The Smoking Lamp Is Lit

. . . throughout Western Pennsylvania.

Here for my wife's family reunion, we go into a restaurant for lunch. Many people smoking. "Do you have a non-smoking area" I ask. No, replied Verleen, or whatever the waitress' name was. So we sit and a minute later Verleen brings us an empty, but dirty, ashtray for our table. She just assumed we'd need it, she said.

Check into our hotel--no non-smoking rooms available. Room smells like the felt on a crap table at the Gold Spike. Management brings smoke eater, but all of us, including my non-drinking son, awake with headaches.

Dinner last night--different restaurant, but again, everyone's eating and smoking. Holy crap, do they hand out Camels at the state line or something?

 

They have two sections: smoking and chain smoking.

 

Where specifically in Western PA are you??

 

Gawd, that's awful. You might as well have requested to sleep overnight at the local pub.
What's the regional song there? Emphy-see-ma (clap clap clapclapclap) Emphy-see-ma (clap clap clapclapclap)

 

You've got to have a high intensity flame to get those chains lit.

 

That's why I'm glad every restaurant in the city where I work is smoke free.

My family is full of smokers, and I've gotten to where I can't stand being around the stuff.

 

That's disgusting, OTD. Love the Verleen line, however.

Two years ago, Little Bird and I traveled to Victorville for one of his soccer tournaments. Since he had an early-morning game the first day, we spent the night in Victorville, rather than wake up at Oh-Dark-30 and drive the 45 minutes east.

Only place we could find has only smoking rooms left -- a fact we didn't learn until we got there, since it wasn't on their website. I woke up with a headache and Little Bird woke up twice coughing. Amazingly, he played pretty well that day.

We gave the room up to another player on our team, who couldn't find a room, and drove to-and-fro the next day.

It really makes a difference, not having to inhale that lingering crud while you sleep.

 

So glad they've passed smoking bans in the city I live.

 

Come on now, the dangers of smoking are overstated.

 

In Kentucky, you get seated quicker asking for the non-smoking section.

 

I had a huge culture shock when I moved from Montana to where I am now. Montana has a smoking ban (including in bars) and here doesn't. I can't go out very often here, cause I get really sick when I'm around cigarette smoke for any amount of time.

 

I'm glad for smoking bans, but the first time I ever really noticed it was after a recent concert. It was a loud, sweaty rock concert, but after I'd been home for a while it felt like it had never happened. I realized it was because I didn't smell like "concert" with my clothes and hair all smoky. It was strange.