My Pipe Made the Paper

[SBC]

Last Sunday, as I pulled into the Christmas tree farm puffing a cheap bent billiard/egg, a lady was just pulling out in her little sedan. She looked up as we passed each other and her jaw dropped to see my pipe. She immediately swung a U-turn and reentered the lot after me.

As we stepped out of our vehicles, she lost herself in a paroxysm of delight to have found a dad smoking a pipe. Turned out that she was from the newspaper and was looking to do a little write-up on a family getting its Christmas tree. She said that finding a dad with a pipe was more than she'd hoped for.







Maybe the Christmas Spirit clears away the anti-tobacco insanity just enough to let us spread a little holiday cheer?

 

[cosmicfolklore]

Right on. Smoking my pipe while selling my artwork at art shows, and in peddling my produce at Farmers markets always gets me positive attention. I've never heard an unkind word.
Good for you!!

 

[scloyd]

That is so cool. Great memories for the kids (grandkids) when you're long gone.

 

[Morrison Jeremiah]

That's so heartwarming.
It's great to be a family man.

 

[mso489]

I empathize with the reporter, having been in her place in terms of needing a lively photo of a routine subject. A smiling family exuding energy and the dad's smoking a pipe! It's true, it is more than she could have hoped. You probably made her day. What's the name of the paper? Print journalism is struggling, but is so important to peoples' sense of community and engagement with local life.

 

[Sweet Home Alabama]

Did you ask if she “fancied a pint”?

 

[STP]

Nice ?

 

[HawkeyeLinus]

Last Sunday, as I pulled into the Christmas tree farm puffing a cheap bent billiard/egg, a lady was just pulling out in her little sedan. She looked up as we passed each other and her jaw dropped to see my pipe. She immediately swung a U-turn and reentered the lot after me.

As we stepped out of our vehicles, she lost herself in a paroxysm of delight to have found a dad smoking a pipe. Turned out that she was from the newspaper and was looking to do a little write-up on a family getting its Christmas tree. She said that finding a dad with a pipe was more than she'd hoped for.

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Maybe the Christmas Spirit clears away the anti-tobacco insanity just enough to let us spread a little holiday cheer?

Hey if you are so in-Clined, a great way to tree shop!

 

[SBC]

I empathize with the reporter, having been in her place in terms of needing a lively photo of a routine subject. A smiling family exuding energy and the dad's smoking a pipe! It's true, it is more than she could have hoped. You probably made her day. What's the name of the paper? Print journalism is struggling, but is so important to peoples' sense of community and engagement with local life.

For how long were you in journalism?
This paper is the Florence Mining News.

 

[mso489]

The Florence Mining News! That really draws a picture. I did reporting for the university owned town paper in journalism school in Columbia Missouri, did a summer internship at The Neosho Daily News in Missouri, did a one-man newspaper for the U.S. Navy on Midway Island in the mid-north Pacific, and spent most of my career as a writer editor with a biomedical research agency where I launched a newsletter and reported and edited it, and supervised other editors when I was promoted. I was the liaison with reporters for our communication group, so I have always kept a finger on the pulse of both print and broadcast journalism. I was always doing some photography for my jobs, but lost interest in it as recreation when it became entirely digital.

 

[Sweet Home Alabama]

That’s better than a pipe made of paper.

 

[augiebd]

Awesome family, awesome story! Love the Christmas tradition!

 

[mikethompson]

@SBC

Scott, I am relieved the headline wasn't "Local Man OD's On Ketchup Chips And Streaks Downtown"

 

[Brendan]

Did she happen to ask what blend you were puffing on?

(The most important question)

Seriously though that is a pretty cool moment, even though you look a little drunk in the photo - Tis' the season after all!

 

[anotherbob]

Did you ask if she “fancied a pint”?

now why would you ask that?

 

[hawky454]

That is really cool. Good to see the pipe still makes a positive impression on some folks, even more so with someone who writes articles for a newspaper!

 

[SBC]

Did she happen to ask what blend you were puffing on?

(The most important question)

Seriously though that is a pretty cool moment, even though you look a little drunk in the photo - Tis' the season after all!

To succumb to a tired mantra, "I never smoke aromatics, BUT..."

I never smoke aromatics, BUT my kids asked me to smoke something "Christmas-y" and my wife -- who does NOT smoke pipes but who does buy aromatic pipe tobaccos to put into RYO cigarettes which she smokes from a classy cigarette holder -- suggested that I make the kids happy by using her Boswell's Christmas Cookie.

And do you know what? It wasn't half bad... (sshh... that's just between you and me).

And I DO look a little cheered in that photo, don't I?! I really don't know why -- I hadn't had a drop all day. Maybe there was more liquor topping on that tobacco than anybody realized...

 

[cshubhra]

Fantastic ?

 

[Sweet Home Alabama]

now why would you ask that?

I watch a lot of British TV and that what Inspector Morse used to say.

 

[anotherbob]

I watch a lot of British TV and that what Inspector Morse used to say.

I see. So why'd he say it?