At the poker table this week, I sat next to a gentleman who was ”smoking” an electronic cigarette, or e-cig. I was surprised partly because this casino’s poker room was known to sternly enforce a NO SMOKING rule (along with many other rules, all beginning with NO). Until this day, I’d only read about e-cigs, and this fellow seemed eager to chat about his brand-new “tobacco-less, smokeless smoke.” He told me the e-cig (GreenNicotine brand) allows a “smoker” to get a good hit of nicotine with none of the tar or harmful chemicals contained in tobacco smoke. His eventual goal was to stop smoking altogether, and he felt the e-cig would help him to achieve it. During the game, I watched him reach into his shirt pocket for a drag on the fake cigarette, causing the tip to glow red. When it was his turn to play, he dropped the e-cig back into his pocket with the “ember” end still faintly glowing, which was startling to the rest of us at first.

Maybe he had asked permission from the floor to use the e-cig before I arrived, because the dealers didn’t glower or send him from the room. The posted NO ELECTRONIC DEVICES ALLOWED rule also was not invoked. To the other players, this gentleman spent a good deal of time explaining his specialness in being able to smoke in this NON SMOKING area. If I’d won a dollar at the poker table every time he blew out the pretend smoke and said, “It’s not smoke – it’s water vapor,” I might have come out a winner that day. One thing I can tell you, because I sat in the very next seat, there was absolutely no cloud of smoke odor about him. He told us the e-cig was a hundred times better than the patch he’d tried before, and the taste was almost indistinguishable from that of real cigarettes. When someone asked him about the expense of GreenNicotine, he said the cost of entire starter kit was comparable to about a $1.60 a pack. I’m not sure what Marlboros cost now days, but considerably more than that, I think.

Nicotine is still a mystery to me, but I’m sold on this electronic cigarette. Everyone I care about who smokes — I’m going to tell them about GreenNicotine. It could prolong their lives — not to mention my life and the lives of others around them. This gentleman ordered soft drinks occasionally while we were playing, once springing from his chair and galloping after the drink cart. I’ve never smoked, and I don’t intend to start now — but, I sure wouldn’t mind getting a rush like that from Diet Coke!

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