Yum. Went to a friend's for dinner and had stuffed tilipia, parmesan risotto, a Greek salad and Bananas Foster for dessert.

It was REALLY good. I was looking at cereal for tonight.

I confess I don't understand smokers, or the allure of smoking, because I've tried to take up the habit, I really have (twice -- once in college, when everybody tries it, and once when I was in the Freak-Ass Church, b/c everyone smoked and my BF smelled like Reds so I might as well get used to it), but it only made me choke and feel like my lungs were collapsing and my alveoli were running for the hills.

So why smokers do it is beyond me. And I wish they wouldn't, partly b/c I want the smokers I love to stick around for a long time, and partly b/c it makes me choke and cough and sneeze. (Seriously -- I applaud the banning of smoking in public buildings, but then all the smokers congregate right outside the fucking door, so I still have to walk through a toxic cloud to get into the building, and then what's the point, because my lungs still just got whammied with secondhand smoke.)

Ahem.

I know I haven't posted i a long time so this feels like a delurk but,

re: smoking

My whole family (except healthy yoga massage therapist uncle) smokes or did smoke before death. When I was a kid I used to make up the notebooks detailing ways for my mom to quit, I never smoked until I was 21. people were smoking and I asked for one. I took to it immediately-- it was like the thing I had been missing all my life, I did not couggh or sputter or anything. It was like sweet sweet life and love and everythung I do not know if I was addicted to second hand smoke, or if, in my family, it is like alcoholism.

I sucessfully quit for 4 years, and know what it would take to do now... I have to think of myself as someone who does not smoke-- for whom that is not an option. But I swear that until I took that first puff, I never though I would smoke.

The main advantage to Utah is that so few people smoke. My lungs simply cannot cope. Fortunately, my friends who do smoke are very considerate and go elsewhere to endulge. I just wish it didn't permeate everything so much. I've changed seats on the bus because I simply can't sit behind a heavy smoker, the smell is so much in their clothes.

I can't bring myself to bug people about their smoking. At the same time, I have very few friends who smoke and most of them do it secretly. I think if it was someone close to me, I would feel differently. I've never smoked a cigarette myself - only a few cigars.

These days, I will go to a great amount of effort to avoid sitting by someone who smells of smoke. I can't stand the smell of a heavy smoker and I don't really enjoy being in smoky bars. I loved California with the smoke free bar. When I was younger, even if I came home drunk and really tired, I would always shower before going to bed because the smell kept me awake all night.

"Jesus loves me, he loves me a bunch.... 'cause he always puts Skippy in my lunch." -Peter, Family Guy, forgetting the words.

I'm not so fond of the nicotine smell, but I don't want to tar our fellow beloved (smoking) bitches or shame them. At all. I just want them to know that we belove them and worry and that particularly if they have cancer in their families it requires an extraordinary level of denial to continue smoking.

Obviously, I'm going to have to hit up one of our handy dandy actuaries to explain exactly how poor the odds are.

It's never been my experience that telling someone they're in denial suddenly makes them go, "Gosh, you're right!"

I went out to club last week and then over to house of some people who smoked. I abandoned my clothes in my usual slovenly fashion that night and in the morning when I woke up I could smell the smoke. I had to wash everything I had worn. Back when my dad was alive, I'd have to wash everything that was in my suitcase after a visit home.

Stats don't make anyone quit. DH quit the year he got bronchitis 2 months in a row. I was a bit luckier. really only a social smoker. I quit because of a law chnage. I was working in NY - just as the changed to no smokeing in cetain kinds of building . I worked in a mall and could only smoke in the more expensive place to eat. I suddenly realiezed what it was costing me and quit.

Food is different. You have to eat. So you need to know what kind of an eater you are. DH does much better if there isn't junk around to eat. I do better if there is some junk around - because then I don't get the urge to eat it all, which is what I do if I buy on demand. I am also the person you can't say never too. Because then I want it all. Limit and occasionaly works much better for me. I am also interested in the informational details. I like knowing what is in my food - is it higher fat or higher carb or nutritionally dense. So I eat better with Knowledge. DH isn't really interested. he's better off just thinking about balance.