Let's hope so. I'm a sucker for anything new too, which doesn't help my willpower. :lol:
I'm looking forward to giving John's stuff a shot. I think its important to have a clean looking stem for a highly anal retentive personal reason. Everyone else may or may not agree.
A well maintained stem looks clean and inviting to the mouth. I've seen others show off pics of pipes with a yellowish green cast and a "slobber line" and although we know what causes it and it doesn't turn us off...others see a dirty stinking pipe and can't imagine why/how anyone could stick that in their mouth. I remember reading in Gary Schrier's book that pipemen are represenative of a certain class of fellow. We are ambassadors. We don't want to be the dirty smokers...cigerette smokers get that rap. We need people to see us smoking something they would want to put in their own mouth. Maybe some day they will, too.
I'm very careful not to beaver up my stems and I keep them shiny and clean. People will often comment on a beautiful pipe, but I imagine they mutter something else to their friends if they see otherwise.
We don't want to be the oblivious smokers either.
