Will the new smoking ban reach Rubbish Island? Miles Hunt is a little concerned...
Not owning a lighter allows me to assume the higher moral ground, something I do rather well, I'm told. I admit it freely, I look down upon the addicted. I maintain that I am not `one of them', I do not entertain thoughts of giving up, because `I am not addicted'. There, that's it.... I now plainly see the claim upon the page, and know for sure that it is fact!
Previously, in weaker moments I confess, I have harboured thoughts of stopping smoking, for health reasons mostly. But never have I done anything of any real significance about it. I've not once made the jump to roll ups, like so many others that, like me, find themselves in that given up on giving up nether world. Mainly `cos the two people that have been in my life, that have regularly switched between `straights' & roll-ups, usually in some pathetic attempt to appease their partners, disgust me for more reasons than carrying around a bag of `rough shag' & Rizzla papers.
What I really wanted to talk about was the inevitability of `The Smoking Ban' reaching our shabby little rock. I've experienced the dreaded thing in several other countries and cities & it's never the same thing.
In Los Angeles, for instance, it's been around for years. But then it never bothered me there as it's virtually impossible to enjoy a night out in LA anyway. (There are venues there now that take your lose change off of you when you enter the gig & all the drinks are rounded up to the nearest dollar. Why? So you don't have anything to throw at the band.) I once myself played a gig in Fresno, CA, another `No Smoking' town, where I was told that I could smoke on stage during my show, but only if I could prove it was an essential part of my performance. I said "sure it's essential, I don't smoke, I don't play, how's that?". The Viper Room, a nonsense cubby hole of a club in Hollywood openly flaunted the smoking ban some years ago because it made them hipper, in some way `dangerous'. Brrrrrr.... why indeed should England tremble?
Californian law-makers make laws because as a society, they're terrified of each other. More to the point, terrified of being sued by one another. But probably they are mostly terrified of having teeth that look like they're on loan from an Englishman. Who fuckin' knows.... they're all mental out there and you surely didn't hear that from me first.
Last year I sat next to a Californian male, of approximately the same age as me, on a plane to LA, who told me that Los Angeles County had recently issued him with some kind of fine for smoking in his own apartment. Apparently the downstairs neighbour could smell his cigarette smoke & reported him to the authorities. It appeared he had committed an actual offence simply by bringing his existence to another person's attention. Land of the free....
The first night that the ban was introduced in New York two people got killed as a result of arguments born out of the matter. But the famous `NY Attitude' of "that shit'll never go down here...." buckled in no time. Some of my favourite bars in NYC now resemble office buildings with groups of smokers assembled on the step, rain or shine, indulging in the mighty weed. This has it's advantages though, "Manitoba's" on Tompkin Square Park, owned & run by the mighty Handsome Dick Manitoba, former lead vocalist of The Dictators, suffers the ban. Even Handsome Dick himself has to retreat to the pavement for a smoke. I know this because I followed him out one evening in hope of a chat. And I got one, I think we even chained a few.
On the whole, and you know I hate admitting this, I'm not overly troubled by the ban & in my most reasonable of moments (few & far between) I even support it. A couple of months ago I was in Dublin, the ban had been in effect since early April this year. At first, on visiting one of the city's finest bars, J. Grogans, I was very uneasy as I sat down for my first pint of Kilkenny. It's a reflex action for me. Bar-pint-seat-fag. I shared my discomfort with my friends, but as the conversation began to flow & the laughs grew louder, the irritation subsided. I even felt quite ridiculous as I made an excuse of having to make a phone call, just to step onto the street to feed my habit.
The smoking ban in Dublin introduces one problem that I haven't encountered in North America though. And that is, the overwhelming smell of farts that permeates every bar, venue & club that I visited. North American cities are well equipped with their air conditioning systems, Eire ain't. We're all at it, farting is as natural behaviour as breathing, but Holy Prairie Shit(!), I've never smelt anything like it. And worse than the initial whiff you get on entering your chosen environment is the fact that you get used to it, it seems to go away!
The ban in Eire applies to `the work place'. This can be a bar, an office, a restaurant or, and this is the one that amuses me the most, a company owned vehicle. Picture, if you will, three great big blokes, sardined into the front seat of their works transit van, a copy of The Sun on the dash board. They should be made to smoke for chrissakes! It's a great British tradition. Not any more it ain't, not the way things are going. And as for employees of bars & clubs not being polluted by other people's smoke! That's like a librarian complaining of the silence in their work place!
And so, will The Smoking Ban come here? More than likely yes, in my opinion. I even might find myself welcoming it, just a little bit. Hangovers are a breeze when I've not been chain smoking. And I tend to chain smoke when I'm out on the lash. I rather prefer having friends come visit me & my flat mates in our home anyway, as opposed to sitting in a pub, bar or club in this country, listening to some one else's dreadful taste in music. But then judging by the ways of California & Eire, I might not be too long before I'm unable to smoke in my own home... it is my work place after all.
If the ban comes to Rubbish Island then so be it. But please, let's work on getting those air conditioners installed first!
Miles Hunt. September 2004.
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