New Fads to Rival Smoking?

By Daniel Taverne


I used to smoke cigarettes and let me tell you, smoking is a disgusting habit I’m glad I kicked. Now if only everyone else in my life would stop smoking I’d be happy. Unfortunately, tobacco companies have done an outstanding job marketing the smoldering paper wrapped stick weeds over the years, and have millions of people (including my loved ones) thinking smoking is cool.

Maybe that’s why I had to quit smoking, and repeatedly observe my loved ones holding those cancer sticks between their fingers and lips, and smell the toxic trailing and gusting smoke emanating from them before I realized how utterly ridiculous the act of smoking actually is. That being said, I still wonder from time to time how I ever thought it was cool to breathe toxic chemicals into my lungs, then expel only some of them. Maybe it was the act of lighting up that I thought was cool.

A buddy of mine used to light his cigarettes the coolest way imaginable. He’d stylishly flip out a smoke, then quickly produce and strike up a Zippo lighter, squinting his eyes while cupping the flame in his hand like some kind of western sorcerer. As he exhaled the smoke, he’d scan the horizon while confidently nodding his head. Let me tell you, he was the coolest. Now that I think about it, I think he and I (when I mimicked him) were not cool at all, but instead were just plain stupid. What a waste smoking is. It’s a waste of money, time, and health.

As everyone knows, smoking causes lung cancer, and these days costs a lot of money. Its for this reason that I tell people instead of smoking, they’d be better off if every morning they burned a five dollar bill, and every hour, on the hour, they slapped themselves in the face really, really hard. Better yet, they can give me the five dollars, and I’ll do the slapping for them.

As I thought about this little rant, I began wondering how such a ridiculous practice (such as smoking) began. I figured such cultural behaviors grow out of fads, then decided to tell you about a few equally ridiculous fads that might, or might not, threaten to take hold in our society as well.

One new fad is called golf ball Grilling. Two or more golf balls are placed in the mouth, and juggled with the tongue. They are then lodged in front of the teeth, but behind the lips so that when the person smiles, only the white of the golf balls are seen. This fad has caught on after a famous rap artist was seen in public doing the same thing. Members of the Cripps and the Bloods began mimicking the mouth balling, and white suburbia is following suit. Some people are taking this fad a step further by tennis ball grilling.

Another new fad is called cheek sticking. Cheek-stickers set the end of a really short stick on fire, then blow it out leaving the smoking and glowing red. They then lodge the non-burning end of that stick between their butt cheeks. The result is an appealing trail of smoke that appears to spontaneously emanate from their buttocks when they hop up and down or run really, really fast. Amazingly, many cigarette smokers say they can’t understand why anyone would want to do that.

Another New fad termed “muffling” involves injecting scented tobacco smoke deep into the rectum. The smoke is then pleasurably expelled throughout the day each time the users flatuate. Compared to cigarette smoking, muffling is reported to be less likely to cause lung cancer. However, muffling through a persons clothing is said to cause unsightly yellow tobacco stains in crotches that are difficult to remove.

Another issue being faced by practitioners of this fad involves employers. Because mufflers don’t want to breathe second hand cigarette smoke, and cigarette smokers are repulsed by second hand muffler smoke, employers across America have been forced to accommodate mufflers by begrudgingly providing public muffling areas separate from designated smoking areas.

Do you think the above fads are ridiculous? I hope so, because that’s how I wanted them to sound when I invented them. If you smoke, you should really think about the mechanics of what you are doing and maybe you’ll realize how ridiculous you are being for not only perpetuating this habit, but poisoning yourself in the process.