Good morning everyone, hope you're having a great Friday.
I've been smoking a pipe for 5-ish months, and have finally started to really enjoy it. My first pipe was an old Grabow that I found when my Grandad passed away. I wasn't confident about smoking it so I purchased a no-name basket briar from our local b&m cigar store. Their pipe supplies are ok, but not great. When I bought the pipe I grabbed a tin of Smooth Sailing, and it was AWEFUL!! Probably because I had no clue what to do, and the tongue bite was ferocious. That said, great men like Chesterton, Lewis, Tolkien (among many others) loved the pipe so I figured there must be something to it that must be worth figuring out. So, down the rabbit hole I went.
I chose pipe smoking because I recently turned 40, and realized I had never tried a premium cigar, and that seemed like a shame. The 90's did a great job of ingraining the imminent death that would ensue with tobacco, so I labeled it as evil. That, and my mom smoked cigarettes for my entire childhood, my grandparents smoked cigarettes their entire lives, and the smell of smoke would take me back to rooms filled with cigarette smoke and an inability to breathe. Regardless, I wanted to try; it felt like a right of passage I guess, a step from boyhood to manhood that I wanted to at least give a go.
I have three pipes that I love right now, an Ashton 3X Old Church bent bull dog, a Nording Erik the red bent apple, and the no name pipe mentioned above. I smoke the Grabow (straight billiard) but it's not my favorite. My go to tobacco is Old Toby and Rivendell by Country Squire, but I've been giving Quiet Nights and Mixture 965 a go as I like the idea of English blends. I also have GLP's Union Square cellaring at the moment.
Love checking out the forum and the thoughts shared about this pretty cool hobby!!
