sqwabb

Nearly 16 months without a cigarette. I quit in late December of 2011. What's my secret? Respiratory-related illnesses. Indeed, when I would have something like the flu, my cravings for cigarettes would diminish in proportion to the severity.

I had previously used a bout of flu or bronchial-whatever to quit smoking at the end of 2007 -- I held out for eight months. At the beginning of 2008 I started working at the Vancouver Masonic Centre, doing custodial, event set-up, etc.. In some aspects, I found it to be a poisonous workplace. I used stress as a excuse to start smoking again (if we allow that to happen Timmy then the terrorists will have won!). I didn't try again until the end of 2011.

I only started smoking in my twenties; I was a wee-young graphic designer, in the middle of a fairly nightmarish magazine roll-out, which turned was a scam, BTW. Out for a stroll with a co-designer -- we were sooo tired, and playing the game, "I could so fall asleep on ..." that concrete, that car, etc.. She piped up that she had something that would perk us up (like bad dialogue from Reefer Madness!). She gave me an unfiltered Gauloise cigarette -- kind of an Adam and Eve moment; we ended up living together. I recall it sure did wake me up then, and I continued smoking for nearly 30 years -- ouch!

My lung power will never entirely recover, but I'll take what I can get. Sure I miss hacking my guts out in the morning, who wouldn't? But I don't smell like a human-sized ashtray, and I save some money.