Spring or Summer?

Doesn't seem like Mother Nature can decide between the two, at least not in Virginia. All I know is that the past few days have been beautiful, as well as progressively hotter and hotter. I'm not a real big fan of heat and humidity. I come from southern California, where it can get reasonably hot but where it's rarely, if ever, very humid.

The point is that I've been enjoying the occasional smoke or two on the apartment balcony over the past week or so. Granted, we're at a time of the year where the sun is pretty much up at 6:30am and doesn't set until well after 8:30pm. In the evening, it's not so bad (depending on the humidity, which seems to retain the day's heat), especially when there's a cool breeze.

I know those days are numbered. This place isn't exactly Needles, which is about as close to Hell as I ever want to get; come to think of it, I'd better change my evil ways if I want to avoid such a fate. When we drove to VA from CA in July of 2007, we spent about an hour in Needles and the temperature didn't drop below 123 degrees. It was a wretched, dismal town, where the people seemed listless from the heat and eternally condemned to wander its roads and sidewalks drenched in sweat. The poor devils. I'd rather go 400 miles out of my way to avoid the place rather than drive through it again.

But I digress.

I know the day quickly approaches when I will step out on the balcony to enjoy a pipe and find that the heat is too oppressive to tolerate. I'll be driven back inside, to air-conditioned bliss, and my wife will bemoan the fact that I've chosen to smoke inside. I'm such a bastard.

Smoking in cold weather is much more merciful than smoking in hot weather. I suppose there's something to be said for cool-burning tobacco in the summer months (never you mind that summer in Virginia seems to last from mid-May to late-September). I guess it might have something to do with the fact that you're sucking on the smoke from a very small, smoldering fire. This is my first summer as a pipe smoker, and I dread it.

I also have this tendency to smoke my pipes a little on the hot side, especially at work. As much as I'd like to take my time and smoke for half an hour, I've usually got about five to ten minutes at a stretch to enjoy a quick puff. On particularly harrowing days, I'll take two or three breaks; normally (about 80% of the time) I take one. I really need to do something about smoking the pipes too hot. It really does affect the flavor.

Not much else to say today. I'm just babbling, really. It's going to be a busy day, and I figured I'd warm up (heh) with a blog post.

Oh, and while I'm thinking about it ...

I ordered a new combo pouch. The original one is pretty much shot, between the torn inner lining and the zipper being tweaked. The second one is still substandard (but what do you expect for $9?). The new one is a MacBaren, black leather. Holds two pipes and a big wad of leaf. Only downside is that it needs to lose the chemical smell of whatever they tanned or dyed the leather with.

I also ordered 4 ounces of a root beer flavored tobacco. The reason I ordered so much is that it was only about $1 more for 4 ounces of the stuff than it would've been for a single ounce. I reckoned that on the off chance it turned out to be a good blend, I'd have a lot of it laying around. I've only tried it once, and despite the pouch smell (which is pleasant and faintly root beerish), the actual smoke is somewhat bitey though not entirely unpleasant.

I'll need to try it again under more relaxed circumstances, given that I smoked this on my break at work and I'm sure I was smoking it a bit on the hot side. ::sigh::