1839 menthol ryo pipe tobacco

Smoking Attestation

"$1,000.00 Penalty
Penalty is assessed if you attest to using tobacco/nicotine, or the __________ deadline has passed without attesting.
Tell us if you have used tobacco or nicotine products in the last 90 days. If you haven't, you'll automatically avoid the surcharge."

1K USD penalty (for people who make less than 50K per year after taxes).

"Tobacco/nicotine products include cigarettes, electronic cigarettes, vape pens, cigars, pipe smoking, snuff, chewing tobacco, nicotine patches, nicotine gum and other nicotine supplements."

If this were about lung health, nicotine patches would not be included. This suggests moralism.
Provider Screening Form

"A patient's waist measurement is considered if the patient does not pass the wellness program BMI goal".

This says "don't be fat" in nice language. This is the more interesting part as it expands beyond smoking policies.
Company Details
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bravowell
Legal

1. Reputational Damage: "Your not hurting their reputation. They did that to themselves".
2. Legality of policy: Everything here is legal. That is what makes it interesting.
3. Fair Use: This is evidence related to my informal journalism.

I hope this post is useful for the discussion around health insurance in America.

So I've never smoked a pipe before but love the smell so want to try it I'm personally a cigar guy myself what tobacco and pipe would you recommend that's decent and cheap that pairs well with a whisky as that's when I smoke?

Bundle deals available/I'm open to reasonable offers. More details are on my spreadsheet. New items have been added recently (particularly from NAVA)! Some notes:

• Most perfumes were received direct from the original store. If you want me to double-check, just let me know!
• All perfumes are kept in a cool, dark place. I live in a non-smoking and pet-free house.
• Payment via PayPal G&S. I will send an invoice. Prices are in USD.
• If buying multiple items that aren't already bundled, make me a reasonable offer for a discount :)
• I will ship within 7 days of payment, though I am often much quicker and will ship same/next day!
• Shipping is $13 tracked to Canada unless you're only getting a few samples, in which case it's $3 without tracking. Shipping to the US is typically around $13 tracked (I will provide a quote based on zip code).
• If purchasing >$50, I'll offer a 50% discount on shipping. If >$125, shipping will be free regardless of location!
• I'm mostly looking to sell, but will consider swaps for scents listed on my ISO tab. However, I'm looking to get multiple items (at least three) from one seller.

Fantome

• Vasilia (FS): Clover honey, neroli, rich tonka, chamomile, dry hay, a flower crown of marigolds & sunflowers

Stereoplasm

• Clemency (2 samples are available): Myrrh, clementine teak, thyme, photographic fixer, tobacco, suede
  
• Disco Stardust (both a FS and sample are available): Winter Mai Tais, roll-on lip gloss, expensive sunglasses, tanning bed oil and new car smell
  
• Excitation: Frothed Irish cream with rye whiskey, evaporated milk, wild honey and chocolate covered coffee beans
  
• Opaline: Iridescent and heavy stones of opalized amber, birds of paradise, frozen yucca and lacquered teak
  
• Perdotmint (both a FS and sample are available): Gems of concorde pear, crushed spearmint, iced green tea and classic jade accord
  
• Yellownog: Intoxicating bourbon-vanilla, cigar-smoked cinnamon, clementine stars, shredded coconut and Chantilly cream
  

Possets

• Mrs. Rabbit's Carrot Cake (FS): The most moist and vanilla drenched melting cake shot through with sugar encrusted rum kissed currents and golden raisins and crowned with the richest butter filled sour cream and ricotta frosting and trimmed with tiny spun sugar carrots, and grass
  
• Silver Narcissus: A stunning fragrance that combines the luxurious Possets' Silver Base with the iconic Narcissus flower, evoking the essence of a warm and vibrant spring morning
  

Pulp Fragrances

• Women In Dresses Running From Houses 2021: This year's version is smokier and sweeter: Caramellized sugar, a roaring bonfire, heliotrope, aged patchouli, and a hint of violet

Nui Cobalt

• Hell Freezes Over: Decadent devil’s food cake, still warm from the oven, fluffy marshmallow frosting and the lightest dusting of crushed candy cane
  
• Little Brown Rabbit: Nutmeg and tonka bean nuzzle up against fluffy marshmallow, cottonflower, pink pepper, and a trace of carrot seed.
  
• Mendacity: Horchata: Classic horchata made from jasmine rice, demerara sugar, and true Ceylon cinnamon.
  
• Roll Initiative: Egyptian cotton, pale driftwood, white pepper, green cardamom, and a slender wisp of copal smoke.
  

Sucreabeille

• Alembic (FS): Sweet pumpkin souffle dotted with marshmallows and drizzled with buttery maple syrup. Tuberose wafts through the open front door

Arcana Wildcraft

• Witches Cavort with Cupcakes (FS): Pumpkin spice cupcakes are smothered in gobs of cream cheese frosting

Hexennacht

• I ♥ the 80’s: A Lisa Frank-esque powerhouse: tuberose, orange blossom, white amber, bubblegum, suntan oil, Aquanet hairspray, gummy worms, & fruit-scented erasers

Andromeda's Curse

• Strength: Coffee, Marshmallow, Milk Chocolate, Coumarin, Brown Sugar, Whipped Vanilla Frosting
  
• The Call of the Void: French Lavender, Nag Champa, Egyptian Amber, Sandalwood, Cedarwood, and Vanilla
  

Poesie

• Nectar: Nectar is the sweet scent of honeysuckle blossoms — honeyed, intoxicating, irresistible

Astrid

• Whisper: Cherry blossom, a pair of patchoulis, sugar, and vanilla

Alkemia

• Vanille Armour (FS): Vanilla Infused with Warm Spices

NAVA

• Buttercream Honey Bee (FS): Orange Blossom Honey, Buttercream Frosting accord, Vanilla, Crystalline absolute, Butter accord (vegan) and Vanilla Bean fleck
  
• Tobacco Musk: Tobacco Leaf, Fresh Pipe Tobacco, Tobacco Absolute, Caramel accord, Bastet’s Amber Absolute and soft white floral blend of Tuberose, Mallow, Angelica, Musk Flower, and White Lily all blended beautifully into Bastet's Musk base
  

Sixteen92

• Be Careful What You Wish For (FS): Dusty magic shop shelves, dried sage leaf, crystal ball, darkened amber musks, a puff of smoke

Pat McGrath

• Eye Ecstasy: Subversive Palette

Link again: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19URt2wyxl2xQd8XN2CPKzqBv0ZANl65yUTx9Gx_u0a4/edit?usp=drive_link
Thanks for checking out my destash!

I'm looking for a good tobacco shop to get pipe tobacco from. Any recommendations?

Last few months I’ve been having weird, inconsistent mouth hygiene issues. All of my back molars will spend a couple weeks hurting and being horribly sensitive at the base and then spend a few weeks being fine. I’ve also been getting more and more canker sores and lesions recently that will heal in a couple days but each new one is bigger than the last. I brush and floss on average once a day. My mouth hygiene has always been really good so the new stuff freaks me out.
My bad habits are eating LOTS of very spicy or sour food, and smoking/drinking inconsistently. I’ll spend a few weeks being really into cigars and pipe tobacco and then take anywhere from a couple weeks to a few months off without touching anything. This has been pretty regular since I was 17. I just spent the last few weeks smoking again, seeing as the weather is warming up and I like smoking tobacco socially, and yesterday I bought a vape for the first time ever. Enjoyed i for the day, but then woke up today with the under side of my tongue looking red and feeling irritated and my teeth hurting again.
Drinking on the other hand is less of an issue. Don’t do it super consistently and it doesn’t seem to be related to any flare ups.
I’m bringing this up because I have serious health anxiety and every time I get one of these flare ups it really stresses me out. The tooth pain started probably 6 months ago so it’s still kind of new to me. I’d just like to know if this is all usual stuff or if it’s cause for concern. I have an appointment with a local university since letting a student work on me for credit is cheaper than going to a professional dentist out of pocket, but that’s still not for a couple months and I want to know if any of this requires sooner attention.

I grew up around smoking. Cigarettes, that is. Despise them. Hate the smell.
Same with cigars.
But pipe tobacco...love the smell. Why does it smell so different/good?

Previous part
Before I go on with the story, I wanted to mention that I finally got around to checking my text messages. I shouldn’t be surprised that all of them were furious. I don’t blame them. I’m still distraught about the whole situation. I pretty much lost all of my friends in one day; all because I thought that a little boy’s doll would come to life and... well...
Just, listen to me.
I know that all of this will sound insane. But everything I am about to tell you happened before. I feel like I can’t bring myself to even think of the moment, let alone tell you, but I need to press on. It is time that you understand the moment that everything changed forever—Pete's 11th birthday party.
What happened on that day plays over and over again in my mind. It doesn’t matter that 30 years have passed. Not a night goes by where I am wrenched from my beleaguered sleep and find myself gasping for air in a pool of my own sweat. Years of broken sleep will get to a person over time. And so, I grew agitated and depressed. I was on and off on medication, and in and out of therapy.
Now, I don’t always freak out when I see them in pictures or on display in a shop’s front window. If I keep my distance and they keep theirs, I am fine. I mean, my breathing would quicken, and my heart would pump hard, but the moment would pass, and I’d come back to some level of normalcy. I’ve got my own way to deal with such a situation. I’d close my eyes and count from 100 to zero, deeply breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth, before slowly turning and walking away.
Oh, right. I guess you want to hear what happened.
XXXXX
Pete and his family lived in a massive two-story house with an acre of forestry within their property line. The house was miles outside of town. It was cozy but isolated.
I carpooled with Andy and his parents. We met up with Mark and his dad in the house. Our jaws dropped at how beautiful the house and their property were; none of us had ever been to such a fancy place.
Andy’s mom mentioned in the car that what she heard from the other moms was that Pete’s dad, George, worked as an inventor and toymaker for a company that no one had heard of, and his mom, Wendy, was a stay-at-home mom. She had tried to invite her out for coffee with the other moms. In the end she decided not to. Wendy’s presence was just too off-putting.
“She wouldn’t stop smiling,” Andy’s mom recalled, “and she’d just nod her head without saying anything. Not a word. And she moved in this very odd, kind of funny way, too. Like she didn’t know how to use her arms or legs.”
Kind of like how Pete was on his first day of class.
The family greeted the guests in the foyer with excited eyes and gaping smiles. They were the picture perfect of a 1950s TV sitcom family. Pete had on a blue and yellow checkered suit with a yellow bowtie. George also wore the same style of suit but with a blue tie. His outfit was topped with a tobacco pipe hanging at the side of his mouth. Wendy had on a yellow dress with a blue ribbon tied around her waist, and her flaming red hair rolled up in a bouffant hairstyle.
There were a couple of dozens of us that showed up to the party. Most of the parents came along, too. My mom couldn’t come; she was stuck at the restaurant picking up someone else’s shift. That was to say nothing of her continued fear and suspicion about the whole kidnapper situation. She believed they were still out there, and that the cops had gotten the wrong person.
Everyone was led into a banquet hall where a great feast waited for us. We stuffed ourselves until the buttons on our pants threatened to burst. Fat roasted turkey thighs, mince pies, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes smothered in gravy, a mountain of steaming sweet biscuits. The choices were endless. And the moms and dads enjoyed themselves, drinking the wine that Wendy, smiling emptily and silently, served.
George went around telling stories to anyone who’d be willing to listen. He was incredibly intelligent with a wide breadth of knowledge of world history. He spoke about historical events as if he’d been there himself, describing in such vivid detail of the event’s atmosphere like how the heaviness of grief weighed in the air at Alexander the Great’s funeral procession, and how frigid cold the Russian winter was in 1812 when Napoleon Bonaparte’s army marched towards Moscow.
He showed us a room filled with his collection of ancient artifacts, even an American Civil War-era musket rifle with a Minie ball still lodged inside. But what caught my attention and raised the hairs on my body were three mummies behind a glass case. They were about my height and, judging by the smallness of their faces, they had died as children.
“Why do you have those?” I asked.
George grinned. “Well, why not?”
“Where’d you get them from?” asked Andy.
“Far and near...”
Squinting, Mark stepped up closer to the glass. “Are they real?”
“What do your eyes tell you?”
Together, we pressed our noses to the glass, staring hard at these mummies. Their skin was withered brown, and parts of their yellowed bone were exposed. They stared back at us with dark empty sockets and twisted mouths as though they’d come face to face with something more terrifying and terrible than death. None of the adults with us thought it weird that this family had such a collection. The moms and dads were starting to act a bit giddy and silly; it was the generous amount of wine they’d drunk, probably.
After a tour of George’s mini-home museum, we were led into an adjacent room filled with toys, clowns, dolls, and a bizarre collection of crossbred animals. A full train set wound about the length of the room and over our heads. This was Pete’s playroom, and George had designed every toy. This massive room with all the toys and games was more than what a child could dream of.
Unable to control ourselves, we got our hands on everything; we were a bunch of 10-year-olds after all. We played with the toys and shrieked with laughter. The moms and dads watched us as they drank the wine Wendy was serving them. Before we knew it, time flew by, and the sun had long since gone down. The grandfather clock struck 9 o’clock. But we weren’t tired; we wanted to play some more. So, we were thrilled when the grown-ups nodded and agreed to let us go on.
Shining with happiness, Pete announced that we were to play a special game, even the grown-ups would be involved.
“This game is called Catch the Souls!” he said. “The rules are quite simple. There are two types of players: souls and catchers. The game will be played both in the dark and in the light. Souls are safe in the light and the catchers won’t be able to move. But when the lights are off, souls better find a place to hide for the catchers will hunt you down and bring you to the king—me!"
“Then, how do we know if we’ve won?” I asked.
His eyes darkened as the pupils enlarged. “Well, when you see the sun rise, then you’ll know.” My stomach sank.
Were we really going to play all night?
I looked at the others to see if they also thought this was a ridiculous idea. Much to my surprise, the others buzzed with excitement, even the adults were eager to play. No one wanted to go home just yet. They wanted to play more. And, surprisingly, I wasn’t at all that tired or sleepy either. George ordered for the moms and dads to follow him into another room; they were to put on their “catcher” costumes.
Mark, Andy, and I decided to stick together. We figured that if we could find a good spot to hide out in, we could wait there until the game was over. At the beginning of the game, all the lights were on in every room and hallway, and Pete counted backwards from 100.
My friends and I bolted. We didn’t realize how huge the house was. It was like a never-ending labyrinth. One door would lead to nowhere except a brick wall, or a sudden drop into what looked like a bottomless pit. Andy had nearly fallen into one and was only saved when Mark and I caught him by the arms as he fell and clung desperately to the doorknob.
The hallways echoed with giggles of excitement. But once the lights began to flicker, the whole house plunged into darkness. We hurried into another room. I hid behind a desk, Mark behind a big tapestry, and Andy in the corner of the room squatting behind a tall vase.
We waited.
We held our breath.
A hair-raising scream erupted in another room. Followed by another, then another. Three in succession.
“What was that?” I heard Mark ask, shakily.
“What are you doing?” Andy cried.
Peeking around the corner of the desk, I spotted Mark out from his hiding spot and poking his head out the door. He quickly shut the door and scrambled back behind the tapestry. Before I could ask him what he saw, the door opened. My body instantly went rigid. I was terrified that if I were to move or breathe, I’d get caught. I certainly didn’t want to find out what Pete would do to me.
A tall, shadowy figure with two long pointed ears entered the room. It was a Catcher. It hopped slowly around the room like a rabbit, playing with the leaves of the plants in the tall vase and sniffing around the tapestry. Then it turned its attention to the desk. I scooted back underneath the desk and slapped my hand over my mouth, desperate not to make a sound. I heard it hop into the air before its feet landed gently on the floor right next to the desk. It took a step closer to the spot where I lay in a fetal position. I hoped that I was small enough that it wouldn’t notice me.
Light swept throughout the room. And I let out a breath of relief. We were safe when the lights were on. That was the rule of the game, I reminded myself. I crawled out from underneath the desk and froze as I came face to face with a giant pink bunny. I knew that inside the costume was a classmate’s parent. But there was something off about it, like it had no good intentions. It stared back with large black orbs for eyes. Its large buck teeth dripped droplets of red on the white carpet. Dark red chunks like mushed up beets fell from its mouth.
“Benjie! Don’t just stand there!” Mark pulled me out of the trance, and I ran out with them. At the end of the hallway, we saw another Catcher dressed in a court blue and yellow jester suit and mask.
The lights flickered; one minute warning for us to find another hiding spot. Without looking back, we ran and tried getting into another room. With utter mortification I learned that most of the doors were locked. Not only that, but others only led to dead ends. We went through one door that led to another hallway that stretched on endlessly with rows of doors on either side of us.
Behind us, the bells jingled on the dangling sleeves of the jester’s cap ‘n’ bells. It got closer and closer. Of course, I stupidly looked back. One by one the wall lights went out, and the laughing jester twirled and leapt its way to us.
We came to a door at the end of the hallway, but it wouldn’t budge. Andy banged on it and twisted the knob as hard as he could.
“I want to stop playing this game,” Mark sobbed. He backed into the corner, trembling and crying. A dark wet spot appeared in front of his pants. I also felt something wet and warm trickling down my pants.
The jester was approaching, inching closer and closer by the second. And then, it stopped. It squatted in the dark with its hands under its chin, gazing at us with its harrowing black eyes. The only thing keeping it from capturing us was that the light from a single wall lamp shielded us. Sniffling and wiping his tears away, Mark squeaked, “Dad?” He took a step forward with an outreached hand seeking a sliver of comfort.
“I don’t think he’s your dad,” I said, but my words didn’t reach him. The jester gestured with a single finger for him to come closer.
“I got it! Come on, guys!” Andy cried, happily, as the door finally swung inward with a hard kick revealing a lighted room. I grabbed hold of Mark’s arm, but he shook me off. And I watched in horror as he tugged on the jester’s mask and pulled it off.
It was Mark’s dad behind the mask. His smile was split so wide, I could see his gums bleed and the skin at the corners of his lips had torn. He was foaming heavily at the mouth like a rabid dog.
“Dad...” Mark uttered.
The wall light went out. And that was the last I saw of him.
XXXXX
I’ll have to continue with my story later. I need to eat something. I can’t remember the last time I did. The hunger is gnawing my stomach. There’s nothing in the fridge. I didn’t even get leftovers from my friend’s birthday party. It’s okay. All I need now is to feed this body.
Next Part

For all my smokers here, is there any good menthol cigarettes ? I used to smoke Royale but apparently u can't find it in Tunisia anymore. And Oris tobacco tastes like s*it
Thank u in advance guys

My first ever attempt at a wood spirit tobacco pipe, could be better but I had fun doing it

chapters 1&2
chapter 3
chapter 4
chapter 5
chapter 6
chapter 7
chapter 8
chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Link to AO3
Gentry’s sweet cravings were getting out of hand.
The last time she had a proper dessert was almost a week ago, and if she had something to say about it, no amount of saccharine text exchanges with pretty boys was going to replace a good old sugar rush. A couple of days ago Sereen treated her to the sweetest snack she could get with her status and that piece of dried fruit was nowhere near enough to satisfy G’s sweet tooth.
So many vending machines and eateries, but not a single good bakery? Hell, even a crappy one would do at this point! She had to hunt down some glucose tonight.
After Sereen’s initial tour around the city, she went off leaving G to explore the city on her own. It was getting easier and easier. With the auglasses on, finding her way around proved pretty intuitive, not in the least thanks to the distinct chessboard-like layout of Ashtapada. Each district had a letter-number label. By remembering one’s “square code”, one could find their way back on foot or by cab in no time wherever they found themselves.
Gentry spent hours exploring the wide walking streets and little nooks that offered yet another glimpse into Ashtapadan reality. She once stumbled upon a bookshop with nothing on the shelves but blank-page tomes. The shopkeeper asked her what she was looking for and after finding out the she was a Newcomer, explained that it was a book-on-demand type of place. She would place an order for a story and he would write it for her in a matter of days.
What confused her most was the snow-white buildings of the city. Despite being made with rough porous concrete, they were drowning in lush greenery that sometimes looked like it nearly chocked the structure. Each had the same distinct feature, though, that made them all look unfinished: however tall or short was the building, the top floor always looked under construction. Though there always were the omnipresent hounds on each of the working site, there were never any cranes or scaffolding visible. The obliging auglasses offered G the answer: everything from the smallest houses to the few high rises was essentially self-producing! From what little she understood reading about this advancement, the carbon in the atmosphere was captured by special aerial filters and dissolved in some water. It later went through the pipes in the buildings’ skeleton-like armature and got sprayed on. As the water evaporated, the carbon solidified into neat coral-like blocks that formed the walls and other structures.
Well, that explained why the fumes she saw on the outskirts smoked backwards!
It was getting dark and the orderly streets came alive once G engaged her glasses that revealed the digital underside of Ashtapada again. Every business had a modest sign in the physical world that didn’t stand out on the angular facades. But there also was a hidden bright animated augmented-reality one that could compete with Broadway neon in brightness.
Signs like these weren’t just decorating the facades: the 3D ones flashing on the ground filled almost the whole field of view, too. They looked amazingly enticing in the evening dusk. Information stalls with digital assistants, huge arrows pointing at meeting points, temporary signs inviting strangers to join a club gathering — Gentry was going to gawk at every single one tonight. She came up to some of them, waving hands in the air to try and touch the flickering lights, not caring what she looked like from the outside. Ashtapadans seemed a very relaxed bunch, not putting their noses in others’ business, which felt liberating. Noting how other people in the streets interacted with 3D service bots, G came up to one of them, too.
“Hello, Gentry, how can I help you tonight?” it chirped. The hologram looked like a cute animated girl with an elaborate pink hairdo. “You can ask me a question directly or say “What can you do” to access the list of commands.”
“Hi!” G said. “Do you have a name?”
“You can call me Yukio,” it responded with a little curtsy. “I can answer any questions, show you around or chat about anything!”
Any question? It must know where the desserts were sold! On second thought, wasn’t there something more important than that? Something that brought G here in the first place.
“I’m looking for a person named Exxy Mah,” she said to the patiently smiling girl. “Is there a citizen or a newcomer with this name?”
“There is!” Yukio answered, gleefully jumping in the air. “Exxy Mah is a famous Ashtapadan, she is an advocate for healthy living. You might have seen her on posters and screens around the city.”
The woman in the picture the assistant conjured up floating in thin air showed an elderly woman. She was looking very fit for her age but it clearly wasn’t the Exxy Gentry knew.
“Hmm... That’s not her...” G said. “There has to be another.”
The girl suddenly looked on the verge of tears. “I’m sorry! It’s the only one in Ashtapada! No other Citizens or Newcomers are registered by this name!”
Did her friend change her name then?
“A friend of mine should’ve arrived here last year under the same name. Can you check where she is now?”
Yukio’s helpful attitude fell apart in an instant. Her posture became stiff like a 3D model she was and a voice void of any emotion informed, “Personal data on people of Ashtapada, including their whereabouts is protected by the privacy laws of the city. Please rephrase your search.”
A blink later, the same cute Yukio was standing in front of G again.
“Can I help with anything else?” she smiled.
Was there a way to ask this dummy in a way that would give her at least a hint about her friend?
“Ok, Yukio,” G attempted. “When did the famous Exxy Mah you mentioned arrive at Ashtapada?”
The girl flickered into a wooden statue again, “Personal data on people...”
“Ok, ok, I got it,” G waved. “Bring back the friendly assistant, you creep me out.”
“Can I help with anything else?” the model went again.
G sighed.
“Is there a place a newcomer can get something sweet, a chocolate or a cake perhaps?”
Yukio gasped indignantly, “Ashtapada has a very strict policy on stimulants! You can’t legally buy any tobacco, alcohol, products with added sugar and other such substances!”
“Such substances!” G hollered, forgetting for a second that she was talking to a lifeless simulation. “Sugar is completely harmless! It’s good for your brains you know! Can I at least ask a Сitizen to get me a snack?”
The girl crossed her arms in defiance.
“You can’t buy any dessert in Ashtapada, whatever your status, the law is for everyone. No refined sugar!”
G thought for a moment, rewinding their conversation in her memory.
“Did you say I can’t buy sugar legally?”— Gentry perked up — “Is there a black market of sweets I can go to?”
“A black market of sweets!”
Yukio stared. It was clearly the first time she had had to deal with this particular word combination. It took her a second or two to process the request.
“There’s no black market of sweets in Ashtapada,” she stated, confidently, at last.
“Ok, pinkhead,” G said, rolling her eyes. “I guess it took all candy floss in Ashtapada to make that hair.”
Annoyed at the assistant, she stomped through the bright neon figure in front of her and into the pedestrian street now full of people.
If there was a place with some glucose in this stuck-up place, she was going to sniff it out.
***
The hunt wasn’t of much success. After watching a street performance by a group of dancers, listening to an impromptu debate and taking part in a couple of opinion polls, Gentry finally felt that it had been a little too much. Even with the auglasses disengaged, he noise, the people and the boisterous crowds in the streets seemed to pour light and sound directly into her brain in an endless stream. It gave her a headache.
Calling up a map from her wristcomm with an already practised motion, she marked a place nearby that looked much quieter and had a swarm of vending machines, too.
Screw the sugar, she just needed some water now.
The place was indeed quite secluded. The narrow street started on the edge of the bustling zone she just left but didn’t seem to cut into the living district. It wasn’t used by many people, but, to G’s surprise, it seemed to be used by hounds, scurrying back and forth with parcels, trash bags and other loads of lesser identifiability.
Perhaps this little alley was shared by humans and these tireless little helpers over the course of the day? The hounds would make use of it in the night but workers would walk it to leave the residential area when the sun was up? That would explain the line of vending machines along both sides, with their tempting lights that invited to at least take a look.
Sadly, their insides weren’t as tempting as the signs promised.
G walked past the rows of healthy corn-based snacks, rows of dried fruit packets, lines of non-edible stuff like auglasses upgrades and finally ended up in front of a drinks machine. It immediately identified her by scanning the device on her wrist and merrily chimed a hello. G frowned. The few options that were available to a newcomer with an embarrassingly low status like hers immediately got illuminated, hiding more enticing bottles and cans in relative darkness.
No need to rub it in, you soulless beast!
But... there was a can that looked a little sweeter than others. Perhaps it was because of its sickly-pink colour, or a pattern vaguely reminding of chewing gum printed along its rims together with the fact that it was unavailable to pheasants like her, but something told Gentry that it probably was it. A sweet drink she was after.
Or, at least, sweetish.
Against better judgment, she tapped the touchglass to order it.
Nothing. The little screen insisted that she must choose what was available.
She scanned her comm again.
Nothing.
She engaged the little flashlight in her glasses and looked at the can more carefully.
Was it... a little askew?
It definitely was.
Its lower rim was half-hanging in the air, the release mechanism lazily holding it in place.
A good shove...
A good shove would probably drop the can down.
Wouldn’t it?
G looked around and immediately felt a pang of guilt.
She hadn’t done anything, officer!
Yet.
No people, just a couple of smaller hounds rhythmically clip-clopping along the dim alley.
Should she?
The can looked at her from behind the glass like a captive princess, waiting to be rescued from the agonizing imprisonment. Someone to grab its slender body, deflower it with a skilled motion and drain its sweet nectar in a couple of gulps.
Hang in there, my sweet prize, your saviour is coming!
Another hopefully inconspicuous glance around confirmed there were still no people in the alley.
Gentry stepped to the side and leaned on the machine, estimating its weight.
Not too bad.
She leaned in heavier, feet pushing into the ground, legs and back straining against the cool metal.
A little more, and...
One of the little hounds stopped and looked G over, like a dog that saw a little furry animal that could be torn apart.
What, little buddy? Just taking a break. Is it against the law to lean on vending machines?
Gentry urged the walking robot to move along with a little shove of her foot and immediately felt a little bad when it obediently left without making much fuss.
Why the guilt? It wasn’t like she kicked the little guy!
Still, Gentry felt emboldened by the little victory against the mindless machine.
Surely, the frigid castle that held her sugary princess shouldn’t be of much trouble either.
With a renewed wind in her sails, she stepped back a couple of meters and slammed her whole body into the automate that answered with a promising clanking. Another good push and the visual assessment confirmed that the pink princess was nearly saved. Gentry smashed into the box one last time and the can that she longed for finally jangled down and into the pick-up box.
Gentry’s exhilaration lasted only for a second, however. Before she could retrieve the can she lusted after, something much bigger than a modest dog-sized carrier hound filled her field of vision. A larger four-legged robot that also had something fastened on its back and belly. It stood motionless, its front camera glinting in the uneven light like a bird of prey’s, watching G as she stood up after the impact, unsure what to do.
Was it a police hound or something? Unlikely. There were no marks on it that would identify it as such. What was its problem then?
It’s alright, mate, be on your way now.
G slowly moved her hand towards the pick-up box and almost grabbed the cool can when the hound gently shoved her hand aside with its boxy head.
What’s your problem, pal?
Gentry considered if it was worth it being accused of theft so soon after arriving at Ashtapada. Was it really that bad though? She could always claim it just dropped there by itself.
She pushed the hound’s stump of a head back, covering its camera with her palm, reaching for the can again. This time, as if blinded by her hand, the hound didn’t do anything to stop it.
Ah, easy. These machines were too dumb.
Gentry stepped back, completely sure that the matter was settled, and popped the can open. Its sweet scent filled her nostrils with a seductive promise. But the hound had other plans. Once his camera was uncovered, it seemed to focus on the offending drink again and made to awkwardly sway its head to kick it out of G’s hands.
Excuse me? What about the Laws of Robotics, mate? Rings a bell?
It wasn’t hard to dodge the clumsy assault, but the sheer size of the robot made G uneasy. If it seriously wanted to harm her, it could just stomp on her foot and shatter the bones there like fragile glass.
Better get out of here then.
Finally making a sip of the promising nectar, Gentry moved back towards the light opening of the alley, flanking the beast at a respectful distance before scrunching her face in disgust.
Shit! The drink wasn’t sweet in the slightest! It was all a lie! Vile flavourings! She was cheated! Her lovely princess lured her with a siren’s song and stabbed her right in the heart!
Disillusioned, G gripped the can tighter as if in retaliation and picked up the pace.
The hound wasn’t having it though. Surprisingly agile on its metal hooves, it appeared in front of Gentry, blocking her way out. The robots usually looked more like docile cows or donkeys, especially when they were loaded with cargo, but this one, now... looked like a real hound. Its posture suddenly squat, the camera glinting once again, it definitely wasn’t going to let the transgressor go that easily.
Shit, shit! Had it seen her face? Had it scanned her comm? Was she going to prison now?
Panic rose in Gentry’s brain like a suffocating wave.
Run? Return the can back? It wasn’t even good enough to be worth the trouble!
Tentatively, without turning her back on the beast, G made a couple of steps back to escape in the other direction but the robot matched her stride, his dark presence looming in the narrow pathway.
Something like this had happened before. A similar quiet spot in her city. A similar evening that started off great but ended in a disaster. The same impending danger, the same feeling of helplessness, a similar... weapon in her hand?
Right. The brawler that attacked her and Pete at The Clockface was human and was taken down by some boiling hot water, and this hound also had eyes. Only one in fact. And if the can is sturdy enough...
Brace yourself now, my princess, it’s time for sacrifices.
With a well-aimed swing, Gentry launched the can into the thin glass of the hound’s camera eye, turning to run for her life at the same time. A crashing sound proved that she succeeded but there was no time to check what the robot would do next. As usual, the time seemed to stretch into a sickening slime and her legs didn’t feel real, but G knew that outside her reeling head everything was moving properly so she had no time to lose.
Run away, mix into the crowd, save your hide.
Feel worthless later.

Could you maybe crush it and use it as pipe tobacco? Has anyone tried this?

Top Notes:Tea, Orange
Middle Notes: Osmanthus, Freesia
Base Notes: Apricot, Leather
Alcohol, Aqua (Water), Parfum (Fragrance), Limonene, Hydroxycitronellal, Linalool, Hexyl
Cinnamal, Ethylhexyl Methoxycinnamate, Butyl Methoxydibenzoylmethane, Geraniol,
Ethylhexyl Salicylate, Citral, Evernia Prunastri (Oakmoss) Extract.
HEDIONE 470
Fresh, floral-jasmine, sweet, clean. Diffusive and fixative
IONONE BETA 140
Floral-violet, woody, sweet, fruity-raspberry, green
DIPROPYLENE GLYCOL 135
Minimal odour - used as a solvent
HYDROXYCITRONELLAL 57
Green, fresh, dead-leaves, aldehydic, floral, watery
LINALOOL SYNTHETIC 40
Fresh, floral-woody, sweet, citrus
HEXYL CINNAMIC ALDEHYDE 23
moderate, floral-green, oily, spice and chamomile nuances
JASMAL 20
floral (jasmine), oily, lactonic, vegetal, with herbal nuances
MUSCONE 15
Musk, powdery, soft, animalic. Exalting. Fixative
GUAIACWOOD OIL 15
Sweet, vaniila, woody, powdery, balsamic, tea-rose, smoky
VELOUTONE 14
Floral-jasmine, fruity-peach, and apricot, lactonic, lavender
PHENYLETHYL ALCOHOL 12
Floral-rose, fresh, rosewater, honey
HELIONAL 11
Fresh, watery, green, floral-cyclamen, ozone, hay, new-mown-hay. Diffusive.
LEMON OIL 10
Fresh-lemon, citrus, sharp, aldehydic
GERANIOL PUR 6
sweet, floral-rose, fruity-berry, waxy citrus
CARROT SEED OIL 6
fruity-earthy, sweet, with woody and powdery nuances
ORANGE OIL 5
Orange-peel, fresh, aldehydic, sweet, sharp
CEDRAT HE 5
citron, citrus, lemon, lemony, zesty
MANDARIN VERT ESSENCE 2,5
characteristic, citrusy, juicy, tangy, fresh, vital
PATCHOULI OIL 2
patchouli, earthy, amber. Diffusive
CEDARWOOD OIL ATLAS 2
Balsamic, woody, oriental, floral-cassia mimosa
ISORALDEINE 70 0,8
floral, iris, violet, powdery, with fruity accents
DIMETOL 10 % DPG 0,8
Lavender, Citrus, Fresh, Floral, Woody
GERANYL ACETATE 0,6
Sweet, fruity-floral, rosy, green, slightly lavender-like
MUSCENONE DELTA 0,6
Musk, nitro-musk, animal, rich-soft, woody. Exalting
LINALOOL OXIDE 0,6
aromatic, camphor, menthol, earthy
LIGUSTRAL TRIPLAL 0,6
Green-herbal, citrus-aldehydic, soapy
ISO E SUPER 0,6
Velvety, woody, dry, ambergris, old-wood, lemony. Extremely diffusive.
GUAIOL ACETATE (134-28-1?)0,6
rose tea rose woody spicy green fatty
CAMPHRE SYNTHETIC 0,6
camphoreous
ALDEHYDE C8 0,6
aldehydic waxy citrus orange peel green herbal fresh fatty
ALDEHYDE C14 10% DPG 0,6
Fruity-peach, creamy, fatty, lactonic, powerful
BASIL OIL 0,5
Basil, sweet, herbal-green, spicy,anise
MANDARIN ALDEHYDE 10% 0,3
Citrus-mandarin, spicy-coriander, fatty, metallic. Very powerful
CIS-3-HEXENOL 0,3
Green, grassy, foliage. Powerful
DIHYDRO IONONE BETA 0,3
Floral-violet, woody, ambergris, fruity-berry
CARYOPHYLLENE PUR 0,3
sweet woody spicy clove dry
TERPINEOL PUR ALPHA 0,2
turpentine-like, floral (linden blossom), coniferous woods, resinous, cool, citrus nuances
L-CARVONE 0,2
Sweet, spearmint, herbal, floral in dilution
ALDEHYDE C10 0,2
Sweet, aldehydic, fresh, orange, waxy and floral. Powerful
SUEDERAL LT 10% DPG 0,1
Leathery-suede, phenolic, tobacco, castoreum, smoky. Powerful
TERPINEN-4-OL 0,1
Old woods, naturalcy enhancer, peppery, earthy
1000
https://perfumersupplyhouse.com/product/cedrat-heart-natural/

The deer posts made me think of that old prank call. Please don’t ban me I realize this is a bit of a shitpost.

Alcohol: this includes beer, wine, champagne, spirits, candy liqueurs, hard lemonade, mead, any product made with alcohol. You CAN drink products with alcohol in them whose primary purpose is not social consumption of alcohol, e.g., mouthwash and cold medicine.
Tobacco product: anything made from tobacco, so cigars, pipes, cigarettes, also vaping, chew, synthetic tobacco products
Other recreational drugs: if you can think of it, it’s banned. Weed, TCH, Cocaine, LSD, acid, meth, as examples but any other substances as well. Non-weed Prescription medicines are ok but you still need a prescription for them.

A cabin remained half-rooved on its eastern face by pelts of dead things while the west slanted with a freshly cleared and smooth metal—it stood alongside a dugout stocked with crates; the structures overlooked an open plane of snow from their hilly perch and beyond that there were black jagged trees against the dreary yonder. Though the wind pushed as an abrupt force against the cabin’s walls, within the noise was hardly a whisper and the heater lamps along the interior walls of the large singular room offered a steady hum that disappeared even that.
The room had two beds—one double and another short cot pushed into a corner— and each was separated by a thin curtain nailed to the overhead support beams; the curtain caught in the life of the place, the gust from the heater lamps, the movement of those that lived there, and it listed so carefully it might not have moved at all.
Opposite the beds on the far wall, there stood a kitchen with cabinets and a stove, and the stove was attended by a thin young woman; she was no older than her second decade. In the corner by the stove just beyond where the kitchen counter ended, there sat a rocking chair where an old man nestled underneath pelts and a wool blanket, and he puffed tobacco and he watched the woman as she worked—she stirred the pot over a red eye and examined the liquid which lowly simmered. The man watched her silently, eyes far away like in remembrance. He absently pushed his gray mustache down with the forefinger and thumb of his right hand. Smoke came from the pipe in spider string and the man blinked dumbly.
Amid the place where pelts lined the floor between the far wall of beds and the far wall of the kitchen, there sat a young pale boy with a scrap of canvas rubbish in the center—he used the canvas strip, browned and filthy, like a bird in his play, spreading the strip out and letting it fall to the ground. “Fly,” whispered the small boy to the strip; each time he lifted the rubbish, it fell to the floor by his crossed legs, and he repeated this process.
The adults ignored the boy, and the woman swiped the back of her hand across her forehead then wiped her knuckles down the front of her blouse. “It’ll be ready soon,” she said.
The man nodded then drifted off in his long expression again, staring at the door which remained closed. Wind speed pitched and the door seemed to warp inward. Alongside the door, there sat a thick glass porthole which one could use to look out on the snow-covered landscape; the curtains before the porthole were mostly drawn but on late evenings, light splintered through ghostly.
Shrugging of his warm coverings, the man lifted from the chair and crossed the room to pull aside the curtains; he stood there in the light of the hole, painted dull in his gray thermals. He watched outside, scratched his receding hairline and when he moved to shut the curtain, he saw the boy had joined him there at the window. The man smiled, lifted the curtain, and angled from there, allowing the boy to peer outside; he puffed on his pipe heavily, holding the thing stiffly with his free hand and offering a glance to the woman by the stove who watched the pair from where she was.
“I can’t even see the road,” said the boy.
The man nodded, “Snow covered it.”
“It’s winter?”
Again, the man nodded.
Winter, with the mutated ecology of the planet, was nearly a death sentence in northern Manitoba. Those places just north of Lake Winnipeg were mostly forgotten or abandoned, but there still lingered a few souls that dared the relative safety of the frozen wasteland—sometimes curious vagabonds, sometimes ex-convicts, or slaves, sometimes even criminals upstarted townships where there was nothing prior.
“Pa, I see someone,” said the boy.
The man angled forward again, squinted through the porthole, and puffed the pipe hard so his face glowed orange then moved surprisingly quickly to hand the pipe to the woman; she fumbled with the object and sat it upright on the counter while he rushed to remove a parka from a wall hook by the door. He shouldered into the thing and then leapt to the place by the door where his boots were kept and slammed into them each, knotting them swiftly.
“What is it?” the woman’s voice shook.
They caught one another’s eyes. “Snowmobile,” said the man.
“One?”
He nodded and strapped his gloves on then moved to the latch of the door—before levering the thing, he took another glance at the boy.
“We’ll shut it behind you,” said the boy. The woman nodded.
The door swung inward with explosive force and the outside wind ripped into the warm abode. The man immediately shivered and stumbled into the snow, appropriately clothed save his legs where only his gray thermals clung to him.
After spilling into the boot-high snow, the man twisted around and aided the others in shutting the door behind him; he pulled as they pushed, and he listened past the howling wind for the latch on the opposite side of the door. He let go of the door and spun to inspect the far-off blinding whiteness—clouds of snow were thrown up in the wake of a barreling snowmobile; it headed towards him, first from between the naked spaces between the black trees then into the open white. The man threw up both his hands, waving the snowmobile down, long stepping through the arduous terrain till he came to the bottom of the perch that supported the cabin. His shouts of, “Hey!” were totally lost in the wind but still he shouted.
The snowmobile braked twenty yards out from the man and the stranger on the machine killed the engine, adjusted the strings around their throat and threw off the hood of their own parka to expose blackened goggles beneath a gray tuque; a wrap obscured the lower half of their face. The stranger took a gloved hand to yank the wrap from their mouth and yelled over the wind a greeting then removed themselves from the seat to land in the snow.
“Cold?” offered the man with a shout.
The stranger nodded in agreement and removed an oblong instrument case from the rear storage grates of the snowmobile then took a few careful steps towards the man.
“Dinner’s almost ready! I’m sure you’d like the warmth!” The man waved the stranger closer and the stranger obliged, following the man towards the cabin; each of the figures tumbled through the snow with slow and swiveling footwork. The man stopped at the door, supporting himself on the exterior wall by the porthole.
The stranger angled within arm’s reach, so the man did not have to yell as loudly as before. “Guitar?” The man pointed at the case which the stranger carried.
The stranger nodded.
“Maybe you’ll play us something.” he pounded on the metal of the exterior door, “It’s been some time since I’ve heard music.” The door opened and the two stumbled into the cabin.
The stranger shivered and snow dust fell from their shoulders as they deposited the guitar case on the floor by their feet—they moved directly to help the man and the boy close the door while the woman watched and held her elbows by the porthole.
With the door sealed and the latch secured, the man removed his parka so that he was in his boots and thermals.
The stranger removed their own parka, lifted the goggles to their forehead, and stepped to the nearby heater lamp to remove their gloves and warm their hands against the radiating warmth; the stranger was a young tall man with a hint of facial hair just below his nose and along his jaw. He wore a gun belt occupied on his right hip with a revolver. His fingers were covered in long faded scars all over. “Thanks,” said the young man, “Clarkesville far? I think I was turned around in the snow. I’m not so used to it.”
The older man went to his rocking chair to cover himself with the wool blanket; he huffed and shivered. “At least a hundred kilometers west from here. You’re looking for Clearwater?”
The young man nodded then shifted to place his back to the heater lamp so that he could look on the family fully. “I’m Gomez,” he said to them. The man in the rocking chair stiffened in his seat and craned forward so that his boots were flatly planted before him.
The boy offered his name first with a smile so broad it exposed that his front two teeth along the bottom row were missing entirely. “Patrick,” said the boy.
The woman spoke gently and nodded in a quick reply, “Tam-Tam.”
“Huh?” asked the man in the chair, “You’re unfamiliar of the area? Where are you from?”
Gomez stuffed his arms beneath his armpits. “Originally?”
The man motioned for his pipe and Tam-Tam handed it to him—puffed on the dead tobacco and frowned. He nodded at Gomez.
“I’ve been making my way across the U.S. Mostly western territories, but I heard it was safer in Canada—North Country. Fewer prowlers. Originally though? Far south. Zapatistas—joined their cause for a bit, but,” Gomez looked to the guitar case on the floor, “I was better at music than killing. Or at least preferred it.” The young man let go of a small laugh, “Do you know anything of the Zapatistas?”
The man nodded, stroked his great mustache, and craned far to lift matches from the counter. He lit the pipe, and it smoked alive while he shook the match and puffed. “Durango.” The man hooked a thumb at himself.
Gomez nodded. “I played there before. Good money. Good people.”
The man grinned slyly over his pipe, “What are the odds? All the way up here?”
“It’s a small world,” Gomez agreed, “It’s getting smaller all the time. What are you doing so far from home?”
“Same as you. It’s safer, right? Everyone said, but I’m not so sure.”
The boy interjected, “You play music?” Patrick neared the case which sat on the floor, and he leaned forward to examine the outside of the object; it was constructed from a very hard, shining, plastic material.
“I do,” said Gomez.
“I haven’t heard music before. We sing sometimes, but not music for real,” said the boy.
Gomez frowned. “How old are you?”
Patrick turned to the man in the chair. “Pa?”
“He’s six,” said the man.
Tam-Tam shook her head, removing the pot from the hot eye. “He’s almost six.”
“Almost six,” said the boy, turning back to look at the stranger.
Gomez shook his head. “Almost six and you’ve never heard music? Not for real?” He sniffed through a cold clog and swallowed hard. “I’ll play you some.”
Patrick’s eyes widened and a delicate smile grew across his mouth.
“I’m Emil,” said the man in his chair, “You offered yours, so my name’s Emil.” Smoke erupted from his mouth while the pipe glowed orange. The older man wafted the air with his hand to dispel the smoke.
Tam-Tam Shut off the oven and placed the pot of stew on the counter atop a towel swatch and she pressed her face to the brim and inhaled.
“Is it good, dear?” asked Emil leaning forward in his chair by the counter to question the woman; the woman lifted a steaming ladle to her mouth and sipped then nodded and Patrick moved quickly to the woman’s side.
The boy received the first bowl and then turned to look at the interloper, metal spoon jammed into the side of his jaw while he spoke, “Play some music.”
“After,” said Emil, placing the pipe on the counter to grab himself some grub.
Emil ate while rocking in his chair and Tam-Tam leaned with her back against the counter, sipping directly from her bowl without a utensil. Gomez took his own bowl and squatted by the front door, pressing his lower back against the wall for support; Patrick, eyes wide, remained enamored with the strange man and questioned more, “Pa said it's warm in other places, that it’s not so dark either. What’s it like where you come from?”
Gomez smiled at the boy, blew on the spoonful he held in front of his lips then nodded, “It’s dangerous, more dangerous.”
Patrick nodded emphatically then finished his food with enthusiasm.
The stranger examined the bowl while turning the stew in his mouth with his tongue; the concoction had long-cut onions, chunked potatoes, strange jerky meat. “Pelts,” said Gomez.
Emil perked with a mouthful, unable to speak.
“You have pelts all over—are you a hunter?”
Emil swallowed back, “Trapper,” he nodded then continued the excavation of his bowl.
“Elk?”
The old man in the chair hissed in air to cool the food in his mouth then swallowed without hardly chewing, and patted his chest, “Sometimes.”
Gomez stirred his bowl, took a final bite then dipped the spoon there in the stew and sat the dish by his foot and moved to kneel and open his instrument case.
“It’ll get cold,” protested Tam-Tam.
Gomez smiled, “I’ll eat it. Your boy seems excited. Besides, I’d like to play a little.” He wiggled his scarred fingers, “It’ll work the cold out of my hands.”
He pressed the switches of the case while turning it on its side and opened it to expose a flamenco guitar. Patrick edged near the stranger, and Gomez nodded at the boy and lifted the guitar from its case, angling himself against the wall in a half-sit where his rear levitated. Gomez played the strings a bit, listened, twisted the nobs at the head of the guitar.
“Is that it?” asked the boy.
Gomez shook his head, “Just testing it. Warming my hands on it.”
In moments, the man began ‘Paloma Negra’, singing the words gently, in a higher register than his speaking voice would have otherwise hinted at. Patrick watched the man while he played, the boy’s hands remained clasped behind himself while he teetered on his heels and listened. Emil rocked in the chair, finished his meal, and relit the pipe. Tam-Tam listened most absently and instead went for seconds in the pot; she turned with her lower back on the counter and watched the man with the guitar.
There was no other noise besides the song which felt haunted alongside the hum of the heater lamps. Once it finished, the boy clapped, Emil clapped, Tam-Tam nodded, and Gomez bowed then sat the guitar beneath the porthole by the doorway.
“Thank you,” said Gomez.
“That’s quite good,” said Emil. As if spurred on by the music, the man gently rotated a palm around his stomach and rocked in his chair more fervently, “Where’d you learn to play like that?”
“All over,” said Gomez, “I like to pick up songs where I find them. Sometimes a fellow musician has a piece I like, almost never their own anyway, so I think we all share in some way.”
“Poetic,” offered Tam-Tam.
Gomez caught the woman’s eyes, nodded. “I guess it is.”
“Where’d you find that one?” asked Emil, “I heard it a few times but never this far north. It’s like a love song,” he offered the last sentence to the others in the room.
“You’re right—sort of,” Gomez placed his body against the wall by the door, glanced at the bowl of food he’d left on the floor then sighed and bowed again to lift it—the interloper tilted the bowl back on his bottom lip and sipped then casually leaned with the utensil against his sternum. “Somewhere in Mexico is where I heard it first. Maybe same as you.”
Patrick examined the guitar under the porthole, put his face directly up to the strings and peered into the hole in the center of the instrument; his expression was one of awe. He quickly whipped from the thing and stared at the guitarist and opened his mouth like he intended to ask a question. The boy stared at the scars on the interloper’s hands. “What’s those from?”
Not understanding the direction of the question, Gomez looked down to examine his fingers then shifted on his feet and nodded. “Mechanical work.”
Emil continued rocking in his chair and gathered the wool around his throat. “Where did you do that?”
“Zapatistas,” Gomez sipped from the bowl again and chewed, “It’s work I was never good at.” The young man shrugged.
“I wasn’t going to pry, but seeing as the boy’s asked, I’ll push more some if it’s not impolite.”
“It’s not,” Gomez agreed.
“That’s a lot of deep scarring for mechanical work,” Emil rocked in his chair, puffed, raised a furry eyebrow, “What stuff did you work on?”
“You want to know?”
Emil nodded, withdrew the pipe from his mouth and rolled his wrist out in front of himself then slammed the mouthpiece into his teeth.
“I worked with the army, but before then—well there was a boy, a little Chicano lad taken into one of the El Paso houses way back and all the girls that worked there loved him, but his mother perished, and no one even knew who she was. That was, oh,” Gomez tilted his head back and stared at the ceiling, “Twenty-two years ago or a little more.”
“Your hands?” asked Tam-Tam.
Gomez smiled warm and continued, “Well this little boy was given a name, but what’s in a name?” He seemed to pose the question to Emil who shook his head like he didn’t understand.
“I don’t understand,” said Emil aloud.
The younger man continued with the tale, “There was this boy, but he was taken over the Republican border by a group of desperados calling themselves Los Carniceros,” Gomez angled down to look at the boy, “Patrick, do you know what a desperado is?”
The boy shook his head, his expression one of total bafflement and a twinkle of nervousness. “A music-people?”
Gomez laughed heartily while Emil shuffled under his wool blanket—the older man stopped rocking in his chair, craned forward so his elbows rested on his knees and his thermals showed as the blanket slipped around his armpits. The hum of the heater lamps continued beside the silence.
“Los Carniceros are a group of fancy criminals that hail out of Veracruz, but they have networks all over. San Luis Potosi.” Gomez’s eyes locked with Emil’s, “Durango. They have connections with the cattle industries all over Mexico. Their name’s tongue-in-cheek, but that shouldn’t fool anyone—they are just as ready to butcher a man as they are a cow. They control the food; they control the politicians; they control trade.” Gomez shook his head. “I’ve gotten carried away. This is no history lesson. There was a boy taken into Los Carniceros territory. He was bought—I’m glad that never happened to you, Patrick—boys that are bought are never kept good for long. So, they brought Johnny-Boy, that’s what they called him, into their inner circle and they used to have Johnny-Boy fight dogs in a ring for the amusement of Los Carniceros’s officers. Sometimes they gambled on the whether the boy would die, but he never did.”
Tam-Tam shivered aloud and rubbed her biceps with her hands and shook her head. “What’s that have anything to do with your hands?”
“You’re right,” said Gomez, “I guess what I mean is when you spend time fighting dogs, they bite—they bite hard, and they break skin that needs to heal. But just as well as dogs bite, so too does the boy that is raised as a dog.” Gomez shrugged.
“Quite the story,” said Emil; he’d refrained from rocking in his chair and stayed very still. “You fought dogs?”
“I did. It’s been a helluva long time, but you know I did, Emil Vargas.”
The older man took a long drag from his pipe then cupped the thing in his hands while his vision drifted around the room. “Have you come to take me back?” asked the older man.
The interloper shook his head.
Emil’s gaze drifted to the faces of Patrick and Tam-Tam. “Will it just be me?”
Gomez shook his head, “I can do you first. You won’t need to see it.”
“What?” clamored Tam-Tam, “What the hell is going on?”
Patrick stumbled away from the stranger, clung to Tam-Tam, and said nothing but began to let out a low sob.
Emil took one last drag and tossed the pipe to the counter. “It wouldn’t help to beg?”
“Would it stop you?” asked Gomez.
“Probably not,” nodded the older man, “Me first then.”
Gomez withdrew his revolver and Tam-Tam let go of an awful shriek as Emil’s head jerked back in his chair to the bullet entering his chest. At the second bullet, Emil’s limbs shot out from him like he was a star.
Patrick and Tam-Tam gathered around each other, shuffled to the counter of the kitchen.
Juan Rodriguez—that was the interloper’s real name—took a step forward and fired the gun again and Tam-Tam struck the counter and blood rained down from her forehead; to perhaps save Patrick, she shoved the boy away in her death spasm. The boy stumbled over onto his knees and when he raised his head, Juan towered over him.
Patrick, almost six, shook violently and wept.
“Turn around,” said Juan.
Patrick turned away from the interloper, stared at the corpses of his mother and father.
Juan fired the revolver one last time and the boy hit the floor; the man holstered the pistol and wiped his cheek with a sleeve. His face was touched with blood splatter; he searched the floor, found a scrap of canvas, bent to snatch it. He wiped his face clear with the canvas and sighed and tossed the scrap away.
The cabin was entirely quiet, save the hum of the heater lamps, and Juan set about clearing the bodies from the cabin, first by opening the door. He chucked the corpse of the boy into the snow by the door, piled his mother alongside him, and fought with the heavier corpse of Emil till Juan fell into the snow beside the others. He pulled himself from the thick storm, staggered through the whistle-blow wind and fought through grunts and mild shouts to close the door.
Upon spinning with the closed door at his back, he saw several of the heater lamps had gone out in the wind. Shivering, teeth chattering, Juan found Emil’s matches on the counter and set about relighting each of the heater lamps which had gone out; he did the act automatonlike, a person driven by force but no lively one.
Through the harsh outside wind, which sounded like breathing against the boards, he hummed a tune to himself that manifested into him whistling a light tune—the River Kwai March—then rifled through the cabinetry of the kitchen, went through the footlocker by the double bed and dumped the contents onto the floor; he kicked the personal affects—papers, trinkets—across the boards. Among the things, he found a shiny glass-reflective tablet, lifted it, pocketed the thing into his parka, then kept looking for what else might catch his attention. He found a small square picture, frameless, face down and lifted it to his eyes then angled over to the nearest heater lamp with it pinched by the corner. The photo was of a woman too young to be a mother—she was more of a girl, really; she carried a fat-bellied infant on her hip in one arm and with the other, she held up a dual-finger peace sign. Juan stared at the picture in complete silence then chuckled at the blank expression of the baby, then threw the square photo like a shuriken across the room; it thunked against the wall and disappeared behind the double bed, never to be seen ever again.
As it went full dark outside, the chitter sounds of outside became prevalent, and Juan went to the porthole by the door, pulled the curtains tightly closed and offered no response to the alien sounds which culminated around the walls of the cabin. It was delirium incarnate—abyssal noise which swallowed even the blizzard howl. Things moved outside and Juan went to the kitchen again, looked over the cabinet doors, opened and slammed them; he huffed with exasperation and moved to the pot where the cooled stew sat and began to eat directly from there with the ladle. His far-off eyesight glared into the dimness of the heater lamps, his face glowing by them, and once he was finished with the pot, he chucked the thing and watched the leftover contents splatter into a wild configuration across the single room’s floor.
Only after removing his boots, he fell onto the double bed, removed his revolver from the holster and placed it there on the well-maintained bedding beside himself; he slept with his parka draped over his torso.
He did not open his eyes for the insect noises of the outside.
In the morning, he promptly wiped sleep from his eyes, rebolstered his weapon, and stared across the room with a blank expression. In a moment, spasm-like, he removed the tuque he slept in to reveal a head of black hair, and scratched his fingers over his head. He replaced the tuque, went to the porthole; upon swiping away the curtains, he stared into the white expanse, the black forest beyond—he took the sleeve of his thermal shirt and wiped across the porthole’s glass where condensation fogged.
Knee-high snow hills spilled inward as he opened the door, and he kicked the snow out lazily and stomped into the mess while shouldering his parka on; the hood flapped helplessly till he stiffly yanked it down his forehead. The wind was entirely mild, still. Through goggled eyes, he examined around the entrance, but there was no sign of the corpses—he waywardly stomped through the heavied snow in the place he’d deposited them and there was nothing below the surface.
Juan stumbled through the high snow around to where the dugout stood alongside the cabin and traced a smallish hill where he crawled for a moment to gather his footing. Snow had fallen in through the high apertures of the dugout, but there was a small door-gate attached between two of the pillars which held the slanted roof of the dugout. After fighting the door-gate out, he squeezed through, removed a flashlight from the inner pocket of his parka and settled down the few steps which led into the earth. A bit of morning light spilled in through those spaces of the wall along the high points, just beneath the roof, but Juan held the flashlight in his mouth and began examining the mess of snow-dusted containers.
Along the lefthand were sacks, well preserved if only for the weather; he kicked a tobacco sack—there was a crunch underfoot. Opposite the piled sacks of grains, vegetables, and dried meats were many metal crates, each one with hinges. At the rear of the dugout were a series of battery banks which seemed to hum with electricity.
He stomped each of the sacks, cocked his left ear to the air and began making a mess of the dugout. One crate contained expensive wooden boarding, he tipped this over into the little hallway created by the goods and carefully examined the contents and then he went to the next. The next crate was bolts of fabrics and twine and he sneered, shook his head.
The interloper took a moment, fell rear-first on the sacks, pulled the flashlight from his mouth and pawed across his forehead and throat; he sighed and sat quiet—in a moment, he was back at the search, more furiously. He rocked his head backward, so the parka hood fell away; sweat shined his face. There were condensed snares and jaws and there was a small crate of maple-infused wine; Juan froze when holding one of the bottles up to the higher natural light. He grimaced but set the box of bottles by the entryway, removing one which he slid into his parka. The Clarkesville Winery stamp was impressed on the metal wall of the package.
After several crates of canned goods, his movements became more sluggish and Juan came upon a crate that seemed to be more of the same, but whenever he tipped it over for the contents to spill out, a smaller, ornate wooden box fell out and he hushed, “Fuck,” while hunkering into the mess to retrieve the box. Some old master carved Laelia Orchids into the grain alongside stalkish invasive sage; the wood—Acacia—was old but well kept. The bronze hardware shone cleanly enough.
The container was no longer than his forearm and he briefly held the thing to the high-light and moved to the entrance and fell haphazardly onto the strewn and half-deflated frozen tobacco sacks.
He opened the small box’s latch and flipped it’s top open and smiled at the contents and quicky slapped the box shut.
In a flash, he unburied his snowmobile with his hands, harnessed his guitar case to its rear, then trailed through the snow gathered against the side of the cabin, using the exterior wall as support with his hand. He came to the backside of the structure, tilted his head to gaze again over at the dugout then swiveled to look at the thick metal tank buried in the ground and marked by a big hump in the snow. Juan moved to the tank, brushed off the snow with gloved hands, nodded to himself. Quickly, he returned to the tank with a hand-pick and bucket he snatched from the dugout. With a few swings, fuel spilled through the punctures he’d created; he placed the bucket beneath the handmade spigots to catch the fuel—in seconds the bucket sloshed full as he lifted it and wavered round to the front of the cabin where the door remained open.
He doused the innards of the structure with the bucket and whipped the object against the interior wall then removed the matches from the counter. Standing in the doorway, he lit the awaiting inferno; the heat explosion pushed him wobble-legged outside while he covered his face from it; he hustled to the snowmobile without looking back.
The vehicle came alive, and Juan trailed across the plane he’d used the day prior. As the snowmobile met the sparse black tree line, the flames too met the fuel tank at the back of the cabin; a heavy eruption signaled, and blackbirds cawed as they trailed across the milk-blue sky.
Among the rush of trees there was a translucent figure and Juan roundabouted the snowmobile. Upon edging to the place of the forest, still very near the trapper’s cabin, Juan caught sight of a stickman among the wide spaced trunks. The noises exhausted from its face the same as a cicada’s tymbal call. Juan killed the engine, removed his pistol, leapt from the snowmobile.
The stickman fought in the snow with something unseen, bulbous-jointed limbs erratically clawed against the ground; it seemed more crab than humanoid. Juan approached with the pistol leveled out in front of himself. The stickman, a North Country native, took up great armfuls of snow as it tumbled to the ground, slanted onto its feet, then tumbled over again. It was caught in a bear trap and as the thing fought against the jaw, its leg twisted worse and worse, and the cicada call grew more distressed. Its hollow limb, smashed and fibrous like a fresh and splintered bamboo shoot, offered no blood at the wound.
“Huh,” said Juan, lowering the gun to his side. He shook his head. The stickman called to him.
The interloper returned to his snowmobile and went west.
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I've been a smoker for 13 years and could never quit it because the body pain would last weeks. The mental addiction was even worse due to all the anti-depressants added into the tobacco.
So I moved onto vaping and did that for 5 more years and that's not nearly as bad to quit as smoking but still very hard because like smoking the hit is instant much like hitting the crack pipe.
Got onto Zyn last year to quit vaping and now a year later on those 3mg pouches all day everyday, I just said I'm not feeling this anymore and quit.
Day 1 and 2 I felt a minor ache across my body and the occasional craving but nothing to cry about. I even went to work today on my 3rd day and felt good, like my energy came back.
These zyns are not hard to quit and have been built up like they are. Stay hydrated during withdrawal, drink lemonade, stay moving, and don't be afraid to munch on snacks.
Few days of annoyance is nothing. Sometimes you just gotta grow up and suffer like an adult and not suck on sticks or devices or salivate wintergreen all across your gums.
Get Goin