Sculpting society

I am old. In my life, I have seen how clever the manipulation of public opinion has become. Of course, getting your minions to do as they are told, is nothing new. It has happened throughout history, But the delivery of the message has always been slow - word of mouth, town criers, priests, rumour, legend, war. The first half of the 1900's we had movies - a good way to spread propaganda and the emerging of science and drug companies. Now we have the Internet - and science  and drug companies are omniscient. 

We think we think, are of an opinion, or changing our minds all of our own accord. But we are simply sculpted society. We think as we are led to think. We are no less infected by modern dogma and creed than vassals under a medieval lord. Science proves and disproves stuff hourly as the media reports.  Governments confer with medical and scientific quangos or lobby groups that we support with our taxes, as much as they ever did with Archbishops, or Popes.

We have found new big-sticks to punish people with, that produce as much shame, fear and deference as the old ones did. And we conform.

Take smoking. The habit of smoking is now despised by people who have been educated during the course of my life to believe it is not normal, is foolish and selfish.  Smokers have now been downgraded and filed into the folder called" Idiots". My generation or earlier are the "modern" smokers, sculpted by the Tobacco Companies - for profit. An example of sculpted society. 

It is a fact that since the earliest times, humans have smoked - something.

As we go into the future I am not going to be ashamed to say that I am a smoker who now vapes. The reason I won't be ashamed is that inhaling something, to some, has always been a pleasurable occupation.  I can see myself sitting in a cave chucking a datura leaf onto the fire thousands of years ago, and inhaling deeply. 

I am a smoker that vapes because vaping is not essentially different to smoking. We are satisfying the desire to inhale that has come down with us through the mists of time.


I AM a smoker who smokes vapour because I prefer the whole experience and the freedom to inhale to my pleasure. If I didn't, I'd still be smoking.

We ARE smokers!

This might be a touchy point for all vapers who feel holier-than-thou over those poor souls who still smoke. I know, I sometimes wonder why smokers don't vape - I feel cleaner, better, fitter and and internally delighted that I don't have to go outside and stand in the rain to have my fix. I can vape anywhere - even in taboo places - by vaping in the loo. That's an advantage over smokers. There are advantages that vapers have over smokers - but that is ALL they are, advantages and not indications we are in any way better than smokers.

I watch how smokers are persecuted. I place myself firmly against anti-smoking witch hunting. I will not do it myself - I am a smoker who vapes. What happens to smokers is very important to me, watching how the persecution is rolled out, gives us vapers foreknowledge of what might happen to us. We ARE smokers!

To my dentist

Dear Emily,

Thank you so much for stopping the pain in my tooth yesterday. I had a great nights sleep.

But today, you disappointed me on my regular checkup, which just happened to fall the day after my emergency appointment with you yesterday. The last time you commented on the state of my gums and teeth, you said there was room for "improvement" so you gave me some tiddly little brushes to stick between my teeth and my gums daily. When you asked, today, if I'd used them, I had to be honest and say no, I hadn't. You looked like a school teacher whose pupil admitted to not doing their homework. I know the feeling, I was a teacher.

I was disappointed in you because, every time I asked a question (yesterday too), you replied "I'll tell you as soon as I've finished my clinical work". Well I AM your clinical work, and I want to know FIRST what you are doing to me and why. If you ever say that to me again, I will not be opening my mouth untill you answer me first. I just wanted to let you know.

I was even more disappointed, because, even though I hadn't done your homework, you loomed over me and told me my gums had improved!  I told you it was because I was vaping and not smoking, and instead of being amazed that I have not smoked for 10 months, you simply handed me more of your tiddly little homework brushes!

I could have told you where to stick them, but I took them like the small child I felt. I punished you by vaping all the way home in my car and eating Caramel Wafers simultaneously.

At 67, going on 68, I will not be bullied by a snip of a girl like you.

I will see you again in December and I expect I will make you behave better.

Yours sincerely,

Me

Dentist's Lip

Thank god for dentists! Dentists make miracles happen even quicker than doctors do. All the pain killers on the market have not eased my terrible toothache and I have spent long lonely nights sitting upright in my lounge chair suffering. Vaping has been a comfort.

But today, my dentist is back!  It took a half an hour emergency appointment and the pain is gone - just like that...

Vaping feels extra good, even with a dentist's lip.

Easy Chair Lonely vaping

Good blogs should be written regularly I hear. I have taken time out to do other stuff - like suffer! Due to a horrible twist of fate, I have been unable to get to my proper dentist  - long story! But the fact is, our dentist is at a practice that is also a teaching facility and MY dentist has been away. My tooth is driving me crazy with pain, but its a "special job tooth" and, due to total lack of courage and confidence in undergoing treatment by some unknown student dentist, I am waiting - and suffering - until MY dentist gets back.

Nighttime is the worst! About half an hour after putting my head on the pillow I "hear" the niggle in my tooth like a newborn in the night that goes "ahuh" and you KNOW it no good lying there hoping the sound will go away because it won't. The twinge just increases to full blown suffering. I have to sleep sitting up and because I'm up and down, up and down, I usually take myself off to the guest room where I can prop myself up into sitting position on the sofa-bed.

But last night, I came downstairs and slept in a chair with my feet on another chair. The chairs, newly acquired through freegle (free stuff) are called "easy chairs", pink, old fashioned, well made and - would you believe it - comfortable! I ate cherries and a banana and drank half a cup of milk with a massive dose of painkillers. And for a while I sat there in the partial dark, thinking about all the others in the world somewhere making their own lonely pain vigil in the night. I vaped.

And then I slept soundly for a whole wonderful three hours.

Father's day

In the old days when everybody smoked, my husband used to walk around with his pack of thirties and a lighter in his hand. He was known for that. Then he got flu and went to bed for a week with a copy of Lord of the Rings. He stopped smoking.

That just left me. I soldiered on with smoking for at least another thirty years. I found that more enjoyable than reading Lord of the Rings! I am not a fan.

Since then, I have had the idea that if you could just get through Lord of the Rings, you could give up smoking - maybe it's about true grit? I couldn't do it.

I just became a vaper instead. I feel sad I can't get the kids to give their dad a device for Father's day. I think he's missing out - and he could pass it on to me!

Weeee! - tank-mania

I suppose you could say I'm suffering from tank-mania. This is a psychological condition that affects vapers who are still learning. Having found something that appeals to them, they play about with it in vape-heaven-on-earth whilst weighing up, tasting, listening, and descerning the benefits of this aspect and the drawbacks of some other aspect. This is an essential part of learning about vaping.

Tank-mania has affected me quite significantly. I have come to know that you DON'T have to hear the tank gurgling to, in fact, have a satisfactory draw. A tank needs not be noisy. Crackling does not indicate a good tank - only a noisy one!

Some of the best vapes I am having on my tanks, are quite silent and no eyes would turn in my direction in a crowd if I vaped with it.

Some of the best vapes with tanks - not of the dual-coil kind, can be had on a small 650 mAh battery pushing out less volts. The flavour is what it really is all about. Some e liquid needs to be gently heated rather than blasted to get the best flavour. Different batteries can give a different perfect flavours - the poor man's variable voltage practise.

A big tank is not better than a small tank - but a translucent tank is better than one you can't see into.

Tank technology is bounding forward - what I thought was the bees knees two months ago, I now consider antediluvian. Wow - watch my hair fly back as we move into tank future! I like what's happening to me now - the future's going to be fascinating.