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Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

I'm quitting smoking tomorrow. I went to the first (of four) smoking cessation classes Tuesday, and tomorrow they'll prescribe nicotine patches and Zyban (for those who need it -- I will).

I started smoking at 18 years of age. I was a freshman in college and I wanted to look "cool". Good reason, huh?

It's been almost 23 years since I started, and my rate of consumption went from a pack a week to a pack a day. Occasionally, when I was truly stressed out, I could smoke up to 3-4 packs a day.

My current rate varies between 1-1.5 packs per day. It's getting expensive these days. "Sin taxes on cigarettes amount to about 80% or more of the 18-25 (US) dollar price per carton. Individual packs sell for between 2 and 4 dollars, depending on where you buy them.

I'm tired of spending that much on a habit that provides so little pleasure. I'm tired of my wife complaining about the smell (I smoke outside in all kinds of weather, but it clings to your clothes). I'm tired of coughing when I don't have a cold. I'm tired of running out of smokes at 8:00 p.m. and deciding at 10:00 that I MUST have another cigarette, so off I go to get them.

I am also tired of self-rightious people joining the temperance movement of the nineties and casting smokers as deluded people with an evil habit. We're not deluded, we're addicted. Don't jump all over a smoker because they haven't quit yet. They will eventually develop a desire to quit if something else doesn't kill them first.

Be supportive. In my case, I will ask (but not require) that if you can, please make as few references to smoking as possible for the next 3 or four days (perhaps over the weekend). The mere mention of that "demon tobacco" is likely to trigger a craving I have little experience resisting.

Wish me luck. I've tried several times before and I'm hoping the Zyban will make a difference this time.

*Cough!*

--Baloo

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WARNING:
This Product Warps Space and Time in Its Vicinity.

Posted by Siegfried (Member # 29) on :

Good luck, Baloo! We're all rooting for you!

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"Some people call me the Space Cowboy. Yeah! Some call me the Gangster of Love. Some people call me Maurice. Whoo hoo! 'Cause I speak of the Pompatus of Love!" - Steve Miller Band's The Joker

Posted by deadcujo (Member # 13) on :

Good Luck Baloo

my dad has been trying to quit for 10 years

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The Unknown Vulcan

Posted by The First One (Member # 35) on :

Go for it, Robert. Try to avoid my 'Rose-tinted brains' thread, though. . . 8)

Posted by Jubilee (Member # 99) on :

You've got all my support Baloo... I had to quit too.

Good Luck!!!!

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If Galileo had lied to save his life, would America, or the West, or Space have been discovered?
And if Columbus had never set sail, would the Earth still be flat?

Posted by Warped1701 (Member # 40) on :

Good luck, Baloo. I might need some luck of my own sometime soon.

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"We choose to do this and more. Not because it is easy, but because it is hard."
-- John F. Kennedy

Posted by RW (Member # 27) on :

My grandparents quit when they were about 65.

But why start? :]

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

RW: Why start?

Remember: calling someone stupid for doing something as a teenager is rather like calling an elephant a pachyderm.

Yesterday we got the prescriptions. The Zyban has to be mail-ordered (sent the envelope off today) and we won't get the patches until we actually quit.

The way Zyban works, you take it for 7 days before quitting. The eightth day, you stop smoking. After ~180 days you stop the Zyban.

I have a friend who quit smoking with the aid of Zyban, and he said it was "A piece o' cake!" That's encouraging.

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WARNING:
This Product Warps Space and Time in Its Vicinity.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

Tomorrow is "Q-day" (as in "Quit").

I've been on the Zyban for a week (as of tomorrow). I have the nicotine patch laid out where I will see it & remember to put it on when I get dressed in the AM.

Hoo-boy!

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Dogged persistence is often a suitable substitute for raw intelligence.

Posted by Coddman (Member # 10) on :

Go Baloo!!! More power to you!!!!!

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(Insert witty, attention-grabbing and extremely cool signature that inspires envy from all who see it Here.)

Posted by Jay the Obscure (Member # 19) on :

Good luck Baloo.

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Mine is the sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and the insane lament.

Posted by Feste on :

I hope you make it, Baloo - stops to cough and light up another True Blue - please post how well the Zyban works. All Nicorette did for me was to induce the weird kind of high I got when smoking grapevine as a kid. BTW - for a while do NOT watch any movies from the '30s and '40s. Really. The smoking is just too seductive. I'm sure Bette Davis and Humphrey Bogart have knocked more than one person off the tobacco wagon.

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"'I'm afraid there's nowhere for you to sit,' I said coldly; 'the verandah is full of goats.'" --Saki "The Guests"

Posted by Orion Syndicate (Member # 25) on :

Good luck Baloo, I'm not a smoker, but I saw my father go through it, and he did give up (for seven years until he started again), but I'm working on that now.

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The public is wonderfully tolerant - it forgives everything except Genius.

Posted by Jaresh Inyo on :

A guy I know found that gargling mouth wash helped. And my grandfather cut pencils to the size of cigarettes because he was used to holding cigarettes to much to stop.

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Josh: I think they're getting to know each other a bit too well, if you catch my drift.
Me: Oh, I agree. I think they're spending too much time together, that is of course, if you catch my drift.
Asher: I think he's *ucking her, and he's cheating on his wife, and he's risking his marriage, and if his wife finds out about it she'll leave him and take their son, and his life will be ruined. If you catch my drift...

Posted by StationMaster (Member # 63) on :

Let me get this straight.

A Packet of fags cost you between $2-4???

LMAO!!!

You think your sin tax is bad? Try this

One pack of Cigs - UK Price -

Try $6.60 a pack.

If you are luck could get a pack of rough old cheapies for around $5.80

Comparison.

The cost of a pack in Tenerife (Small Spanish island off the coast of Africa) is $1.30
Now they have to be making some minor profit off that.

Interesting is it not that on a pack of fags that cost $6.60 we pay $5.30 in pure tax.

Needless to say I would love to pay $2-4 a pack.........

Chris G

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---- AAARRRRRRRRHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!----

I feel better now.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

In 1983 I was stationed in North Carolina (Tobacco Country). Generic cigs in the commissary were as low as $2.00 a carton! One time I got some smokes that were 2 bucks a carton, with a $3 off coupon! "Limit 4 to a customer." So I got four. Paid for my lunch with the proceeds.

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Next: proving that stepping on a crack won't break your mother's back. Nothing against Mom, but sometimes we all have to make sacrifices for the greater good.

Posted by Warped1701 (Member # 40) on :

ROTFLMAO!!

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"Angels and Ministers of Grace, defend us"
-Hamlet, Act I, Scene IV

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

Yesterday was just plain bad, bad, bad!

I was driven to such distraction that around 11:00 a.m., I bought a pack of cigs.

I smoked one or two at a time throughout the day, but still managed not to smoke the whole thing.

This morning I had enough strength of will to take the pack, destroy the remaining smokes, and throw away the pack. Don't cheer yet.

Day three is supposed to be the toughest, but I dunno if cheating yesterday resets the clock or not. Today doesn't seem too bad yet.

We'll see.

--Baloo

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I just hope that no one in heaven wears stupid T-Shirts that say �I Survived the End of the World and all I got was this crummy T-shirt!�

Posted by Feste on :

Don't beat up on yourself. At least you threw the rest of the damn things away. The last time I quit it would have taken several Green Berets and a crowbar to take away the new pack from me.

You can do it.

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"'I'm afraid there's nowhere for you to sit,' I said coldly; 'the verandah is full of goats.'" --Saki "The Guests"

Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :

Technically. I believe, that resets the clock.
Stick with it, however. You CAN do it.
Don't think of it as a smoke.
Think of it as putting dead, burning weeds in your mouth.

I did once know a guy who managed to shift his cravings from tobacco to ho-hos... or was that a part of a Bloom County strip?
ARGH...

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You're just JEALOUS because the little voices talk to ME!

Posted by PsyLiam (Member # 73) on :

Try putting up a counter on your web-page, showing how many days it's been since your last smoke.
Also, try putting up a money counter, showing how much money you've saved every day.

Most of all, DO something. Don't sit around worring about it. Try to find all the situations that made you smoke...going to the pub, browsing the web, sitting on the loo, and avoid them.
Well, okay, avoiding the loo will be difficult. But you could always take a book in there.

Go out to places that are non-smoking, so that you can't smoke even if you wanted to.

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'Those are the headlines. Happy now?'
-Chris Morris.

Posted by Baloo (Member # 5) on :

I'm just glad I don't live in California any more. The anti-smoking Temperance Movement is on such a high horse that it's a pleasure to court cancer just so you can piss 'em off.

They have all tha tact of a group of sanctimonious [illegitimate children] going to a leper colony and tut-tutting the lepers 'cuz they can't seem to hold it together as well as they.

(Hmmm... Nicotine withdrawal does seem to make one more prone to go on about things, doesn't it?)

--Bal[AAAAAAAAAAAAaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhh]oo

(No. That didn't make me feel better.)

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I just hope that no one in heaven wears stupid T-Shirts that say �I Survived the End of the World and all I got was this crummy T-shirt!�