Smoawkin'!!

I'm off tomorrow morning early to fly to Oregon to see my friend Ted. I hope you'll all miss me. But just in case you don't, I believe that Ted has the IT facilities to permit me to carry on bloggin'

I thought I'd leave you with my current thoughts on smoking in pubs.

Up to about five years ago I was an occasional smoker. I enjoyed going to the pub, which was the only time I smoked.

We then bought our pub. I only smoked when in a pub, but as I lived and worked in one I could smoke all the time, so I did. But I still believed that smoking would have a detrimental impact on pubs.

I started to realise that I was smoking more and more. When in the pub and when not. I also realised that many of our nicer customers didn't smoke. Ann decided to ban smoking in all but one bar.

Eventually the smoking ban came in, no more smoking in the pub, and so I eventually stopped. I feel better, the pub smells better, and we've not noticed any problems with the trade.

In Brussels they still allow smoking. In Mort Subite (see crap picture) the sight of smokers brought back the craving. After taking myself outside and giving myself a beating, reminding myself how long it had taken me to give up, I felt a little better.

Is the smoking ban good? I think so. But then ex smokers are the worst anti smokers you can get. I know, there are many sleazy pubs that are suffering, but they need to wake up and smell the fresh air.

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Oh yes, and because I want you all to carry on commenting, I'll take off the comment moderation - but you'll have to have a Blogger account or similar - be good, anybody who isn't good will get banned.

I do hope Ted has some nice big fat cigars we can try in his firepit.