Is cigarette smoking nearly non-existent in Boulder and nearby?

[Sean Kellogg]

Originally Posted by brown_dog_us

Hey, we do get a lot of tourists from Nebraska.

Saw another guy light up today, again at a gas station. I checked his plates and they were indeed Colorado. He looked kinda like this but wasn't smiling:

[bostonguy1960]

Originally Posted by Meowen

Please don't move here, most of us don't smoke, and most of us don't take kindly to racists either.

I don't think I'm racist...just classist.

Most smokers in my Boston environment seem to be of lower education and white, some minorities, seems many Chinese men, and some foreign students.


I'm a veteran cabbie, and realize many/most of you would consider me white trash, and not rent a room or apt. to me...even without meeting me.. all due to my job. If I called myself an Uber driver, you'd have a better opinion, right? Well, at least here in Boston, one's job is important to image in many cases. It's just the way some/many people are here. We all have some prejudices against some people, I think. We have biases against certain colleges, certain cars people choose to drive, etc. We judge.

I judge people on clothing, grammar, tattoos, piercings, use of profanity. When I see someone attractive, then they reach for a cigarette, I'm disappointed. Heck, they're not any less of a person once they reach for that cigarette, I understand, but I do pre-judge.

Am I the only one who admits this?

[Mike from back east]

Originally Posted by bostonguy1960

... Am I the only one who admits this?

You're not the only one. I don't like smoking, hell, I hate it. It killed my father and one of my uncles and two of my B-I-Ls and my oldest sister and my little sister fought off breast cancer but still smokes. I grew up in a house full of smoke and cannot stand the memories of yellowed walls and yellowed drapes on the windows and hazy car windows. Before Jimmy Carter outlawed it in Federal offices I used to come home every day reeking of the stuff. I won't hang around any place where there's smoke. None of my pals smoke. We go out to eat more now that it seems every eatery is smoke free and I so like that smoking no longer is allowed on airplanes.

It seems that trades workers smoke more than the white collar types, or maybe it just seems that way since the white collar types have to exit the building to smoke. When some of my co-workers in the Pentagon had to jump out of a second story window after the plane hit on 9-11, there were already people outside who caught them as they jumped - it was the guys outside for a smoke break.

I've one Boston cabbie joke I've been waiting for years to tell.... an unemployed English major from Harvard was driving a cab for a living, a fare hops in at the airport and says 'take me some place where I can get scrod' and the English major cabbie says 'that's the first time I've heard it in the past plu-perfect tense.' (Cabbie thought the fare wanted to go to a bordello, but scrod is actually the term for young cod, haddock or other whitefish....takes a certain wordsmith to enjoy that joke.)

[Stevedore]

Originally Posted by mysticaltyger

I'm not sure of the details because I don't live there.

I just know that here in CA where pot is supposed to be for "medicinal" purposes only (which is a joke), people smoke it openly in public and there's little to no enforcement.

I live in Long Beach which is very liberal, never seen what you're describing.

[livecontent]

I also pre-judged people I see smoking and I will not apologize. I do not associate with those who smoke tobacco and/or marijuana. I will not patronize any business or hire anybody who smokes, if I can avoid it and had other choices. If I was again in the working world, I would not hire smokers.

No one smoked in my immediate family. The extended relatives who did smoke all died of cancer before their time.

I never could stand bowling alleys because they were filled with smoke. Where I grew up--unions, booze, smoking, gambling, bowling, the mob and whores were all comorbid.

When I managed restaurants when they had smoking and non-smoking sections, it was a big issue with wait assignments. All wanted to wait on smokers as they tended to tip more. Of course, it comes from being loose with money. Smokers then to be heavier drinkers and think nothing of throwing cash on a bar for a tip. Non-smokers are more conservative and watchful of their money. An interesting note that in breakfast service, non smoking tables filled up earlier while smoking tables saw the smokers straggling in later.

I had much dealing with Boulder employees who I supervised when I was younger. Those who smoked and those who smoked pot were the worse workers. The pot smokers did not pay attention to details and were not conscientious; as such, there were situations where it was a danger to customers and other employees health and life--and I fired many of them.

To see smoking at gas pumps goes beyond toleration.

Livecontent