OT - The price of chocolate bars...

My local shop sells me 20 B&H for just over £7.00.
Luckily I only smoke while having a drink, so I only buy 1 to 2 packets a week.

You ever get hit by a Squash ball?
They're hard little fekkers believe me. Especially if you get hit in you nether regions. Not a good place to be hit :(

My Dad caught me with a packet of cigaretes when I was younger and made me smoke the whole packet.

I just wish he'd caught me with a girl.

I only smoke when I drink too. So far I have had 17 packs this week :P

You would rather smoke a girl?

"Squash, dangerous sports?"

No, but I done boxing for 4 years when I was younger have done several bungee jumps and am doing my third sky dive this year.

Everything you eat nowadays is bad for you and all the information is so contradictory

Eat your 5 a day every day?

Well, that'll be putting your sugar and acid intakes through the roof. 125 grams of grapes contains 20G of sugar, 1 glass of orange juice contains the equivalent to about 6 lumps of sugar. When it comes to that nice healthy apple it's probably best not to mention the pesticides it's sprayed with and if you think that washing them helps, it doesn't. That kind of waxy coating on apples serves two purposes, it makes them look shinier and healthier and also seals the apples against moisture loss but the other bonus to the carnuba wax/shellac coating is that it absorbs the pesticides so washing them does nothing.

Exercise regularly?

Studies carried out show that 50% of people who do cardio or aerobic exercise regularly are likely to develop fibrosis or scarring of the heart tissue compared to almost zero percent of people who don't. People who exercise long term are more likley to suffer heart defects due to the wear and tear put on the right chamber of the heart.

There's absolutely no winning so you may as well just enjoy yourself and not worry about stuff IMO

You must be pretty handy at squash Andy. It's games like that and tennis that have more in common with boxing than anything else.

I'm rubbish at squash, tennis i'm ok at but squash is just too damn fast for me.

I wear glasses and up until recently when I bought a pair of Edgar Davids style sports glasses(which cost a fraction of the cost of my normal glasses!) I couldn't even see the ball and the person I play squash with is my brother who has been playing it for 6 years while I only started last year.

In the year we've been playing, once a week i've not beaten him once.

The only thing I don't like is the "Shame" i'm supposed to feel about smoking. The cigarettes are now covered up where I work and you're no longer allowed to browse them. If we're out of stock of a certain brand, tough. Staff have to be quick about opening the shutter too in case someone faints from the sight of Lambert & Butler.

.....yet on the other side of the shop, down the biggest aisle you have numerous deals on cheap alcohol.

I'm not denying the health argument. I just don't understand why one product makes people uncomfortable and angry, yet the other is an acceptable way to relax at the weekend...

"Staff have to be quick about opening the shutter too in case someone faints from the sight of Lambert & Butler."

Oh wont somebody think of the children.

"I just don't understand why one product makes people uncomfortable and angry, yet the other is an acceptable way to relax at the weekend..."

The only thing I can think of is passive smoking. If it's in an enclosed area (would have to be your house now) then you're not just damaging your own health but other peoples. But since the smoking ban that's really a moot point.

True, it is very hypocritical. There is, I suppose, the idea that cigarettes directly harm those around you whether you like it or not, but then it would be interesting to see how many injuries or domestic incidents take place under the influence of alcohol.

I agree with passive smoking, or even smoking in any building (Bar your house) full stop. I generally don't smoke indoors anyway as I find it puffs out the room abit.

Are people THAT offended by smoking that they can't even look at a pack though? If we're going to go that far, I demand that Bacardi Breezers have a photo of kids throwing up their stomachs printed over 60% of the bottle. Maybe even throw in a copse of someone who has clearly choked on their own vomit.

"then you're not just damaging your own health but other peoples"

Same with alcohol though... Stella isn't affectionately known as 'wife beater' for nothing and the missus doesn't touch a drop of alcohol but frequently suffers alcohol related black eyes!

Same with drink driving.

Yes, I realise that joke is in particularly bad taste :(

On a related note, I was in South Africa the year the ban on smoking in bars came into place over there and they were much more sensible about it than over here.

It wasn't banned completely but any smoking areas had to be open air or sealed of from the rest of the pub with extraction units in so in some of the bigger bars you'd just have a closed off area where you could go to smoke if it was raining outside.

True but they require extra actions, not just drinking alcohol. But by the very nature of smoking that's all you have to do to damage someone elses health.

It's not the alcohol that's damaged the 3rd party, at least not directly.

I'd put money on alcohol having killed more people than smoking but all the same not many people complain about the smell of a pint. Live and let live I say. We can't smoke in pubs. The non smokers have already won so why not let us have the very limited oppertunities to enjoy a cig we have left.

But it would be interesting to see the number of people hurt and the cost attached to that for smoking vs. drinking. I'll bet the latter is a lot higher.

Also wrt the smoking ban I've got a mate who started smoking as its a good way to strike up conversations with women outside pubs.

"I've got a mate who started smoking as its a good way to strike up conversations with women outside pubs."

I just tend to use Rohypnol instead.

Much higher success rate, a lot less effort and you only have to buy them one drink instead of buying them drinks all nigh :)

I'm not against people smoking. But they all smell so utterly terrible.
5 kids in my form smoke and their odour is ghastly.
Most smokers I know are also amongst the most unclean looking reprobates I know. Really look like they need a good wash.

"Much higher success rate, a lot less effort and you only have to buy them one drink instead of buying them drinks all nigh :)"

Only downsides are:-
- their teeth are yellow or need to be taken out
- they're out of breath when you engage them in any 'activity', meaning it sounds like you're with a panting dog
- they stink

Smoking related illness costs the NHS about £610m a year.

Alcohol related costs to the NHS is £2.7b a year.

But it doesn't say how much of that is secondary costs (ie not the drinker/smoker) and what is primary. I think it's a reasonable assumption though that alcohol causes more third party damage based on that but I think the point I raised earlier still applies. While it may cause more third party damage it's not directly from the process of consuming alcohol, whereas passive smoking is.

You're point is fair enough then, but if we were to even look at the number of non-smokers whose health is adversely affected by smokers (probably most likely children whose parents smoke) versus the number of sober people injured or otherwise harmed as a direct result of alcohol, I bet again that booze is more harmful both in terms of people affected and cost to the country. That sort of data probably isn't available though, I'd guess.

I don't care if other people smoke as long as they don't do it near me. One thing I hate are shops who let their staff smoke just outside the entrance to the shop.

But now apparently bacon gives you heart disease or something. What happened with ketchup - I remember for a time it was bad for you, then good for you, and then bad for you again. Either way I don't mind ketchup is gack !!

I say eat/drink/do what ya like - something's gotta kill ya, might as well enjoy yourself before you go !! =)

And on the cig front - a pack of L&B Silver used to be 1 euro 80 here, so just over a quid (cos they're tax free) and despite still being 'tax free' they're now 4 euro 35 - dunno how that works lol

All of this stuff about hiding the ciggies out of sight is rubbish anyway. You want people to stop smoking or not to start then DON'T Sell them Simple really