Ask Hank 12: Ultra Marathons
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Kevin Godbee - Oct 7, 2016
- 7 min read
A. Miller
I sat on a chair in the middle of my large grassy backyard yesterday in shorts and t-shirt. This morning I find myself in flannel shirts and long pants. Rain is descending from the sky rather than sun ascending over the horizon. The weather is changing and I’m looking forward to my first bowl of something heavily Latakia-based this morning.
I’ve had a few friends over who have asked to partake of a pipe lately and when I’ve shared, they’ve smoked less than half the bowl. I’ve tried to be calm about this. Happy my friends just want to partake. And it’s not like I’m short on tobacco.
But would you throw away gold?
I wouldn’t. And I just don’t get these “friends” of mine sometimes. Whatever. I can’t win them all.
Rather than getting an early start carving our pumpkins I’m sifting through the mailed in questions and fan-mail postcards you keep filling my smoking den with. Let’s get to it.
Dear Hank,
I’m of the class of folks my wife refers to as the creative type. I like to build, design, create, and make fancy, just about anything I can find. A few months back I created an Etsy shop and started selling corn cob pipes I had modified in some way. Some were just painted, some were franken-cobs. The shop did well and I decided I should go for more big ticket items. I’ve been experimenting with buying big name artisan pipes, painting them, chopping them shorter, connecting two billiards using PVC to make reverse calabash pipes etc…
Unfortunately, these pipes I’m buying for thousands of dollars and only marking up a small amount for my artistic additions, well, they don’t seem to be selling very well. What am I doing wrong?
Sincerely,
Stay-at-Home Artist.
Dear Stay-at-Home Artist,
There are a few flaws in your thinking here. First of all, you need to use more quality materials. You can’t buy an artisan pipe, hack it to pieces and fix it together with PVC pipe, that’s just wrong. People would rather have the original than something with PVC. Consider materials more widely lauded as being of inherent quality. For example, almost everyone seems to love duct tape and super glue. I’m sure a simple switch to things like this will make a big difference in the perception of quality, value, and luxury.
Also, never make artistic changes and then do just a small price bump. You want people to pay heavily for your artistic additions, otherwise they’re essentially just paying you to be a middle-man to shuffle the pipes between the artisan carvers and themselves. My suggestion would be the double the cost of the materials purchase, even if your changes only take a few minutes. It’s all about perception. Tell people your ideas are worth thousands, or be destined to a life of mediocrity.
Finally, I want to encourage you to take your painted cob idea to the world of briar. While there are pipes out there with unbelievable grain, some folks want the craft of something like a high-grade Charatan without the straight lines. If you were to paint, say, Santa Clause, or Kanye West on some of these pipes, I think you could get a significant following.
Bang for your buck if you will.
That or you’ll soon be so poor you can’t afford Borkum Riff. Really it can only go one of two ways.
Trump and Hillary pipes will be huge even in to the 2030’s,
Hank
Dear Hank,
I recently joined a pipe and cigar club. The membership fees are closer to that of a country club than a pipe club. I do get two ounces of pipe tobacco and three cigars each month as part of my membership, but it hardly pays for itself.
The “inner room” I get access to as a member is pretty cool, leather couches, a locker to store some liquor in, huge televisions always showing some kind of sport, and at least two or three other people who aren’t idiots.
I have two questions:
1) Is paying a high fee for a membership to a place where all I do is what I could do at home for free, actually worth my money?
2) If places can charge such high fees, should I quit my day job (I work for Amway) and open my own clubs for a living?
Thanks,
Regional Sales Leader Franklin
Dear Regional Sales Leader Franklin,
1) Yes.
2) Also yes.
Hank.
Dear Hank,
I’m an ultra-marathoner sponsored by a big brand you would know. My lifestyle is one of absurd discipline with tight controls on everything from, how many of the calories I consume each week must come from fish, to how many hours I sleep with my legs elevated at night.
About a year ago I was camping with some friends when one of them introduced me to a pipe and Captain Black Royal (still my favorite blend). I’ve been secretly smoking a pipe in increasing numbers of bowls-per-day, even going through great lengths (like walking through vinegar mists) to keep my habit a secret. I do this for fear that if my sponsoring brand found out about my new hobby, they would drop my sponsorship—and this my only source of income.
I already think I know the answer to this question, but is giving up a life of a professional athlete (travel, fame, leisure, etc…) worth it for a little Captain Black?
Please say yes,
Anonymous on a Trail Somewhere
Dear Anonymous on a Trail Somewhere,
I understand your concern. In this particular situation I feel I can best answer your question to me with a series of questions aimed back at you:
1) Does the wind blowing in your hair on a sunny day out on a path love you in the way smoke envelopes and hugs you back while sitting on a porch with your pipe?
2) Has your pipe habit ever dictated a diet to you?
3) When was the last time your pipe encouraged regular sleep over “just one more bowl”?
4) You speak of travel, fame, leisure, as though sitting on a porch and enjoying bowl after bowl of captain black weren’t equivalent. Are you somehow confused about what these words mean?
5) When you say, “professional athlete” and “absurd discipline”, I question your love of the pipe hobby. If you’re truly conflicted about which of the two to choose, are you perhaps, simply not “professional” or “disciplined” enough to join our pipe-smoking ranks?
6) When that friend on a camping trip introduced you to pipe smoking, did the heavens not open? Did a ray of sunshine not beam down upon you and show you the truth?
7) If that “big brand I would have heard of” finds out you smoke a pipe and drops your sponsorship, did you really want to be sponsored by them anyway?
Choose freedom. Choose joy. Choose pipe tobacco.
And, hey. I hear the Scandinavian Tobacco Group has been looking for some ultra-runners to sponsor. Nothing says “Captain Black” like a good 100 mile run….
You know we invented cars so we didn’t have to use our legs over long distances right?
Hank
SOS,
My boat sank somewhere 100miles east of Tahiti and I’m stranded on an island with nothing but fruit. Send help.
Dear Person-Crying-SOS,
This is indeed a first where I have received a letter by means of a floating wine bottle. I’m not entirely sure how you knew I would be visiting Hawaii this week, but well played. You clearly know your tides and sea currents well to have targeted me so specifically.
I wish I had a little more information. I mean, I can package up some pipes and take a wild guess at your preference in tobaccos (I’m thinking I’ll lean heavily on Virginias as it’s probably hot where you are). It’s great that you have food—and a terrible tragedy to be stranded without tobacco.
Lucky for you a few of our site sponsors ship worldwide, although I’m sure you’ll understand that this package will need to be air-dropped in as it sounds like you’re somewhere without a regular mail service.
Take care of yourself out there. And I hope a few years worth of supplies will be sufficient. I’ll be sure to include a few pipe tools should you lose one over the course of the next few years. If you have more specific instructions, I’ll be on the same beach in Hawaii in May of 2019 for further correspondence.
The weather, calm, and food on these beaches sure is glorious,
Hank
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Written by Kevin Godbee
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 604. Our featured interview tonight is with Jon David Cole. JD is the Owner/Tobacconist at The Country Squire in Jackson, MS, and he is the former co-host of the podcast, Country Squire Radio, which ended their 10-year run last year. We’ll have JD with the “From the Country Squire” segment talking about all the new things happening at the store and in the business in general. At the top of the show, we’ll continue our audio tour of Brian’s pipe collection.
Before we begin, I should tell you: this tobacco review is being written by an A.I. Not the fancy new GPTs or their ilk; no, this is last century’s meat-and-bone, all-organic model. To be fair, a large part of what we call knowledge is merely the accumulated perceptions and impressions gathered from a life wandered through, synthesized into a spongy mass of what-it-is-that-we-think-that-we-know. The algorithm for this prompt is simple enough: pump thousands of bowls of smoldering plant matter into a gaping maw, cross-reference the chemical sensations with all other matter previously ingested or inhaled, sieve it all through the diffuse and fractal twin lens of memory and emotion, and churn out a panoply of adjectives that attempts to convey the sensations to someone who hasn’t experienced it yet. Odds are that a diligently trained monkey could succeed half the time; if this reviewer nears fifty-one percent then that would qualify as an unrivaled success. There must have been some similar musings perambulating through the mind of Per Jensen when he began his mad scientist routine at Sutliff with the Pipe Force project, which brings us to the current mixture under the microscope—Sutliff’s Pipe Force: Episode I. Here again are the unusual ingredients that engendered the series, with the stoved Rustica being the defining voice in this composition. From the tin: The Latakia-forward English mixture offers plenty of smoky flavor from the fire-cured leaf, which is artfully harmonized with floral, earthy Stoved Rustica. A mixture of high-grade Virginias imparts a natural sweetness. Katerini, the sole Oriental component, offers herb and spice notes bringing complexity and nuance to the flavor profile. It’s certainly Latakia-forward, with the stoved Rustica doubling up on the rhythm section like a second bassist. A first whiff from the tin releases the aromas of shoe leather and hide glue in a base of clay soil with a campfire wafted over it like last night’s beach party. Once it’s been accustomed to oxygen again, subtle hints of sweetness poke through from the Virginias: lemon rind, light milk chocolate, the dregs of a peaty Scotch, and muddled cherry. Old regulars like fresh-sawn oak and tilled earth are there, of course, with distinct notes of truffle, creosote, damp peat, and pine bark mulch. As an aside, I’ve been re-potting my camellias and the similarity of aroma to the ericaceous soil mix is notable; the Katerini really brings the unique depth of its vegetal complexion when supported by the Rustica and afforded more voice in the mix. The smoky Cyprian Latakia, in turn, is backed by equal earthiness from the Rustica, which overall exhibits a profile similar to dark-fired Kentucky; it leans more toward the woody and vegetal end of that spectrum, echoing and amplifying those traits of the other constituents. The tobacco is presented pressed and cut into a couple of thick, hearty flakes in the tin, lightly moist and easily crumbled to prepare—I prefer mine with a bit of drying time. The out-of-this-world tin art for this episode in the series is Major O’Meara smoking a cavalier. In the absence of confirmation, I’m going to hazard a guess he’s of the Ithklur species. The first taste from the light is sweet, with hints of that milk chocolate dancing around the edges. The Virginia leads the smoke through the top of the bowl, and orchestrates it well. Thoroughly smoky with lemony, grassy highlights from the Virginia spectrum, it soon segues into the mid-bowl profile: heartier, smokier, with the flavor leaning to the mildly acrid and tangy tinge that is the campfire-esque signature of English blends. Caution advised, it can turn overly bitter if pushed—this is where one’s sipping technique is required to maintain the fullness of flavor through to the heel. I did tend toward a lot of relights, though it may have as much to do with technique as with the blend. Pacing is also important as the nicotine starts to manifest; though the Rustica’s contribution has been tempered well by the stoving, it can certainly upend an empty stomach. At the end of every bowl, the mouthfeel somehow gets better. The balance of sugars in the tobaccos would seem to be spot-on in this regard. I started out my tasting in cobs, then cut short an unpleasant bowl in a meer, and finally landed on my best instrument with the lovely Dunhill 4427 pictured, a quaint group 4 shell briar with a gentle curve and Cumberland stem supporting a perfectly executed acorn bowl. It surprised me here, as I’ve learned through the years that I generally have the best experience with English blends in large, wide bowls. With this blend it seems that to get the best out of the Katerini’s somewhat diaphanous influence the smaller bowl fared much better. Room note is very English, so the company you keep will either love it or hate it, and it doesn’t linger too much. I find it paired best with a strong coffee; Sumatran beans complement the flavors well, as do Ethiopian if a lighter brew is preferred. Overall impressions of the blend are that it’s a curiously interesting take on the English genre, almost a reductive reconstruction of the theme using the unique components. This blend, if nothing else, expanded my vocabulary of sense perceptions with the uniquely treated leaf. While the average human can distinguish approximately one trillion (1,000,000,000,000!) different aromas, multiplied by seven basic tastes, and wholly dependent on variables from body chemistry to atmospheric conditions, our overworked and underpaid simian brains can’t effectively catalog them all. Our pet adding machines are exceedingly good at this, however, and someday soon they’ll be the ultimate and unequivocal authority on what something tastes, smells, looks, or even feels like. Until that time, friends, revel in the moments that can be stolen to savor over a bowl of Pipe Force: Episode I.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 603. Our featured interview tonight is with Rick Newcombe. Rick is a well-known author of several pipe books, and he is currently working on his third book. He is a prominent collector of Danish pipes, and vintage tobaccos. He has traveled the world visiting pipe makers, and learning their different techniques. He is also the founder and chairman of Creators Syndicate, which currently represents more than 200 writers and artists. At the top of the show we’ll have a Pipe Smoking 101 segment discussing best pipe shapes and sizes that are best suited to certain types of tobacco.
You know the olde saw: April’s showers bring May flowers.” Just to let you know, Pundit is all in on May and the flowers. Not that Pundit is a knowledgeable horticulturist, but walking about the woods on a bright sunny May day with wildflowers blooming and blushing whilst puffing a particular pipe is what spring is all about. So, to properly prepare in April, Pundit begins cleaning up several pipes that will make the wildflower walks this year. And never mind that I receive strange looks and snubs as I lean over to view up close and personal a beautiful wildflower and snap a photo. Pipe firmly clenched, natch. For good reason, spring brings to mind a couple of notable characters. First is the poet Robert Frost and his poem Birches. One could do worse than be a swinger of birches, is the last line of this wonderful poem about young boys climbing birches and bending them down to nearly touching ground. This lovely poem by the four-time Pulitzer Prize winner brings back memories of a crew of ragtag barefoot country boys swinging tall, spindly pine trees to earthly experiences. Yes, and falling from said pines, as well. Now, Pundit is uncertain whether or even if Frost was a pipe smoker. The history of this is a bit confusing. The other great original is one Yogi Berra, the Hall of Fame catcher for the New York Yankees, who played 18 seasons with the Bronx Bombers. He was a 15-time All-Star, a three-time American League MVP Award winner, and a 10-time World Series champion as a player. It is fairly well documented in photos that the great Yogi smoked cigars from time to time. The Baseball Hall of Fame calls Yogi “a cultural icon whose fame transcended the baseball diamond. “Yogi-isms” such as it ain’t over till it’s over and a nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore have found their way into everyday vernacular for baseball fans. This neatly brings us to Pundit’s favorite Yogi quote this time of year: When you come to a fork in the road, take it. Let’s just call Yogi baseball’s Phrase Laureate. I take the forks along the trails, looking for the rarest of wildflowers. Getting lost in the woods away from the madding crowds keeps dirty looks and slights shielded as I walk, huff and puff. That’s precisely what a pipe-puffing Pundit does on his May wildflower walks. You never know where you are likely to wind up, but you will know when you get there. My best Yogism, doncha know. You can thank me later. And the best pipe that takes me along on these nature walks? Why a White Spot, a Northern Briar, an Ashton, or a Cavicchi. At times I also attempt my best Holmesian pipe look with a Peterson Calabash shape with its iconic flared rim. Or all of the above, and then others tossed into the camera bag for good measure. It’s a big camera bag! And now that we have had a nice walk in the woods, it’s time for some Pipe Smokers of the Past. Starting things off is not a personality so far back in the past, J. Robert Oppenheimer, was born April 22, 1904, in New York and died Feb. 18, 1967, in Princeton, N.J. The famed so-called “father of the atomic bomb,” the Oppenheimer movie just walked off with a plane load of Oscars in this year’s tinsel town extravaganza. The biopic won seven, including Best Picture, Best Director for Christopher Nolan, and Best Actor for Cillian Murphy. Oppenheimer, celebrated pipe smoker and theoretical physicist, was director of the Los Alamos Laboratory in the thick of the Manhattan Project in World War II. The atomic bomb was fully enabled by July 1945 and dropped on Japan in August. It was the first nuclear explosion in history, created by bombarding neutrons with plutonium and uranium which resulted in a nuclear fission explosion. Uh, Pundit doesn’t profess to know fission from fizzling. Allegedly, one of Oppenheimer’s most famous quotes, Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds, was either around the time of the first bomb test in 1945 or shortly after. Another, softer quote from the great scientist, is Genius sees the answer before the question. And finally, author, Gunter Grass, winner of the 1999 Nobel Prize in literature, was born Oct. 16, 1927, in Danzig, now Gdansk, Poland, and died April 13, 2015, in Lubeck, Germany. Grass, also a poet, reportedly smoked Stanwell Extra Fine, an old Danish pipe tobacco popular in Germany, as well as W.O. Larsen Classic, Three Nuns, Mac Baren Navy Flake, and Dunhill Early Morning Pipe. I’m always astonished by a forest. It makes me realize that the fantasy of nature is much larger than my own fantasy. I still have things to learn—Gunter Grass. And a parting shot: Pipe smokers are the mind workers of the world!
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 602. Our featured interview tonight is with Kevin the Hobbiton Piper. Kevin was originally on the show in August 2021. The Hobbiton Piper YouTube Channel has 9.24k subscribers and over 120 videos with pipe and tobacco reviews, box openings, food, drink, and more. Kevin’s interview was one of our early novice pipe smoker features, so we’ll check in and see how his pipe smoking and YouTube channel have progressed. At the top of the show, we’ll have an “Ask the Pipemaker” segment with pipe artisan Jeff Gracik.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 601. Our featured interview tonight is with Rich Esserman. Rich is one of our regular guests that has been on the show many times, and is returning after a 15-month hiatus. Rich has penned innumerous articles about pipes and tobacco for several publications, and he is known for collecting quite large pipes. We’ll get caught up with Rich, and also get his take on some of the same questions we asked Steve Fallon on his recent episode. At the top of the show we’ll have a tour of the tobaccos that Brian is most coveting in his collection right now.
