My 1000th Post!

Good heavens, I have posted 1000 times putting myself in view of a group of people, most of whom I have never met in person. What an experience this has been! We share a hobby in--a love of pipe smoking, and yet we are such a diverse group of people. Some of us smoke only one type of pipe, some of us have a more eclectic selection. We find that there are a wide number of tobaccos that satisfy our taste preferences: mild, strong, Virginia, Burleys, aromatics or nonaromatics, Latakia., perique or not. And we respect the choices of someone else's taste buds. Some of us don't smoke pipes at all, but simply collect them because they think pipes are beautiful. Some of us wear suits to work, and push pencils across pieces of paper; some of us wear jeans and T-shirts and get our hands dirty on the job, and at the end of the day it's that pipe stuffed with our favorite tobacco that makes us truly a unified community of men and women who confer with one another about the experiences of our hobby, the joys and sorrows that come into our lives, even to vent about something or other.

If I have posted 1000 times, it means that I have read at least 10,000 or more of your postings, and I think that number is itself a bit on the conservative side. For that experience I have all of you to thank, because you have enriched me far beyond my ability to describe to you. And if anything I have posted has contributed in any way to your already vast store of pipe and tobacco knowledge, then I am in humble appreciation of the gifts we have all shared with one another.
1000 posts! Thank you for accepting me as one of you. It is truly a pleasure to be here.