My Sister ( a life long non smoker), lives in Dublin and recently told me that on her way to work one monday morning she was shocked by the amount of fag-ends outside her local pub. The paving slabs were literaly covered by a carpet of fag-ends.
Seemingly, there as been a very large amount of redundancies amongst the companys that install and supply vending machines to the pub trade though road sweeping seems to be the new growth industry.
Slan,
D.
“you cannot get cancer from the passive inhaling of farts”, suggesting you can get it from active fart-inhalation?
Once again the Irish Government lead the way, while the British Government are still shilly-shallying over the loss of tax revenue.
Speaking to Irish friends, it seems the ban was initially moaned about by smokers, but within a month or two they got used to it and managed to cut down their fag/day ratio. I know many English people who would welcome such a ban, both smokers and non-smokers.
…I recently visited Ireland for the first time this past May. During my stay I went to many pubs, and being a smoker myself I found that I ended up having many a great conversation with the locals when we were outside having a smoke. 
Being that I’m also kind of shy around strangers (especially when in a different country) and it’s impossible to have a “conversation” in a pub, it was kind of nice to go outside to catch a few puffs and end up talking with the guy/girl standing next to me… The conversation usually started out with the local bitching about the new law and the rest is history 
Apparently the only problem for most people is that now you can smell what the average pub really smells like; beer, urine, and vomit. ah well, ya cant have you cake and eat it
edited to correct my punctuation
Im not a smoker but feel in Ireland America where ever you are who cares let the law be its your government and if you dont like it get them to change it (god bless democracy). BUT i would be the last to enforce or complain about the subject. The way i see it if a 86 year old man was sitting in the pub with a smoke let him enjoy the thing its his will to do so and if the smoke bothers you get some fresh air smoke has been in pubs longer than fresh air.
I normally don’t mind smoke in the pub when I’m playing in a session but I always find I spend the next three days at home trying to play my concertina at arm’s length because of the smell. Bellows and smoke don’t really mix.
One pub we meet at doesn’t allow smoking and the sessioneers who smoke find they don’t get through so much baccy when we’re there.
Does anyone know where the word ‘fag’ came from relative to cigarettes?
In fact does anyone know where the word ‘fag’ came from as a pejorative for ‘homosexual’?
“Fag” is short for “faggot” which means a torch, often made from a bundle of sticks tied together. There’s a short leap from a torch to a cigarette. I have no idea why the same word is used as a derogatory term for homosexual.
Mike
At the risk of sounding like a bad person:
Have you ever seen a flaming “torch, often made from a bundle of sticks tied together”?
Just another short leap 
Sorry about that,
Peter
Hmmm…we’re getting somewhere, here… How about the term “flaming homosexual”? A friend of mine (who is gay) once used the term “flamer” in reference to someone who had just entered the restaraunt we were in. (In shock, I nearly drowned in my Pepsi, but since then, I’ve watched a lot of “Will and Grace”–I’m desensitized a little, now. Hee-hee!)
Oi, the discussions you find on quiet little whistle message boards! ::falls off her chair laughing::
I think one of the key milestones in the “acclimatisation” (i.e. acceptance) to a “multi-sexual” culture lies in this “desensitization”. Not to say that Will and Grace is the only path to this acceptance 
.
[quote="whimsy_b
Have you ever seen a flaming “torch, often made from a bundle of sticks tied together”?
Peter[/quote]
These are often seen in monster movies, carried by angry peasants storming the castle of the mad scientist. A perfect example is Frankenstein…
For some reason, these bundles of sticks burn quite brightly, but only at the desired end. In the real world, they would either go out in seconds, or the whole thing would go up in flames right down to the handle.
I’m not certain what the real reason is for referring to homosexaul men as ‘faggots’, but it is a derogatory use of the word and therefore one I seldom if ever use. I am, however, tickled by the use of the word ‘breeder’ by gay men in reference to straight folks. But…back to the original thread…
As a smoker, when Florida passed the smoking ban in pubs, I didn’t mind. First, it has been ages since I have visited a pub (sniff), and secondly, I haven’t smoked indoors for many years. Neither my wife nor my dog smoke, thus I have been doing so outside on the porch or driveway. Funny, but I find myself asking home owners who smoke permission to do so in their homes.
Eventually, I am giving up the tobacco, probably by the end of August. At 40 something, I have smoked long enough.
how sadly true
Well, one law doesn’t stay alone. A good old Prohibition of liquor (including ale) should follow, taking also care of the puke-o-rama. Then you get back to Victorian rules and frown on women walking in without their duegna. Non-drinking guys don’t go to the john anyway, do they? while women, especially if tea remains allowed…
Just to make sure, a law on sexual harassment should also cross from over the Pond, where “do you live at your parents’?” or “I like your haircut” brings you to court, and then a pub will finally be a morally acceptable place.
Looking forward to such “pubs”, so we can all get recorders and have gigs with some nice, err… Vivaldi?
Ow… come to think of it, such a place is called an Iowa* shopping-mall coffee shop. Complete with a Four Seasons elevator-style rendering. :roll:
*Nothing personal, ok?
Zoob! You’re back! Where’ve you been old chap? Like the grail, you have been missed.
Wow–that’s warm greetings! Thanks, you stinking knnnigggett with you seeeelly kween!
Now, I wasn’t the one missing–where were you when the action was here in Brittany?
Been nowhere but staying here in Mesquer, too busy enjoying our local ITM Festival and harmonizing (well, I’m more into dissonances…) 'til dawn to find a minute for the pooter screen.
Couple of C&F known nicks were there–great gigs, too. They’ll drop their own names if they feel like it…
Zoobenberg castle full of rugrats running everywhere, wrecking a (welcome) havoc and chiffers trying each other’s whistles… and some other instruments I don’t dare and name! 
Also had a “window” of anticyclone just right for the weekend, so to the beach twice a day. Nee-nee-nee-na-na-nah…
…and, since then, the worst sequence of thunderstorms we’ve had for years. Pretty fine breeze, as sailors put it.