Smoking
Pub life has always involved smoking and
being in a smoky atmosphere, but of course now that the smoking ban in England
has taken full effect pubs are starting to take on a sweeter aroma. Gone are the
days when an unsporting darts player could blow a cloud of smoke across the
dartboard just when a player was about to end his game on a splendid finish.
Nowadays when a player wants a cigarette to calm their nerves they have to
disappear outside for a quick drag.
So many people are going outside for a smoke that most pubs have erected gazebos of some sort for them to shelter in from our wonderful British weather. That’s fine for the Summer but what the smokers will do if we have a hard Winter I don’t know.
Apart from shelters for the smokers pubs
often install small bins on the outside of the pub doors or entrance walls for
the numerous cigarette ends that are discarded by the hordes that nip outside
for a quick smoke. I heard of one incident at a local pub the other day where
there were a number of smokers standing all in a line puffing away outside a pub
when a bus came up. The bus stopped by the line of men and waited with it’s
doors open. After a minute the driver called out, “Are you going to get on
then?”
The reply went back, “Very funny, we’re just having a cigarette.”
There is no doubt that the pubs smell completely different without the smoke and some people miss the old smells. Such is the feeling amongst a certain type of pub user that one firm has come up with an aerosol spray to add a certain flavour. It is not so much an air freshner but “Unfreshner” with the delicate scent of cigarette ends and the aerosol is called “Fag Ash.” You may laugh but some night clubs have found a more serious side to the missing aroma of cigarette smoke. Without the clouds of smoke to mask it the customers can smell the B.O. from the sweating dancers gyrating around the floor and it’s putting them off. So some clubs have had to add perfumed scent to their ventilation systems to hide the smell of the B.O.
Straying
a bit from pub life there have been other significant ramifications of the
cigarette ban. One acting company in London had to apply to the local council
before an actor could light up on the stage for a key role in a play that was
being staged. The Rolling Stones on the other hand have always been into drug
culture and not really paid that much attention to the law on drug use and are
as rebellious as ever. However, now they are all pensioners they limit their
illegal drug taking to smoking cigarettes on stage!