Reflections on my first year smoking a pipe

Tomorrow will be my one year smoking a pipe, and I think that is pretty cool.
It was a year ago I walked into my local Smoker's Friendly and picked up a little bulk bag of Whiskey pipe tobacco and a Fujima pipe. Those were technically mistakes 1, 2 and 3: cigarette shop, value bulk bag and plastic Chinese pipe.
The pipe looked like a wood pipe in the box to my novice, untrained eye.
The result was me burning the hell out of my tongue that took three days to get back to normal. But that didn't stop me because it was soon after that I found all of you.
The guys on this forum have been a wealth of knowledge from which I've pulled from time and time again. You all were instrumental in keeping me going with the great advice, similar stories and general humor. I don't know how many times I dipped my bucket of questions into the Googleator about pipes during that first week and every result practically lead me back here.
Sure, I got some good info from other forums, but it was PM where most of my questions found answers. How to pack a pipe, light it, what kind of pipes are good, which ones suck, cleaning, restoring, buying, selling, tobacco's that are good, ones to avoid, and reviews upon reviews.
So, thanks for being a huge part of my formative year.
Here's a short list of guys that have either been influential or just really solid dudes from my first year that I'd like to extend a "thank you" for either advice/recommendations you may have indirectly dispensed or good conversations: @numbersix, @peck, @harris, @cortez, @lostandfound, @sparrowhawk, @trailboss, @troutface, @tbradsim. I'm sure I've forgotten some others, but anyways, thanks guys.
15 pipes and 3 lbs of tobacco later, I can say it's been a good year. Here's to many more.

Yeah, this forum has been a life and money saver. Without you guys I'd probably either have given up after quite a few more futile efforts or wasted a bunch of money on bad blends that didn't suit my tastes (I've still managed to do a bit of that on my own anyways) or lesser pipes.
PM, P&C and TobaccoReviews have seen a lot of traffic from me in the last year. I was always a big eBayer (most of the things I like can't be found in stores or at the mall) but I've bought practically all my pipes there.

Yup, made the estate Brylon pipe mistake as well. Lol. Medico Apollo, that thing was terrible. Welcome to the pipe tobacco Thunderdome.

@harris, I'm not fighting it. I just have to temper myself which usually results in sporadic bursts of PAD/TAD, usually the latter. I can't wait for my week of vacation here in a couple weeks, going spend lots of time on the patio smoking and will really get to enjoy the late night smoke. I enjoy lighting a pipe at 2 AM when its quiet, dark and cool.

No doubt, every time I go into a B&M (which isn't too often as I buy everything online because it is cheaper and a far wider selection) there is almost always folks smoking cigars (including the employees) and sometimes a pipe smoker is present.
My gym shorts I wear around the house are proof of the flying tobacco embers vs synthetics question.

Here's my cabinet just a little less than a year ago. I took this near the end of August. Pretty bare bones and that was all I had bought in about a month of picking up the briar.

Here it is today.