Walking Dogs While Smoking a Cigar
Theoretically smoking a cigar while walking the dogs always goes so smoothly and is a wonderful joy for all involved. I am at the park smoking a good cigar and the dogs are galloping around and not getting muddy from the tip of the their noses to the end of their tales. Alas, that never happens.
My first problem is that it’s inevitably windy at the park and it wrecks havoc on the lighting of my cigar. I have to crouch in a ball and say a prayer to get my cigar lit well enough. When I do this I must look a lot like a gigantic armadillo in the presence of a predator. Then, once it’s lit the burn line will almost always give me problems. It burns a little to fast on this side and on the other side it doesn’t burn fast enough. Rotating doesn’t work because it seems like the winds can sense me turning my cigar and will shift itself accordingly.
But that isn’t where my problems end, oh no. The taste of the cigar is off too. It’s not like the cigar is waste, it still tastes good, but it’s different. Whether it be to the smells of the park, the walking around or thanks to the helping hand my friend the wind has given me the cigar always seems to lack as much flavor as when I’m smoking it sitting down.
There’s more. Now that I have my cigar lit and have started to walk my dogs, two chocolate labs weighing 75 and 95 pounds, have already sprinted off to make sure their scent is still on that tree and the thousand others at the park. No bother, I say to myself, no one else is here! And that is usually the case except for when it’s not.
Sometimes other people will show up at the park and sometimes they will have the gall to bring their dogs as well. And then sometimes they will have the temerity to ask me to leash my dogs. Well, I think you can see the beginnings of a problem here since I have two dogs and three things to hold: my cigar, with its misbehaving burn line, and my two substantial dogs with enough energy to run for miles. Oh, and the bag I have to carry that holds leashes, water bowl and an Epipen since the more substantial dog is deathly allergic to bees and wasps.
So what choices do I have? I can either throw the cigar away, which is a cheaper cigar but it’s still a cigar, or I can sling the bag under my left arm, hold both of the leashes in my left hand and continue smoking. More often than not I choose the latter option because I’m stubborn.
That’s usually the worst that happens when I’m walking my dogs with a cigar. Occasionally things are worse. As was the case the other day when within a couple of minutes of getting to the park my boys find a girl dog in heat. And I’m smoking a cigar. And all the dogs are off leash. So here I am pulling 170 lbs of dog away from the thing they most want in this world with a cigar in my mouth.
Once I have finally separated them from the female dog I am dumb enough to let go of them for a minute so that I can get leashes on them. As you may have guessed, that was stupid of me so I had to do my best impression of history and repeat myself. But this time the leashes were ready and the cigar was safely resting on a picnic table not made out of wood (the likelihood of starting a fire if I had put my cigar on a wooden table is basically zero but still not worth it).
In the end I just let the cigar go out and walked my horny dogs on leash for the remainder of the walk. I was somewhat angry with them at the time but that was pretty dumb because they are dogs and I don’t think they could have stopped themselves from doing it like they do it on the Discovery Channel if they had tried. And it’s not like either of them was about to try that Herculean task of self restraint either.
One of the other negative situations I am faced with while smoking a cigar while taking my dogs on a walk is when my dog walking friends are also at the park. They aren’t the kind of people who will complain about dogs being off leash since their dogs are also off leash but some of them are the kinds of people who will overtly hint at their disgust of cigar smoke.
For a while I would just politely let my cigars go out whenever a nonsmoker dog walker would pop by but then I realized that I just don’t like some of these people. Fortunately, the ones I like are also smokers, mostly cigarette smokers, but they will at least not pretend to need to cough when they get within a country mile of cigar smoke. So, for this situation at least, there is an ancillary benefit to smoking a cigar while walking my dogs.
Oh, I almost forgot about the one thing that unites, or at least should unite, all dog walkers: the poop bag. For whatever reason, my dogs have decided that the park is the best place to take a crap. Actually, they usually take many craps down there. So I have to hold the cigar in my mouth, take out the blue plastic bag, open it up and turn it inside out with my hand inside, take the cigar out of my mouth so that when I bend over to pick up the poop I don’t choke on the smoke and pass out into my dog’s feces, pick up the poop, stand up and put the cigar back in my mouth, tie the poop back together so that it won’t smell so bad in the trash can and then throw it away in the trash can. Yes, it’s a complicated process but it’s the right thing to do. I always hated stepping in crap when I was a kid at the park.
I guess now is as good a time as any to make your reading of this post of dog walker angst worth your while. So here are some tips if you too want to smoke a cigar while walking your dogs:
- Bring one of your cheaper cigars along since it won’t be as good as it would be if you were sitting down.
- Bring a cigar with a little extra body to it because mild cigars will end up tasting like nothing at the park.
- Know your dogs, if they are going to be a pain in your butt most of the time then don’t smoke that cigar.
- Light your cigar in the car so that you can mitigate the wind’s interference.
- Keep your lighter on you because you will probably need to do some burn line maintenance along the way.
- Watch out for other people with dogs because if your dogs are anything like mine they will get more unruly around other dogs.
- Go at a time when the park will be almost completely empty like early morning, the afternoon or at night.
Do you have any dog walking stories?
Cuba Libre Short Cigar Review
This is a cheap cigar; $2.50 per stick or less when you buy it by the box. As long as cheap cigars are tasty they are worth it. If they aren’t tasty, well, I think you get the picture.
Very nicely made box pressed cigar. It is probably a little too tightly packed bit it does have a good amount of oils on the wrapper. No blemishes on the wrapper that I can see which is a good omen.
Thanks go out to Cigars Direct for this cigar.
Cigar Stats
Length: 6″
Ring Gauge: 50
Wrapper: Honduras
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua
Price: $50.00/Box of 20
Krish Krush Flame!
Earthiness is the first flavor to greet my palate. There is a slight coffee flavor there as well. Nothing spectacular with this cigar though. Good draw and burn, medium bodied.
Slow burning cigar with some good flavors. It’s not exactly the most memorable cigar though. The flavors aren’t boring, per se. They just are not all that lively.
A hint of charcoal starts creeping in near the beginning and takes on a more substantial role as the burn progresses. It’s a pretty good cigar.
Now that I have finished this cigar I can say that for $2.50 a cigar it might well be worth it. Don’t expect much from this cigar as it does not have much to give. Average is the best way to describe this cigar.
3 points
Perdomo Habano Corojo Cigar Review
A rather thickish-looking robusto, this cigar has no visible malformations. Of course, like nearly all cigars, it has the stray bump but even those seem to be less bumpy than the average cigar’s bumps. Plus it is oily and nicely packed.
Cigar Stats
Length: 5″
Ring Gauge: 50
Wrapper: Nicaragua
Binder: Nicaragua
Filler: Nicaragua
Price: $90.00/Box of 20
Gaiman Flame!
After getting it lit, which took longer than usual, I am welcomed with a bouquet of goodness. There’s a little bit of a zing followed by a floral sweetness, a bit of a cookie dough flavor, a touch of citrus and some barnyard for good measure. This is definitely a unique mix of flavors and, even though this cigar is in its infancy, it is shaping up to be a good cigar.
Now that I am a little more than an inch into this cigar I can still say that I like it. Citrus is playing the lead right now, which, while interesting, is a little odd. It’s not like the citrus flavor is bad but, well, it’s just unexpected. On the other side of the coin is a dash of spice; thankfully. That barnyard flavor, more like hay, is still present. That cookie dough flavor is not.
After the halfway point this cigar becomes a little bland. Citrus is gone and in its place is a full-throated hay flavor, which is boring. I had higher hopes at the beginning of this cigar but all my hopes seem to have gone down the drain after the halfway point.
It’s a medium bodied cigar with a good draw and a good enough burn (a couple of touchups were necessary during the middle third).
Three quarters of the way through and it does improve a little bit. A doughy flavor starts to come through and the hay takes on a burnt quality. Additionally, a nutty flavor has also entered the mix.
Alright, it is a fine cigar but it’s just nothing special. Like most other Perdomos it falls into that solid category.
88 points
Happy Father’s Day
To my dad and all the other fathers out there I hope that you have a wonderful Father’s Day. Go watch a movie, have lunch with your kids, start a bonfire or smoke a cigar with your kids.
San Lotano Maduro Cigar Review
I like the look and smell of this cigar. It’s dark brown, almost black, and the tobacco gives a distinctive barnyard aroma to it. There is some spice in the smell as well, gives it a bit of zest.
The San Lotano Maduro is a box pressed beauty. From what I can see there is nothing more than a pittance of a flaw on the wrapper and that “flaw” is just a minor stretch mark about 1.5″ down from the foot. When you feel the wrapper it’s extremely oily and very smooth.
Here is what the cigar maker has to say about the meaning of this cigar:
San Lotano meaning “from San Lius” refers to Pinar del Rio´s most famous city and the birthplace of A.J. Fernandez. The San Lotano brand originated in pre-Castro Cuba under the direction of A.J.´s grandfather. Today the tradition continues in Nicaragua where San Lotano is made with the choisest, aged Cuban seed tobaccos all fermented using the secret Fernandez family process, wich has been passed on for over three generations. Let San Lotano gives you a glimpse into what real cigar making is all about, a atradition you can taste.
Now let’s smoke this baby!
Cigar Stats
Length: 6″
Ring Gauge: 52
Wrapper: Mexican Maduro
Binder: Dual – Honduran & Dominican
Filler: Honduras & Nicaragua
Price: ~$7.00/Single
Movie Maker Flame!
This is another one of my cigars that have been resting in my humidor for a while now; this one at least seven or eight months. While the extra time maturing in my humidor has helped this cigar I don’t think it has made a tremendous difference – maybe more time would. But that doesn’t mean this is a bad cigar, not at all.
Creamy is the best way to describe the smoke’s texture. Smoke just goes everywhere and the flavors stay much longer than the flavors from most other cigars. Earth, mint, hay are chased by a small but lingering bit of strong spice. Interesting and complex at the beginning of a cigar usually portends good things for the rest of the cigar.
Some changes do happen during the second third. Sweetness begins to take over a little bit more, it kind of reminds me of caramel. Hay is still there and so is that spice on the end. Altogether, it’s still a pretty good cigar.
During the final third the sweetness basically vanishes and in its place is earth and some hay. The spice has also nearly vanished, but not completely.
Overall, it is a pretty complex cigars with some very enjoyable flavors. The draw is good but the burn does require some maintenance. This is a medium bodied cigar. My main problem with this cigar is that the flavors, while good, just are not what I am looking for in a cigar. I would have liked the spice to be a more central component to the flavor profile and less hay.
88 points
