Moderate or Occasional Pipe Smoking Only?

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tarak

Lifer
Jun 23, 2013
1,528
15
South Dakota
Hey all. I'm just curious how many people on here only smoking moderately or occasionally - perhaps weekly or bi-weekly.
With a background in nursing, having worked in ICU, cardiology, and post-anesthesia, I just can't get myself to smoke daily. I've seen many negative outcomes from tobacco.
Now I'm NOT trying to start a thread on whether tobacco is hazardous or not or in what quantity, just curious how many of you smoke in fair moderation, like myself.
Tarak

 

petes03

Lifer
Jun 23, 2013
6,212
10,653
The Hills of Tennessee
Smoke em if you got em! I work an odd schedule. On 2 off 2 kinda thing. I usually only have one when I get off on the days I work. On the days I'm off I smoke pretty much all day. I'm on my fifth bowl right now.

 

kashmir

Lifer
May 17, 2011
2,712
64
Northern New Jersey
I would bet the negative consequences you are attributing to tobacco involve cigarette smokers, and not pipe smokers. The two are as different as night and day. To conflate the two does disservice to both, and furthers little in the way of understanding. Pipe smoking in moderation, as defined by the, AMA to be 3 bowls or less per day, has been shown to have no deleterious consequences to health. In point of fact, it is well known to the medical community, that moderate pipe smokers outlive both cigarette smokers and non-smokers alike. How else to explain the preponderance of octogenerian pipe smokers distributed throughout the 20th Century? The greatest minds of the last century were avid pipe enthusiasts, and a statistically significant fraction passed in their late eighties.

 
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kashmir

Lifer
May 17, 2011
2,712
64
Northern New Jersey
Why I smoke a pipe.
I routinely use this missive as a broad sheet to answer the question of "Why I smoke a pipe". A question so often asked by many of my anti-tobacco friends. Friends, I might add, that give me a hard time whenever I light up my tobacco pipe. You see, I'm a reader, and my heroes are those I read about. And usually they involve men who smoked a pipe.
Run your eyes down the list below of names and see how many you recognize. Collectively, I would argue, these men actually made the 20th Century, both literally and figuratively. To a man, all avid pipe smokers, each and every one. Moreover, many lived well beyond the average lifespan of their day, many passing in their mid- to late-eighties.
Albert Einstein, Mark Twain, William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, Norman Rockwell, Orson Wells, JRR Tolkein, CS Lewis, Douglas MacArthur, Admiral Arleigh Burke, Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Bing Crosby, President Gerald Ford, Carl Sandburg, Harold Macmillan, Konrad Lorenz, Errol Flynn, Edgar Rice Burroughs, John D. MacDonald, Warner Baxter, Thomas Selfridge, Charles Nelson Reilly, Ossip Zadkine, , Max Frisch, , Paul Casals, Jack Lynch, Patrick Moore, Anthony Hulme, Ronald Colman, Alexander Kent, Jacques Brel, Lino Ventura, Alfred Wainwright, Rudolph Bultmann, Philippe Sollers, Jean Gabin, Leo Malet, G.E. Moore, Gilbert Ryle, Edmund Husserl, J.L. Austin, Lalo Schifrin, James Whitmore, Anthony Quayle, Ralph Richardson, Bernard Grebanier, Jean-Paul Sartre, Stanley Holloway, , Carl Jung, Paul Kruger, Curd Jurgens, Gerard Walschap, Trevor Howard, Tony Benn, Rod Hull, Trevor Baylis, Joss Ackland, Frank Muir, Manny Shinwell, Jack Hargreaves, Warren Mitchell, Rupert Davies, Russ Abbot, Van Gordon Sauter, Walter Cronkite, Robert Fulghum, Milorad Pavić, Glenn Ford, Erwin Shrodinger, Moustapha Akkad, Evelyn Waugh, Harold Wilson, Bertrand Russell, Alf Landon, Edgar Buchanan, Dean Jagger, Edward G. Robinson, Rudyard Kipling, Aaron Spelling, P.G. Wodehouse, Allen Dulles, Otto Klemperer, Henry Fonda, Lee Van Cleef, Jack Lemmon, Peter Cushing, Barry Fitzgerald, Hume Cronyn, Graham Chapman, Nigel Bruce, Bennet Cerf, Raymond Chandler, Alexander Graham Bell, Arthur Frank, Richard E. Byrd, Gregory Peck, Albert King, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Edward Abbey, Juan Trippe, Frank Sinatra, General George S. Patton, Jacques Derrida, Hurbert Hoover, Sid James, Fred Trueman, Vincent Schiavelli, Eric Morecambe, Stephen Fry, Fred Thompson, Roscoe Dickinson, Guy N. Smith, Gunter Grass, Sean O'Casey, A.A. Milne, Sir Compton Mackenzie, Laurie Lee, W. Somerset Maugham, J.B. Priestly, Andre Dubus, Gordon Parks, F.A. Mitchell-Hedges, W.W. Denslow, William Conrad, William Gillette, Edwin Hubble, Rober Oppenheimer, Niels Bohr, Robert Young, Clark Gable, Fred MacMurray, Ralph Bellamy, Cary Grant, David Ogilvy, Sir Winston Churchill, Kind George VI, Arthur Miller, Ernest Hemingway, John Ford, Shelby Foote, Herschel Burke Gilbert, Thomas Johnston Taylor, Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss), Sir John Mills, Owen Barfield, Alan Christopher "Al" Deere, Elliot Harold Paul, Healey Willan, Harold Tucker Webster.
After perusing such a list, I ask: Can it be that the greatest minds of the 20th Century were all common miscreants, who did not fully fathom "what they were doing to themselves"? Are we, with all our advances of modern science, more intelligent than they were? How many men today can you count that can measure to the list above? I am hard pressed to find a handfull, if that.
We current tobacco pipe smokers actually represent the historical legacy of a community of world pipe smokers, a community which, in the not too distant past, encompassed some 35% of the adult males in the United States. Lest it not be forgotten, these anonymous pipe smokers were our grandfathers, and allowed for the freedoms many of us enjoy today. Although far fewer in number today, we nevertheless still hold the candle to the memory of these men and the deeds they accomplished, with, of course, a pipe in hand.

 

protestantpiper

Starting to Get Obsessed
Jun 20, 2013
200
1
I always preferred the finer tobaccos over cigarettes, but you get lazy and want a quick fix. After close to 15 years of a 1-2 pack a day habit I finally put them down, and now only smoke a pipe and only in what I consider to be moderate terms, 3-4 bowls a day. I do however still have an inhale "reflex", and tend to pull the smoke through my nose as I puff, but I'm sure that will fade with time.
You are always ciphering out how much a man’s health is injured, and how much his intellect is impaired, and how many pitiful dollars and cents he wastes in the course of ninety-two years’ indulgence in the fatal practice of smoking; and in the equally fatal practice of drinking coffee; and in playing billiards occasionally; and in taking a glass of wine at dinner, etc. etc. And you are always figuring out how many women have been burned to death because of the dangerous fashion of wearing expansive hoops, etc. etc. You never see more than one side of the question.

You are blind to the fact that most old men in America smoke and drink coffee, although, according to your theory, they ought to have died young; and that hearty old Englishmen drink wine and survive it, and portly old Dutchmen both drink and smoke freely, and yet grow older and fatter all the time. And you never try to find out how much solid comfort, relaxation, and enjoyment a man derives from smoking in the course of a lifetime (which is worth ten times the money he would save by letting it alone), nor the appalling aggregate of happiness lost in a lifetime by your kind of people from not smoking...
Mark Twain

 

tarak

Lifer
Jun 23, 2013
1,528
15
South Dakota
Kashmir the smoking of pipes certainly doesn't need to be defended towards me, I'm on here because I smoke a pipe. :)
I respectfully disagree that smoking tobacco in a pipe has no deleterious effects, though I do agree that the bulk of cancer prevalence in research has focused largely on heavy cigarette smokers. If it helps, I spoke with a head/neck surgeon one day who takes cancer out of people's face for a living - we discussed moderate pipe smoking, and he stated the amount I'm smoking vs. a non-smoker had an almost "immeasurable" risk.
I also happen to be have a strong genetic pre-disposition towards having cancer on both sides of my family - all 4 of my grandparents have had it, as well as multiple other family. So, I take that into account with my personal decision to limit my smoking.
Anyway, as I said, my intent is not to challenge the hobby itself, simply to see if there are any more like me on this forum that smoke a little less vs. a little more :)

 

dread

Lifer
Jun 19, 2013
1,617
9
I hope for 1 bowl a day, miss that often with the little one around these days (just passed 1 month old), and sometimes luck out and get 2 (never happens since the little one's arrival).

 

plateauguy

Lifer
Mar 19, 2013
2,412
18
PG Wodehouse - great friend of Rex Stout - big favorites of mine.
Count me as an occasional puffer - by the time I get home, do chores, and eat dinner, it's time for a shower and bed. "Me" time is when my wife has a drink already and tells me to park my arse in a chair and forget the chores. That's usually once a week, maybe twice.

 

protestantpiper

Starting to Get Obsessed
Jun 20, 2013
200
1
Tarak: Now I'm NOT trying to start a thread on whether tobacco is hazardous or not or in what quantity, just curious how many of you smoke in fair moderation, like myself.

 

brewshooter

Lifer
Jun 2, 2011
1,658
3
I smoke at least once a week, usually kick back Sunday afternoon. Sometimes, I smoke a second pipe during the week, depending on if I can find time.

 

kashmir

Lifer
May 17, 2011
2,712
64
Northern New Jersey
I respect your answer Tara. As for myself, I've been smoking 5 to 8 bowls a day for thirty years. Course I walk five miles a day, don't drink alcohol, and eat sparsely, when I do its mainly vegan. Everyone's tolerance level, and genetic predisposition will differ. I just get tired of having to combat the naysayers who as a rule,equate pipe smoking with cigarette smoking. As I said they're as different as can be. Also, after teaching doctors to be doctors I've met my share of subpar "medical professionals". So I'm biased in that regard as well.

 

tarak

Lifer
Jun 23, 2013
1,528
15
South Dakota
Don't worry about me Kashmir, I was a really good nurse :)
Of course a church started paying me to play guitar and sing so I ran with that. I respect your standpoint as well. Heck, if I could figure out how to add you as a friend, I would. But I'm too new and too dumb on this forum.

 

kashmir

Lifer
May 17, 2011
2,712
64
Northern New Jersey
Tarak - Nurses are the best!

As everyone knows, they run the show.

The doctors think they're there to provide adult supervision, but really are just there for the ride.

 

pruss

Lifer
Feb 6, 2013
3,558
370
Mytown
I understand my predilections toward... let's call it "overuse"... so limit myself to a handful of bowls/month. Most of those occurring on nights when the pipe club meets.
I also make my living using my taste-buds and frankly don't have the time or capability to retrain them to overcome the impact of regular smoking.
I love a pipe, and cherish my few bowls/month; especially because when I do smoke I do so with friends and/or my wife.
-- Pat

 

tjameson

Lifer
Jun 16, 2012
1,191
4
Count me as a moderate pipe smoker. I maybe smoke a full bowl a day. Recently it's been a half bowl a month lol. If I could I'd smoke my pipe all day, including in the shower like my grandpa did haha

 

voorhees

Lifer
May 30, 2012
3,834
937
Gonadistan
Same here, my pipe smoking consists of maybe 4 bowls a week. Mainly, after dinner or mornings on the weekends. I don't inhale, I usually open a window for ventilation. It was the same with cigars and I never felt any long term effects. The calming experience is beyond measure.

 

smokeybear

Lifer
Dec 21, 2012
2,202
23
Brampton,Ontario,Canada
Ill keep it simply I probably on average smoke 2-3 bowls a week that's and average week long weekends I tend to smoke one or two a day it all really depends on how much time I have.
Also I like to give my pipes good resting time.

 
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