Quitting Those Damn Smokes

It seems I really did quit smoking and it will probably not come as a surprise that I stopped my quit as soon as I got my grubby hands on some money.  The reason I say I quit is that after smoking a single cigarette today I got tremendously dizzy.  This was exactly the same thing that happened when a stupid kid walked two weeks away from the high school as that was where the 'cool kids' went to smoke.  As idiots just taking up the habit, many would get so dizzy from smoking that we would have trouble walking back to the school.  That wasn't enough to deter anyone because, after all, we were 'cool kids.'

The coolness wore off decades ago when smoking turned into a nasty and expensive habit but  it's not as hard to quit as some think.  If you get some Nicorette then the annoyance can be greatly reduced and that's what I did.  However, that doesn't change anything about the desire to smoke as there's a twisted pleasure in the impact of the smoke, quite apart from the effect of the nicotine, and that's why I dashed out to get some smokes as soon as I could.

Much worse than quitting smoking is cutting off caffeine.  Some of you are taking it in coffee, some from tea, and some from soda but the effect is the same with any of them.  If you stop without tapering off then you won't just be irritated, you will be physically sick with what doctors affectionately call 'flu-like symptoms' (i.e. headache, nausea, and general misery).

So the question now is what to do next.  The probability of a successful quit is not very high if you're forced to it.  What the state puts on the side of a pack of smokes doesn't make any difference at all.  They could make the cigarette companies say cigarettes will kill you, your dog, and probably your whole family but that won't stop anyone.  Nicotine is the most fiendishly addictive substance on the planet and I've stood on a street corner talking with junkies who had successfully kicked heroin but, sure as hell, we were smoking cigarettes while we talked.  (I was never addicted to heroin and didn't even use it but the reason I was there is not germane to the story.)

It's now my choice to go off to get some more Nicorette, even if only for simple arithmetic.  A package of Nicorette costs £14,00 while a 20-pack of Marlboro costs £8,27.  The pack of Marlboro will last for a day while the pack of Nicorette will last you for a week and maybe the rest of your life.  Add it up.  (Tip:  Nicorette comes in 2mg or 4mg gum tablets.  They cost the same so get the 4mg as you can cut them in half if you smoke a pack or less a day.)

I really don't give much of a damn what you do as it's your business, not mine.  No-one's going to tell me what to do and I won't presume to tell you.  Nevertheless, if what I'm doing helps you make up your mind then I'm happy to share it.  One thing I notice immediately is the smell.  Smokers don't realise that non-smokers can smell us coming, particularly when we've just smoked a cigarette.  It's really quite disgusting and maybe that's as good a reason as any to stop.


An aside you may find amusing is the length to which the UK Border Force will go to stop people from smuggling cigarettes and they devote as much effort to that as to stopping the influx of drugs.  It's no surprise that people smuggle them as the taxes on cigarettes are so high that a pack of cigarettes here is the equivalent of roughly $15.00 US.  With that kind of differential you can make a packet of easy money by smuggling them.  Brilliant.