I gave up cigarettes (finally) about a year and a half ago, on my birthday. It was a present to myself (and to Tess). But as Jake once said, you know I gave up cigarettes, but I didn't give up smoking. My friend and former co-worker Martin the Macedonian gave me a Cuban cigar not too long ago, as a thank-you for setting him up with a job lead which turned into a job. I fear it's going to be a downhill journey from here on out. That was a good goddam cigar.

I've always thought of cigars as a camping thing: they weren't that great (think wood-tipped, sitting in a tackle box for 3 years), but not that bad when you can sit around the fire and spit at will. The reason why I never really liked cigars was that I never had a good cigar, until recently. I once had a Macanudo (don't remember what kind) at Donovan's Steak House in La Jolla, but that's about it. It was very tasty, especially after a USDA Prime ribeye and a bottle of 1997 Casa Lapostolle merlot. But everything that night was tasty (ought to have been for what it cost) and the quality smoke got drowned out by the quality of everything else.

This last Sunday I had a Don Capitano Churchill (from Ybor City, cigar capital of the world, apparently) that I got from a newly married bride whose reception I had attended the day before. Some relation to her had a box of them and was passing them out with much fanfare. She doesn't like cigars but felt obligated to take one, owing to their hand-carried-from-far-away-lands nature. She surreptitiously gave it to me, and I smoked it after a big dinner (steak again this time, oddly enough) with Tess's parents Sunday night. It was a very good cigar. There's something about a nice thick steak and red wine and good cigars. The Don Capitano wsn't as good as Martin's Cuban, though.

These two events, coupled with Martin's gift of a cigar sampler from his humidor have given me a taste for cigars. And not just any cigars, either. Good cigars, like the kind from a store where you have to walk into a special room to get them. I've recently tried buying some from regular (grocery/drug) stores, but they aren't at all good. No, I need a certain kind. The Cuban kind, one particular brand. Martin may as well have just given me crack. Now I not only need to go to a special store which has a special room, I need to go to a whole different country to do it.

I found a shop in Tijuana called La Casa del Tabaco which sells Ramone Allones Specially Selected Robustos. I don't know how much they cost down in TJ (I emailed them but haven't heard back yet), but they aren't cheap. I'll also be keeping an eye out for counterfeits while there. Although the shop has a good reputation, based on the searches I've done, you never know. The fake Cuban cigar trade apparently flourishes in Tijuana. Luckily, I have the band from my original Ramone Allones to use for comparitive purposes. It may seem like a lot of hassle to go through just to get a cigar until you realize that it takes over an hour to smoke one of the damn things. A box of 25 represents something of a committment.

I emailed Martin to see if he wants to trek on down to TJ this weekend. If it turns out that the cigars are $300, then I'll just order the Dominican Gustosos and call it good. In fact, I might just buy one of those anyway to see if it's the same. If it's close to the Cuban one, then I may just stick with that. They say that Dominican cigars are better than Cubans these days because all the quality left with the embargo and rise of Castro. I don't know yet if that's true.

I still want to go down to Mexico, though. Even if I don't buy any cigars, we'll have a nice day trip no matter what. I've never seen TJ, and niether has Tess. We've been meaning to go for like five years. And now, thank the maker, we may have a reason to go on a semi-regular basis! Joy!

I'm going on a camping trip the weekend after Labor Day. The cigar-around-campfire situation will be much improved.