dunhill's 'Nightcap', not as ethereal and civilized as Germain's 'And So To Bed'. Why either of those mixtures utilize an end of day metaphor is quite baffling, because like Sam's Blend, they are perfect for that first cup of coffee, although it would be considerate to wait till everyone you live with has left the building.
So probably the second cup of coffee. Make it strong.
A better breakfast than you've had in a while.

It needs a little drying out, and due to the Perique and black Cavendish it will still feel a bit moist, oily even. For something that isn't alleviated in the slightest by paler leaf, it has a surprising subtlety underneath the masculine machotude. Yes, I really can imagine a lovely young lady huffing on this!
One with self-confidence, quiet charm, and a devilish sense of humour.
A woman who reads books that her peers have never heard of, and concerning which their thoughts would consist of "whut?"

This is a fine way to start the day, for regular pipe-smokers -- you'll want something more nicotine-rich later, such as a full flake or matured Virginia, or better yet Greg Pease's 'Navigator' -- but if you are a sometime smoker, this could very well be your go-to tin. A tobacco to enjoy while perusing a book of poems by the Wicked Wasp of Twickenham.
Or Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, if you're into more sprightly stuff.
Spritz some attar of roses behind your ears afterwards.
Before you rejoin your parents downstairs.
Best wait until they're tiddly.
On sherry or port.


If they say anything at all, just tell them you were burning love-letters from an elderly suitor who has joined the priesthood. They should be used to your rare 'individuality' by now.
Or just plain scared.


Like many Latakia-powerhouses, this becomes a harder smoke at the end.
Renders a gritty medium ash, not particularly powdery.
Evenso, I recommend it.

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OLD HOLLYWOOD

Several months ago, when Grant's Tobacconists on Market Street still existed, there was an open tin there from one of my favourite manufacturers.
So I sniffed it. Sniffing is very much something that pipe-smokers do, in which we resemble canines somewhat. It's a nose-brain thing.
But unlike your family dog, we do not go around sniffing the private parts of other creatures. We think we can tell enough about their personality, gender, and state of being from their eyes and their conversation.
No sniff test required.

For example, a scowling Berkeleyite Earthmother Type glaring at my pipe with undisguised disdain is clearly a narrow-minded self-righteous diphead, sexually frustrated, and quite likely constipated too. She needs hydro-therapy, heavy medication to make her more socially smooth, and likely a sharp clout upside the head to get her mind off her own sanctimonious self.
I need not smell any part of her to know that.

Unfortunately, I usually CAN smell her. The reek of cramped shrunken soul, coupled with frowsty tribal shmatte from somewhere spiritual and politically correct, as well as soap made out of backyard compost, carries for at least a block down Market Street during rush hour, to disturbing effect.
It's kind of like soggy dog.
Rancidly moist.


There are precious few people whose private parts I wish to sniff.

You probably have the same problem, don't you?

Let us NOT trade notes.


Anyhow, back to the open tin. As that is what leads to this.


OLD HOLLYWOOD
Cornell & Diehl, Inc.

Tin blurb: A blend of red VA, Latakia, red VA cavendish, Turkish & cubed burley designed to bring out the best in these rich tobaccos.
End cite.

I purchased all tins that were left on the shelf. And recently I augmented my supply. I've been smoking it an awful lot lately. Like many of the Cornell & Diehl products that contain Burley, this is neither a blend to huff or hot-box, nor one to slow-sip.
The best tack is to load lightly, and after setting match to it, let it smolder along with some encouragement. It can be enjoyed slowly and steadily down to the bottom, yielding a spicy and almost perfumy note which is incredibly pleasing.
Lightly sweet, and subtly zesty.

One bowl after the shower, another before lunch. One in mid-afternoon, then one more at tea-time. A blend for lightheartedness in any season.
It performs well in pipes of various bores and depths.

It may actually be modelled after something available in the Los Angeles area when my dad was young. He probably smoked something similar as a boy.
As I recall he preferred light Orientals with a bit of Burley among the Virginia.
His pipes gave ample evidence of that.


Blends like Old Hollywood give a hardness to the carbon layer inside the bowl, without the brittleness associated with standard English Mixtures. On that note alone I would recommend it. But Old Hollywood is also a darn fine all-day blend, with enough spice to intrigue.

Oh, and it definitely irritates the living spit out of sourly self-righteous wheatgerm-snarfing Berkeleyite earthmoms.

But that is purely icing on the cake.

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AN AFFAIR WITH A FUSILIER

To quote a startled fellow pipe maven: "what the heck?" And that indeed seems apposite. The product in question is alleged to be an interpretation of the legendary Bengal Slices pipe tobacco. Seeing as the legend has been off the market for a generation, one could compare it to almost anything, without much squawk. I still have a little of the Bengal left, which is significantly changed from when I first opened the tin.
The very last of it.


FUSILIER'S RATION
Made in the USA exclusively for
www.pipesandcigars.com
Blended by Hearth & Home Tobaccos
russo@pipesandcigars.com

"lightly scented it with an old fashioned top dressing and hot pressed "

I doubt that very many fusiliers reeked of snuff-casing. The top dressing may be tonquin, but without a laboratory I shan't go out on a limb. Personally I think that Blakeney's Best Latakia Flake produced by McClelland comes far closer.
But I may be biased -- I took a sniff of the tin of Fusilier just to try and identify the odour, and promptly had a sneezing fit, so on second thought it may not be essence of dipteryx odorata (cumaru) -- Samuel Gawith's 1792 Flake has never forced me to shampoo thick rivulets of snot out of my whiskers.
I am somewhat offended. More than.
I am not allergic to tonquin.

Hell no, I'm not throwing it out! Perish the thought! It is in its own way far too interesting and amusing a product. And I won't keep it for curiosity value alone, I shall smoke it.


Just for comparison, here are some actual fusiliers:

SUCH MIGHTY MANLY MEN


[Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vRJyjevRao.]


Maybe the fusiliers referenced in the name of the tobacco aren't English, but French or Swedish. Quite a bit more poncy and decorative.
Mighty queenly men.
That would explain the addition of perfume.
Another English blend containing Latakia and a top dressing is Samuel Gawith's Westmoreland Mixture, from the Kendal Mayor's Collection. Distinct nose of tonquin. Very nice. Pleasantly velvety in the mouth, and pleasingly perfumy, in an old dame fashion. She's ensconced in the snuggery, discretely having herself a quiet smoke.
There's a row of rum bottles in the bookcase, behind the encyclopedia.
She'll come out for tea when she's good and ready.
Not one moment sooner.
She smells a bit.

My problem with most flakes containing Latakia and Turkish is that they're always too damned smooth. Yes, the creosote dominance is there, but it's almost like whiffing air. Very enjoyable at three o'clock in the morning, in summer, when your windows are open and you are resolved to not get up on time. Spot of sherry, someone snoring softly somewhere else in the house, silence all about.

It's lovely then.

That doesn't often happen. For one thing, my neighborhood has too many drunken twenty-somethings yotzing about at all hours, loudly celebrating their escape from points further east. For another, those intemperate blonde party animals across the way might cream in their easy-off panties at a whiff of fusilier.

Jump the poor bastard and succubate him to death.

So caution is advised.

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NAVIGATOR

Some things are ethereal, yet in combination with other elements leave a lasting impression. Without fully realizing how it happened, the mind is permanently marked, and what had been cannot be called back.
Progress has been made, developments have taken place, things have become different.

I'll probably always associate Greg Pease's most recent product with smiling women, being whacked to the gills, and marked improvements in the weather.

As well as a sudden surge-remembrance of old friends long out of touch, whom I last saw in a small town in the Netherlands.

But perhaps mostly with Chinatown.

Not, however, with rum.


NAVIGATOR
Old London Series

Tin blurb: For centuries, men of the sea have known the pleasures of fine Virginia tobaccos, pressed and aged with a drop of rum. The addition of rich dark-fired Kentucky leaf brings a new dimension to the flavour and aroma of this timeless combination. Chart your course for a new world of enjoyment, light a bowl, and set sail with Navigator.
-----G. L. Pease.


It's an easy smoke. Perhaps a bit generous on the nicotine, which may leave one lightheaded, but soft and smooth on the palate. It consists mainly of a gentle Red Virginia, with a touch of bright and other flue-cured leaves, given an intriguing nose with a light touch of fire-cured Kentucky. The rum facilitates the melding of the leaves, but it is barely noticeable in the tin, even less so after rubbing out, and almost entirely absent in the smoke.

Especially once you're near the end of the tin.

This tobacco is not strictly a powerhouse, but too much might leave you somewhat nicotine crazed. After one bowl, you will not want to wait to light up again.
Slightly sweet, and soothing in a not-quite-red-flake kind of way.
It works best in a generous size.


VALKENSWAARD

The hint of Kentucky, combined with the red Virginia fragrances, reminded me of Herman Ritter, Peer van de Palen, and Tom Bouten, who lived together in a cottage on the Kromstraat in Valkenswaard. Three bachelor music-afficionadoes who made and repaired instruments. Watching Herman Ritter gently heating up rabbit's hide glue and steaming a sheet of wood, then carefully applying an even ribbon of paste ere pressing the wood in place, was always fascinating. Effortlessly, as if it were part of the process, he would tamp down the tobacco in his pipe in between his several other hand movements.
The red Virginia reminds me particularly of him. That hint of Kentucky calls Tom Bouten and Peer van de Palen to mind; smokers of dark Dutch shag, the spicy reek of which permeated the house as much as Herman's paler pipe tobacco.
Though not at the same times.


TONG YAN FAU

I've smoked this every day since I got it, often while strolling around Chinatown. The weather is nicer than it was at the beginning of the month, and while the aroma truly benefits from a crisp chill, the smoker himself is happier this way.
More folks are about. Perfect people watching conditions.

Two pipe-fulls on Jackson near Powell, during mid-afternoon. An elderly gentleman pushing his wife up the hill, slowly and painfully. Once past the entrance to Adele Court, she got up and together they inched further afoot. It was obvious that she did not want to be such a frightful burden, equally obvious that he did not mind at all. He was mighty pleased to be with her.
There was a gentleness to their faces.
Especially the eyes.

Teenagers leaving the bubble-tea place on the corner scattered down the block, twittering like birds. One said "oh, pipe" when he saw me.

A little tyke going food-shopping with her mom stared in goggle-eyed fascination, swivelling her head almost like Linda Blair in the Exorcist in her attempt to keep the apparition (me) in view from the top of the block to past M. P. Seafood Market (銘發海鮮 Min Fat Hoi-Sin) at the corner of Trenton Street.

The day was more golden because of the tobacco. Possibly the spiced fragrance worked upon the subconscious, likely the various stimuli sparked the mind.
Marvelous.

Do I remember the waitress with the warm smile?
Of course I do. Her charm was more noticeable with a jolt of nicotine, the flavour of the tobacco made more sweet because of the memory.

No, still not going to pursue that woman. She is far too young, and I'm smoking a tobacco that suits a mature man. But inextricably her complexion and this fine leaf intertwine in my mind's eye.
Definitely a maiden for Virginias.

Hardly any coffee this week. Instead I've been swilling extra-strong Oolong as if there's no tomorrow. I'm more attuned to certain smells after a few bowls of this tobacco. It's a strange interplay I cannot explain.


I'm whacked, but not tweaky.


Down to only four tins.
Need to order more.

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MANHATTAN AFTERNOON

This blogger is a restrained and abstemious person.
I only have good habits. Nothing peculiar.
Nothing I do qualifies as 'bent'.
Especially smoking.

If you see a dapper-looking middle-aged dude walking in your neighborhood with a handsome piece of briar sticking out of his mouth, that might be me. Especially if you live in Sany Francisco, north of California Street; anywhere between Van Ness Avenue and Chinatown.
I like to wander around Nob Hill with a pipe.
Sometime between noon and tea-time.

That's 'San Francisco'. Not 'Manhattan'.

One of the things I'm currently smoking is 'Manhattan'.
Manhattan-ish. Between noon and tea-time.
Hence the title of this post.


MANHATTAN AFTERNOON
Manufactured by Cornell & Diehl.
From the 'Simply Elegant Series'

Tin blurb: Naturally sweet Golden Virginia leaf with a drop of honey sliced into flakes.


The tin I opened dated from 2009.
It bulged in a disturbing way.
Which is a good thing.
Nicely fermented.

It was destabilizing one of the stacks of tins on a bookshelf, so I had to open it. Rubbed it out fully and dried it to the moisture level that I prefer.

The slices of flake where beautiful, of a hue that indicated a lot of deep brown goodness. The aroma was intoxicating, though not overly so. Rubbed out, the constituent tobaccos are somewhat evident, though guessing the proportion of blonde to brunette would be difficult. Some blondes are at heart brunettes.

[Never trust blondes. Good rule to live by.]

I'm about half-way through the tin now, it does not pall. Unlike finer-cut flakes it needs a bit of attention, but the pay-off is well worth it. Smooth, sweet, with a very pleasant rich taste, and an excellent room-note. The drop of honey is more noticeable in the tin-aroma than in the smoke, by a wide margin. And unlike gooped-up blends it does not leave a layer of skank in your bowl.
Remarkably, it is both tangy and creamy at the same time.
Blondes can be a bitch, but this one is very nice.

Smokes down to a fine ash that sounds crisp when stroked across the walls.

Blondes benefit from maturity. This product proves it.

I still have one tin of that vintage left.


*      *      *      *      *      *

I've always admired the attention to detail that the Tarlers of Cornell & Diehl showed in their products. Craig Cornell Tarler passed away on Tuesday, September 4, 2012, aged eighty-two.
He was an all-round good man, and the fraternity will miss him.
Morganton, North Carolina, is a less exciting place now.
R.I.P.

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NAVIGATOR - SMOKING ON THE EDGE OF CHINATOWN

I remarked to Dante that if one had a choice of service with a warm smile from a pretty woman, or haphazard attention from a not very bright uncle, it was always better to go on a night when the person who is pleasing to the eyes is working.
He agreed. As, naturally, any man would.
And I will admit that I tend to go to that restaurant ONLY when the pretty woman is working. The food seems to taste so much better that way.

That, possibly, also affects my present perception of Greg Pease's latest tobacco product: Navigator. I smoked a big, BIG bowlful after dinner.
But I had let enough time pass that the residual taste of the bitter melon chicken rice (凉瓜雞球飯) was long gone, though not the memory of the keen intelligent eyes and sincere smile.


GREG PEASE'S NAVIGATOR
[Sixth in the Old London Series.]

No, the person in question does NOT resemble red Virginia, neither in ribbon cut form nor lightly pressed flake. But if they began featuring charming women on tobacco posters again, she would be in the running.
Certainly my first choice.


'Smoke a blend of predominantly red VA, with a touch of yellow, brown, and something aircured plus a demure and mysterious extra note;
smoke GLP Navigator!'



I think we can all agree that my skills as an advertising copy writer leave something to be desired. But don't worry, she would be fully clothed. Shirt and v-neck sweater (it was cold last night), plus jeans. Although we'd have to shop around a bit for the jeans, leastways a better fit.
The sweater made her look very fresh and collegiate, and crisp white cotton shirts evoke innocence and clean living. The hair was perfect. Long, black, clean and shiny, with a clip keeping it out of her face.
She'd be the ideal poster-girl for a pure and generous tobacco.

Navigator tastes velvety in the mouth, with a good balance of boldness and complexity. Yet it is more subtle than you would at first think. This is the type of mixture that, if you smelled someone else smoking it, would inspire you to reveries, and might colour an entire period of your life, or bring back brilliant memories of an era long ago.

The pipe was a biggish Barling billard, and it sang. Perhaps overly optimistic of me to load such a large pipe to the brim with a product laden with nicotine (flue-cured leaf and Kentucky tend toward wallop), but an hour and a half later I was happy as a clam and high as a kite.
Nicotine stimulates quite a bit.
Navigator, a lot.

It was a splendid evening, what all Saturdays should be.
Good food, good company, good cheer.
Plus something evocative.


I'm wondering whether I should first order eight tins, or twelve. Or place two separate orders.
This tobacco will age well, I think. And it will likely end up in my regular rotation. Smokes down cool and clean, delivering graduating spectra of complexity, then quietly departs, leaving naught but happiness and a fine white ash.

 

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FLUFFY BRITISH FRUITS

Regular readers remember that this blogger dallies with pipe-tobaccos that many more mature men might give a miss.
Though that may mean regrets and unsettled dreams.
Why?
Because I can.
And sometimes remarkable discoveries are made.


GERMAIN’S PLUM CAKE MIXTURE
PIPE TOBACCO made in the British Isles

Tin blurb: Cavendish, Virginia and air-cured tobaccos blended with a special black cavendish, flavoured with wine and spices to our 80 year-old recipe.
“A UNIQUE SMOKING EXPERIENCE”


Thin shaggy ribbons that become powdery white ash.

The initial tin-odour verges on bizarre. Sweet, like dessert wine, with hints of licorice, mint, and hair growth promoting scalp tonic.
Perhaps also anise extract, and your maiden aunt’s talcum powder.
Very vegetal, like an old-fashioned apothecary shop.
Seemingly the wine-gum of tobaccos.

Like many products manufactured by J. F. Germain & Son it requires quite a bit of drying first. Which is no problem, so for hours my office had a faint hint of this floating about. At end it was more incense-like than perfumy.
I’ve smoked several bowls now, and have thoroughly enjoyed them.
This is not a standard aromatic, but falls in the category of fragrant oddness to which both the lamentable Ennerdale and the fulsomely praised 1792 Flake belong.
It is far more smokeable than Ennerdale, much milder than 1792.
Unlikely that this will knock your socks out from under you, unless you smoke it fresh out of the tin and huff it like a teenager.
Don’t do that.

Dry first. Don't pack tight. Smoke slow.
If you do not do these things, you will experience regret.

The preparation of this product obscures the derivation of the constituents. Allegedly this is a mostly Virginia compound, with only a little air-cured leaf. But you would not think so. And the teasy ribbons will remind you of various ancient Dutch tobaccos that were only mildly dosed at best.


It will grow on you, and you might find yourself liking this more with each subsequent smoke. Particularly if you have a fondness for civilized aromatic tobaccos – Germain’s Plum Cake Mixture highlights what a bunch of crude vulgarians so many other manufacturers are. But this is not a nicotine powerhouse, so it won’t appeal to smokers of plugs and flakes.
Fans of Latakia had better avoid this.

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DORCHESTER - RATHER LIKE DUNBAR BUT NOT

Some pipe tobaccos are orgasmic. Monastic orgasmic.
Life slows down, the taste induces a dream state.
The next several centuries should be like this.


DORCHESTER
Blended exclusively for Butera Pipe Company by J. F. Germain and Son.
Esoterica Tobacciana

“A rich, full, matured Virginia with Louisiana Perique”


If this were a woman, she would be young and lively, with pleasing subtle roundnesses, not overly buxom. As well as one hell of a sparkling personality and a ready wit.
Come to think of it, I rather wish she were a woman.


On a whim I cracked a tin because my supply of Brown Virginia was getting low, and I didn’t want to rely on the aged Dunhill flake for my jollies. I’m also nearly through the tin of St. James Flake, which is a quite bit better than the Dunhill product, despite having considerably less age.
I’ve always thought the label design of the Esoterica line of tobaccos was pretentiously antique, both too precious and studiously elegant. Artsy.
But the products are all of stellar quality.
As is also this one.

Like all fine leaves that come out of Jersey in the British Channel Islands, this product needs to be dried considerably ere use. It is packed moist and springy, and may prove hard to get used to in that state. A day or two of leaving the tin open to the air will leave it dry but not desiccated, and send a faint delicious hint of fragrance into the room meanwhile.

It’s hard to describe in the pipe. Creamy, faintly fruity, freshly mature. Complex, vivacious, and brightly sparkling, and in all ways of most beguiling character. It has a slight tanginess, enchanting sweetness, and is enough to keep one occupied.
This, ideally, is what one would like to come home to.
Whether tobacco or female companion.

I had a full bowl after lunch in Chinatown. The meal was fun – and the waitress has a very trim figure – but the post-prandial smoke was the best part of the afternoon. It was over all too soon.

Reminds me of dozing in the long soft grasses.
I'm looking forward to Autumn and ripe apples.

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THE TOBACCO THAT HELLO KITTY WOULD SMOKE

Just finished a bowlful of McClelland’s Honeydew.
If Hello Kitty had the exceptionally good sense to smoke a pipe, this is what she would smoke. Now, whereas normal felines have teeth which are not suited to clenching a pipe, necessitating special stems just for the pussy market, Hello Kitty is some kind of shovel-jawed freak, and would have no problem whatsoever with a Dunhill Fishtail.
If Dunhill made a Hello Kitty pipe. Which they should!
Lord knows, if you can find Hello Kitty vibrators, Hello Kitty Vodka, Hello Kitty Chainsaw Massacre Tattoos, Hello Kitty Hamburgers, and Hello Kitty S&M slut-harlot bridal suites, in Hello Kitty Love Motels, you really should be able to find Hello Kitty Pipes.

Tell Dunhill to make it happen.

Maybe Hello Kitty borrows someone else’s equipment?
It would certainly make sense.
But I digress.



McClelland’s 221B Series

HONEYDEW

“A subtly sweet, fragrant flake tobacco in the Irish tradition”

The Irish, as is well-known, have certain issues.

To further quote from the tin-blurb: “The sweet, fragrant Honeydew was all gone by the time Susan Cushing offered the container to Sherlock Holmes, but he was undoubtedly familiar with this fine Irish flake’s gratifying flavor, pleasing aroma and gentleness on the palate."

Manufactured by McClelland Tobacco Company, in Kansas City, Missouri, USA.
I haven’t checked whether they have a Hello Kitty store in Kansas City.
I’m sure they do.


I opened this tin about three months ago, and first described it in a post at that time.

Since then I have finished quite a few tins of Samuel Gawith flakes of various types, and some lovely pressed tobaccos from other houses, including blondes, browns, and red Virginias.
I've also gone through full Latakia mixtures, strange compounds containing Burley, and here and there other stuffs.
As of this writing, the tin of Honeydew is only half empty. When I put my nose to it, it smells like something a refined junior slut would wear, if she were ditching the prom to go work at the upscale hotels on Nob Hill. Precisely the thing elderly businessmen from Japan or the Midwest would love to sniff their dates wearing.
Don't look so shocked - it's NOT like she'll actually 'do' them. She'll simply encourage them to drink a bit too much, dance a bit too much, and live it up for a change. She knows they're married, and consequently desperate for the company of someone considerably younger than the frau who stayed in Osaka or Podunk or wherever while hubbikins went to SF.
She won't even take their wallets when they finally fall asleep tiddly and fully clothed, back in the hotel room. Though she might scrawl something salacious on the bathroom mirror in pink pink pink lipstick.


THE FRAGRANCE OF HELLO KITTY

Underneath the sweet cloy, a foetid acetic odour still faintly lingers. What they've perfumed this product with may not have been a mortal melon. Conceivably a space-age fungus.
Or something developed by the Defence Department.
Psycho-war division.
I would not describe it as a recognizable fruit. But that is probably because many fragrances have a far broader spectrum when fresh, than purified and reduced.
Much dissipates and fades.

All in all, a very decent Virginia mixture, and the funk soon burns off if treated as such.
It has a discreet natural sweetness, and some depth.
Every bowl so far has been quite pleasant, with ghosting that doesn't last nearly as long as I first thought it would, and is easily countered by something in the stinky Syrian category - to which it will add a beguiling oddness. As aromatics go, it is an exceptionally well-behaved product.
Still not something a big butch hairy gay bear should smoke, but very suitable for summer, outdoors, and horrid icky felines.
Like with other such products, I am smoking it ironically.
Though nevertheless enjoying it.
Not because I have a frilly side.
But because I have a mean streak and a keen sense of perversion.

And also, for some reason, it makes me want to purr.
As well lick myself.

Yes, I will indeed buy more of it.
Consider that a recommendation.

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