Puff, puff, puff...

While I'm trying to catch my breath after walking a couple of dogs, I'm going to ask all my friends in Illinois to take advantage of this last day of good will between smokers and the rest of us... starting the day after tomorrow, the law says there is top be no smoking in public places or private businesses.

Quite frankly, while my wheezy, miserable lungs are happy about the result, the rest of me is less than impressed with the method. Well, that's not quite frank enough, but my mother occasionally reads my blog, and I'm not inclined to subject her to the sort of language struggling to trip past my guardian fingertips and onto the key pad.

I'll be glad when I can go to the local public house of a Thursday for Open Microphone night. Who knows? I may even participate, this year. I have a kazoo, and I know how to use it. I'm also told that my friend/sister (extended family gets complicated) Elke's bird, Pippin, likes my singing... That (and a whole lot of money when I win the lottery) ought to get me a recording contract.

But kazoo azide, just where do the jackasses in Springfield get off "protecting" me from second-hand smoke, when, as yet, they've not exhausted every other non-nanny-state option, first? Did they allow, say, insurance companies to actually jack up rates for smokers, for health, fire, and liability? Did they do the same for businesses which permit smoking on their premises? Did they, perhaps, introduce city/county/state fees for fire protection, community clinics, etc., in which businesses which do not allow smoking get a cut rate? Did they really try anything, honestly, at all, before they decided smokers are not human and, therefore, have no rights? Of course not.

So, all of my friends who smoke, puff like crazy throughout tomorrow, for on Tuesday we will fume without tobacco.