Giving up smoking... again!

"These nicotine patches are great" I tell my friends. "I've used them so many times, and they always work for me". Well if they really worked for me, I wouldn't have to keep using them, would I? Still, it's better to have a nicotine patch on your arm than puffing on a pack of smokes every day. Or is it? Will we all develop cancers on our arms or backs, where we kept on placing those patches? Do people get addicted to patches?

Quitting's all about willpower, the epic battle of your Good Conscience against Nick O'Teen, the little Iago who whispers in your ear... "but you like smoking... smoking is great... just have one, you can give up tomorrow"

And you've got to have a reason to give up. When the Tobester proudly brought me a cigarette and a lighter, thinking that this is a kind thing to do, then I know it's time to give it up. This morning we had a brief conversation (it was hard to compete with The Fairly Odd Parents on Nickelodeon) about smoking and addiction - a tough conversation to have with a five year old, but he took it in, eventually.

I onced dreamed up a concept-album cover, in garish yellows and greens like a Zappa album, called "Fag-Butt Sarnie"*; a close-up photo of a slice of pappy white bread smeared thickly with cheap margarine, and the filling? The contents of an over-brimming ash-tray. God knows what the album would have sounded like, but I'm holding the thought of that sandwich, and every time I get an itch, I think of eating the sarnie.

* Note to non-British people: a "Fag-Butt" is a cigarette end, OK?