The only reaction I ever had to latakia was huge amounts of JOY!! Some people though are sensitive to it. I would suspect the preservatives in the sail myself.
The painted ones I squirrel away. Those with stick on labels I clean off and am saving to do salt water etching on. First I need to scrounge up a laser printer. shouldn't take me long as I am a master scroungologyst
One way would be to cut the tenon off and instal the Delrin tenon. Another would be to use a drill press as a lathe ( I never could do it). Pimo has a tenon tool for around seventy bucks. Or send the block out to have a stem fitted. Matching up to a stem is tricky at best.
Joe. Clean up the superglue with a very fine file followed by various grits of wet or dry paper . You can get a smooth finish that won't look all that bad. For the chip I have had some success by melting shavings of an old stem into places like that. DO NOT try this on a good stem until you get...
I like small pipes for my Lakeland tobaccos. They can get to be a bit much at times in large doses. The little guys are nice for some of the old time codger butt kickers too.
To be totally honest (yeah right) . The best shape there is, is the one with a big hole in the fat end for tobacco and a small hole in the skinny part to draw the smoke through.