***What Are You Smoking, December 2020?***

[tfdickson]

Hey Wire in my BST.

 

[lukasstrifeson]

It's only DEC 4th and there's already 20 pages of this thread for me to catch up on??! That's wild! Seeing a lot of new names and faces and pipes lately, how jovial.

Starting off December right with some Dunhill's ('14) Elizabethan Mix in this gorgeous Tsuge by maestro Fukuda I'm struggling to classify the shape - looks like a lionfish to me though.

 

[jaytex1969]

C&D Haunted Bookshop in a BriarWorks Poker.

 

[JimInks]

Relaxing after a wonderful salad, big filet mignon, mushrooms and green beans dinner with strawberries and cherries for dessert. Now smoking KBV Festivus GT beta test in a 1986 three quarter bend Bacchus face CAO meer with a dark tortoise shell colored tapered acrylic stem. Ice water and berg is my drink on this cold, rainy evening.

 

[B_Rock]

Really enjoying a Friday evening smoke of Penny Farthing in a Savinelli Octavia.

 

[username]

Ps cube Cut in a meer.

 

[Backwoods Briar]

Finally breaking into my tin of Samarra 20th anniversary blend. The only other oriental forward blends I've tried were the McClelland grand oriental series, and this seems right on par in terms of quality.

The retrohale is where this one really shines. I get a spicy incense note that is pretty unique. Great stuff, glad I picked up a few tins.

Solid nic hit too, I gotta slow down my puffing!

smoking my first bowl right now. I ordered a few tins also. What a awesome smoke! Hope I can get more

 

[charf]

Smoking some C&D Big N Burley in a Sibiryatkin. Drinking some tea. Relaxing after a long day out in the bush yesterday hunting for red deer. Nice day out. Saw lots of Kaka feeding on the spring growth. It a native parrot we have here in NZ. Saw one deer and it’s still there ?.

 

[Backwoods Briar]

To misquote Monty Python "And now for something a bit different".
There was a time when the enormous choices of today in the area of different pipe shapes, what pipes are made of and bowl sizes was limited to just one shape and one material - clay.

The smaller than usual bowl size and thinner than usual shank and stem of the pipe I posted above - compared to most other briars I've seen of that period - makes me thing of a pipe more suited for a woman but compared to early clay pipes it's a big bowl.

In the time of James I (1566-1625) tobacco was brutally expensive. He's the one that initiated probably the first 'tax for health reasons' and raised tobacco tax 40-fold from 2 to 82 pence per pound, making tobacco more expensive than silver with the result that the bowls were really small compared to even fifty years later.

Below are two examples of excavated clays from that period - one without a maker's initials or trademark (not unusual for that period when less than 10% of pipes were stamped with either) - and the other with a maker's mark:-
1) Circa 1600-1610 - a previous owner in the middle of the 19th cent. has thoughtfully had the clay mounted with a horn stem.
2) Circa 1580-1590 - Incuse W.B (William Batchelor 1580-1620 / 1619-1635) on the underside of the heel.
View attachment 54024

Love the history lesson, interesting

 

[Backwoods Briar]

Really enjoying a Friday evening smoke of Penny Farthing in a Savinelli Octavia.View attachment 54042

Beautiful pipe!

 

[virginialover]

Solani Virginia Flake Blend 633 in a GBD Bronze Velvet saddle bit Bulldog followed by Savinelli Doblone d' Oro in the same pipe.

 

[JimInks]

Now smoking KBV The Woodford beta test in a 2003 medium bent Ural meer with a lined and etched egg shaped bowl with a brown pearl acrylic saddle stem.

 

[cshubhra]

Bengal Slices in an Eriksen Straight Grain Freehand

 

[trubka2]

Erinmore Plug I got as a gift from a very generous forum brother. Thanks again, my man!

 

[jttnk]

A Royal Evening, Germains Royal Virginia 2/3 and Royal Latakia 1/3 mixed dried for 20 min then packed in Dragon Briar 4 square billiard. Not bad, not stellar, but pleasant. Probably packed a bit to tight.

 

[bent1]

Hey Wire in my BST.

View attachment 54039

Sahaa-weet pipe!

 

[tfdickson]

On to Verge Engine straight in my Jesse Jones bamboo billiard.

 

[bent1]

It's only DEC 4th and there's already 20 pages of this thread for me to catch up on??! That's wild! Seeing a lot of new names and faces and pipes lately, how jovial.

Starting off December right with some Dunhill's ('14) Elizabethan Mix in this gorgeous Tsuge by maestro Fukuda I'm struggling to classify the shape - looks like a lionfish to me though.

Krike, the plateau bottom is so cool ?

 

[jaytex1969]

Stonehenge in the Non-Barling Barling.

 

[btwes7]

2015 Esoterica Woodbridge in a Savinelli 316KS.