# Should I take up smoking? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 15, 2005, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389 "2005-04-15T00:19:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![MidnightRadio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecd19e/32.png) [@MidnightRadio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MidnightRadio)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/61 "2005-04-16T09:47:15Z")
> [@Kalhoun](#): > > It’s fabulous. You’ll absolutely love it. And actually, contrary to what you said, not many people are doing it these days, so you will look very hip and innovative. [_Leaving Normal_] Cigarettes are good! Mmm, cigarettes! When you grow up, you should smoke! [_LN_/] ---
**Author:** ![Alias](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a88e4f/32.png) [@Alias](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alias)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/62 "2005-04-16T14:04:45Z")
I smoked from the time I was fourteen, until I was seventeen, then I quit for awhile, and started up again at eighteen, and smoked until I was twenty-four and quit cold turkey. I’ve smoked on and off since then, so I’m no saint, but I will say that a friend of mine who started smoking again recently sat next to me at a movie theater a few weeks ago, and SHE REEKED. It kind of freaked me out, because I realized that I had smelled like that for years and years, and no one told me!!! It kind of made me laugh though, because I thought about how discreet we smokers thought we were in high school, and how we thought we could grab a quick smoke in the parking lot and slip back into class undetected. I feel like such a fool now! How did we think we were getting away with anything? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/63 "2005-04-16T14:19:08Z")
Well, if the OP does start smoking, I hope he does the honourable thing and drop dead of a heart attack the day after he retires, thus having made a lifetime of contributions through income taxes yet not sticking around to draw benefits or burden the health care system. It’s really the best thing a smoker could do for society. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/64 "2005-04-16T20:44:35Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > So, **Lobsang**. Made your decision yet? No. I mean Yes. I mean yes -\* No.\* I seem to have done a silly thing by posting the OP. I think I was drinking when I typed it. In hindsight it was a stupid thing to ask. I thought about the number of people who do it (It seems to me like most people. Somone posted a link saying about half. Where I work it’s something like 90%) and drunkenly thought I must be missing something here. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/65 "2005-04-16T20:47:49Z")
Oh. And I also thought: “I’m killing myself anyway. I may as well synchronise the lungs and the heart with the liver” Which is just about the stupidest thing you can think. I know. ---
**Author:** ![Jaade](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/dfb087/32.png) [@Jaade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jaade)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2005, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/66 "2005-04-16T21:05:07Z")
Though you’ve made your decision, I’ll post one more negative I’ve heard about (though I’m breaking your first rule because I have _never_ smoked. My mother smokes like a chimney and a more clingy, disgusting smell does not exist outside of a morgue or burn unit, IMO.) It destroys your sense of taste and smell, I’m told. I’ve been told this by smokers of many ages, including a few coworkers who are only 21 and 23. They already know that they cannot smell things I can smell and that food loses its taste. That’s scary at such a young age. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/67 "2005-04-17T00:53:05Z")
You can always look on the bright side. If you don’t get lung cancer, you can most assuredly get emphysema and slowly, suffocate to death. Real slow. So you got that going for you. And don’t forget all those really cool items you get when you send in proof of purcahses from Marlboro or even Salem ( and a host of others, I’m sure) that are their designer series apparel, bags and sundry. Show the world that you are a tool in a whole other form. Won’t you look stylish in your Marlboro jacket as you cart around your oxygen tank and have a tube up your nose. \*\*PSA Announcement You Will Never See. \*\* Teacher: Kids, what does smoking do to you? Kids: (shouting) Smoking takes your breath away! Teacher: And what are you if you smoke? Kids: (shouting) A Tool of the Tobacco Industry! ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/68 "2005-04-17T04:14:24Z")
My mother stopped smoking more than thirty-five years ago. She was still diagnosed with emphysema this year. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/69 "2005-04-17T07:14:49Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > So, **Lobsang**. Made your decision yet? Perhaps you could link to some pictures of lungs from autopsies of smokers? My Google-fu is lacking. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/70 "2005-04-17T14:27:55Z")
A picture is worth a thousand words, or in this case, a thousand breaths: [Here](http://medicolegal.tripod.com/preventlungcancer.htm) [More pictures.](http://quitsmoking.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tobacco-facts.info%2F) [voice Box Cancer](http://quitsmoking.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tobacco-facts.info%2F) Now, that’s sexy! \*\*These are very gross to look at and if you are a smoker, you should see what you are doing to your body. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/71 "2005-04-17T15:04:11Z")
Successful social smoker here. I’ll go months without a cig then, occasionally, when I go out I’ll have a few. I used to smoke two a day (at morning break and lunch), but that’s stopped. If the friends I go out with don’t smoke, then I won’t either. If I hang with some smokers then I’ll buy a pack before hand and light up with them. I ALWAYS get a worse hangover when I smoke. Even after a night of smoking, I’ll look at a habitual smoker smoking in his car on the way to work with the windows rolled up and just think what an idiot that person is. Don’t start, the chances that you will be able to contain it to certain social circumstances are very small. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/72 "2005-04-17T17:04:26Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Perhaps you could link to some pictures of lungs from autopsies of smokers? My Google-fu is lacking. Why expend the effort? If none of the other postings here have convinced him, what will a bit more do? He’s intelligent, he knows this stuff. Other than thinking that half the people smoke, that is. There he’s waaaaay off. Besides, I expect the chances are about 50-50 that one night when he’s in his cups, he’ll try one, and then he’ll be off to the races. That’s the typical pattern for regular drinkers. The thing in his favor is that he’s not yet started. The thing acting against him is if he starts at his state (not too old, and consuming alcohol regularly), he’ll be very likely to get hooked thru the bag all that much quicker, and scream all that much harder as any attempts to stop rip those hooks thru his bag all that much harder. But nothing is certain, and he’s fully capable of making informed choices on his own. QtM, free of alcohol and narcotics for over 14 years, free of nicotine for over 7 years. (The tobacco was harder to give up that the alcohol and narcotics) ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/73 "2005-04-17T18:25:15Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > Why expend the effort? If none of the other postings here have convinced him, what will a bit more do? He’s intelligent, he knows this stuff. Other than thinking that half the people smoke, that is. There he’s waaaaay off. I misread **matt\_mcl** ’s post. Still, 28 and 24 percent are still a lot. ‘in his cups’? "he’ll be very likely to get hooked thru the bag all that much quicker, and scream all that much harder as any attempts to stop rip those hooks thru his bag all that much harder. "? I know you’re a doctor, but English please? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/74 "2005-04-17T22:19:10Z")
> [@Lobsang](#): > > I misread **matt\_mcl** ’s post. Still, 28 and 24 percent are still a lot. > > ‘in his cups’? > > "he’ll be very likely to get hooked thru the bag all that much quicker, and scream all that much harder as any attempts to stop rip those hooks thru his bag all that much harder. "? > > I know you’re a doctor, but English please? > > 😉 In his cups: Drinking to intoxication. Hooked thru the bag: Addicted. An allusion to the fact that an addiction has a hold on one similar to the hold that barbed fish hooks can have when embedded in the scrotal sac and testicles of a male. Remember that visual image if you pick up a tobacco product. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@The\_Hook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hook)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/75 "2005-04-17T22:26:58Z")
Now, I’m not a smoker, but I believe the correct phrasing would be: “Should smoking take up you?”. ---
**Author:** ![Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilvert_s_Pagan)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/76 "2005-04-17T22:35:41Z")
I quit many years ago, but I’ve been occasionally intrigued by the idea of **Social Patching**. You know, start out with a really tiny nicotine patch and work your way up to the big potent ones. No lung cancer, no taste problem, just a full-blown nicotine addiction. of course, if you want to wean yourself off of nicotine patches later, you could always use cigarettes… start off with a pack a day and work your way down… :rolleyes: I know, I’m being a :wally ---
**Author:** ![ZebraShaSha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/eada6e/32.png) [@ZebraShaSha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZebraShaSha)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/77 "2005-04-17T22:44:56Z")
> [@The Hook](#): > > Now, I’m not a smoker, but I believe the correct phrasing would be: “Should smoking take up you?”. This really isn’t funny any more, and I seriously doubt it ever was, but there is rarely a time you can use this following joke in reply to something some one says, so I’ll tell it anyway. “Only in Soviet Russia.” ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2005, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/78 "2005-04-17T23:54:32Z")
> [@ZebraShaSha](#): > > This really isn’t funny any more, and I seriously doubt it ever was, but there is rarely a time you can use this following joke in reply to something some one says, so I’ll tell it anyway. > > “Only in Soviet Russia.” In soviet russia, joke tells you. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2005, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/79 "2005-04-18T15:11:34Z")
[Smoking Monkeys are funny! LINK! 😃](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&e=17&u=/nm/safrica_chimp_dc) ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2005, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389/80 "2005-04-18T15:36:17Z")
Don’t smoke. Anything. IANAS, but I have to be around them. They stink. One of my cow-orkers is forbidden to come into my office because she stinks so badly that the stench literally lingers for hours afterwards. I’m not even going to touch cancer, addiction, waste of money and all that. Just understand that if you smoke, a long dead goat’s asshole will smell better than you will. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-take-up-smoking/299389.md?page=5)