Generational Discussions

[pg1067]

What baffles me about smoking is how many young people STILL smokes.

I mean, I'm 43, our generation and our parents... I get it, it was just a thing. In Italy up until 2002 you were allowed to smoke indoors in bars and pubs. But young kids? there's a lot more of awareness, a lot more of information about the dangers of smoke, cigarettes cost A LOT, it's forbidden to smoke in like 95% of the places.... and young kids STILL smoke? what possesses them to say "hey sure, let's pick an expensive habit that everyone warned me about and that I will not be able to enjoy in basically every closed space I'll ever be in"? I don't get it. Sure, peer pressure, parents smoking and all of that. But as I said I was a teen in the '90s and nobody pressured me to smoke, I just didn't start. But I seriously don't remember anyone ever asking me if I wanted to smoke, or even worse, pressuring me to do so or make me feel excluded 'cause I didn't smoke. Heck, I feel excluded now as an adult whenever there's a bunch of coworkers at a social gathering who "go out to smoke" and you just miss out 'cause you don't smoke and there's no point in getting a coat and go outside to hang.

Yeah...when I was growing up, almost every sitcom would have “a very special episode" about peer pressure to smoke/drink/do drugs.  I kept waiting for it to happen, but it legitimately never did.  I was offered my share of drugs, but no one ever pressured me or belittled me or anything.  The usual attitude was, "cool...more for the rest of us."

[King Postwhore]

Same. You want some? 

Yes or no. It was no big deal.

[Samsara]

Same. You want some? 

Yes or no. It was no big deal.

It was that way. I recall that too. But saying "it was no big deal" really doesn't do the situation justice, ya know? When things like that were asked of me, I was older, late teens, less impressionable. Had I been 12, there might be a different story. It's such a complicated issue.

[jingle.boy]

What baffles me about smoking is how many young people STILL smokes.

Amen.

Word.

We had a crew doing an installation in our house last week, and the crew leader - couldn't have been older than his early 30s - was taking a break for a smoke.  I didn't have an issue with it (the break), but man... I can't fathom anyone in the last 20 years consciously wanting to START smoking.. and then continue smoking once they had their first cigarette.  I smoked in my teenage years ('86-'92), but quit when it was too damned expensive.  I don't even want to think about how much a pack of smokes costs nowadays.

[Stadler]

Any Gen X'ers out there who remembers riding around the back seat of their parent's car without seat belts on?

Mom or dad would take a curve and you'd either slide into your siblings or they'd slide into you?

I was talking to a friend about this memory and they shared that once the back door flew open on the curve and they literally fell out of the moving vehicle.  And their mom pulled over to pick them up and yelled at THEM for falling out!

I thought that story pretty much summed up being a kid in the late 60s/early 70s.  And of course, every adult smoked cigarettes in the car.

I’m not old enough to remember cars not having seat belts, but we did all used to pile into the back of the family station wagon without seat belts all the same when we had too many passengers.

Hell, yeah!!  Well, we had seatbelts, but they were jammed down in between the cushions, so as to be unusable. 

My dad had a Corvette two-seater, and my brother and I would hide behind the seats in the "boot".  We had a family truckster (Ford station wagon with the wood siding) that we would used the back as our own personal play ground.  Later, we had a '73 Buick Centurian convertible, you could fit five people across the bench seats in the front and the back.

And until he got sick with arthritis, both parents smoked like chimneys.  We played with metal Tonka trucks as well (when the crane boom would close, it was like a paper cutter).

[Stadler]

What baffles me about smoking is how many young people STILL smokes.

Amen.

Word.

We had a crew doing an installation in our house last week, and the crew leader - couldn't have been older than his early 30s - was taking a break for a smoke.  I didn't have an issue with it (the break), but man... I can't fathom anyone in the last 20 years consciously wanting to START smoking.. and then continue smoking once they had their first cigarette.  I smoked in my teenage years ('86-'92), but quit when it was too damned expensive.  I don't even want to think about how much a pack of smokes costs nowadays.

A PACK is $10, $12 in the north east.   I remember when cartons cost that much.

[TAC]

When I was a kid, I filled up our kitchen sink and submerged a whole carton of my father's cigarettes in it. Needless to say, he was not happy.

[Dave_Manchester]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

[King Postwhore]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

There were ashtrays build into the arms of the seats. Yuck.

[pg1067]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

The smoking ban on flights under 2 hours within the U.S. went into effect in 1988 (with the full ban 2 years later).  The only times I got on an airplane before that were when I was VERY young (and don't remember) and when my mother and I went to visit my sister in Colorado when I was 12.  I "made" her promise not to smoke on plane.  In 1989, I dated a girl who worked for Southwest, and we took a couple trips together.  I remember her telling me that the CEO of Southwest would only fly on other airlines because all of SW's routes at the time were under 2 hours, and he couldn't handle going more than a couple hours without smoking.  I guess he had to figure it out the next year (or simply stop traveling).

[jingle.boy]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

The smoking ban on flights under 2 hours within the U.S. went into effect in 1988 (with the full ban 2 years later).  The only times I got on an airplane before that were when I was VERY young (and don't remember) and when my mother and I went to visit my sister in Colorado when I was 12.  I "made" her promise not to smoke on plane.  In 1989, I dated a girl who worked for Southwest, and we took a couple trips together.  I remember her telling me that the CEO of Southwest would only fly on other airlines because all of SW's routes at the time were under 2 hours, and he couldn't handle going more than a couple hours without smoking.  I guess he had to figure it out the next year (or simply stop traveling).

Huh... I always thought it was AC797 in 1983 that was the catalyst for smoking being banned.  But, a quick skim of the Wiki reveals it was a starting point for a lot of safety features related to smoke in a plane, but not banning smoking outright.

[Stadler]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

Do you smoke?  For some reason I imagine you as a smoker.

Early in my career I took a number of Chester Karass's negotiation classes (they would be video tapes of his class sent out for viewing and in-class workshops with a facilitator) and it always used to make me chuckle that the tapes would have a thin grey haze across the top from all the smoke in the original auditorium. 

[El Barto]

Re: smoking, it was still ok to smoke on planes when I was a kid, and I have nostalgic memories of the stench of smoke wafting over the "non-smoking section" from the back of the plane 10 minutes after takeoff. Nobody in my family smoked but it didn't matter. On a fully booked 737 to Benidorm, everyone was inhaling that shit.

The smoking ban on flights under 2 hours within the U.S. went into effect in 1988 (with the full ban 2 years later).  The only times I got on an airplane before that were when I was VERY young (and don't remember) and when my mother and I went to visit my sister in Colorado when I was 12.  I "made" her promise not to smoke on plane.  In 1989, I dated a girl who worked for Southwest, and we took a couple trips together.  I remember her telling me that the CEO of Southwest would only fly on other airlines because all of SW's routes at the time were under 2 hours, and he couldn't handle going more than a couple hours without smoking.  I guess he had to figure it out the next year (or simply stop traveling).

That would be Herb Kelleher. He's something of a local legend down here. Or at least he was. His sort of behaviour wouldn't really comport with modern ideals. I recall touring SWA's corporate HQ, and it was a fiercely smoke friendly environment. Partly to accommodate Herb's smoking, and partly his libertarian leanings. Much like my boss, the government isn't going to tell him what people can or cannot do in his own damn building (and we do have one smoker left here). In SWA's case that probably ended at some point after he stepped down.

[El Barto]

Huh... I always thought it was AC797 in 1983 that was the catalyst for smoking being banned.  But, a quick skim of the Wiki reveals it was a starting point for a lot of safety features related to smoke in a plane, but not banning smoking outright.

That was almost certainly not smoking related. That's something that always amazed me. The number one fear is a fire breaking out on the AC, and yet to the best of my knowledge smoking has never caused any major mishap.

[jingle.boy]

Huh... I always thought it was AC797 in 1983 that was the catalyst for smoking being banned.  But, a quick skim of the Wiki reveals it was a starting point for a lot of safety features related to smoke in a plane, but not banning smoking outright.

That was almost certainly not smoking related. That's something that always amazed me. The number one fear is a fire breaking out on the AC, and yet to the best of my knowledge smoking has never caused any major mishap.

My recollection from the episode of Mayday on this flight was that it was determined (thought?) to have been a cigarette in the lavatory trash that started the fire - but I guess that was simply the pilot's presumption.

[Stadler]

If memory serves, we had a lot of conversations about Herb Kelleher in business school, some good, some not so much. 

[El Barto]

Huh... I always thought it was AC797 in 1983 that was the catalyst for smoking being banned.  But, a quick skim of the Wiki reveals it was a starting point for a lot of safety features related to smoke in a plane, but not banning smoking outright.

That was almost certainly not smoking related. That's something that always amazed me. The number one fear is a fire breaking out on the AC, and yet to the best of my knowledge smoking has never caused any major mishap.

My recollection from the episode of Mayday on this flight was that it was determined (thought?) to have been a cigarette in the lavatory trash that started the fire.

The pilots assumed that, which is why they didn't descend sooner. They figured they'd just put it out and continue with their business. The fire actually began inside the walls of the aft lav. A lit cig could have conceivably caused it, the NTSB wouldn't eliminate it as a possible cause, but it'd be one hell of a fluke. The cigarette would have to fall through a 2x2 hole in the trash bin, and then roll to a different hole in the floor to reach any combustible material in an area around the toilet flush motor (which is where circuit breakers tripped simultaneously). Fire of electrical origin is similarly unlikely, but there were 3 different possibilities there, and one of them has real potential. That's where the smart money is.

[El Barto]

If memory serves, we had a lot of conversations about Herb Kelleher in business school, some good, some not so much. 

He was certainly a character. I never met him, but my mom thought he was a real hoot. It wouldn't surprise me if Thornton Mellon was based in part on Herb. From an educational point of view, I suppose his contempt for "the customer is always right" would be the most noteworthy and valuable. I've decided that its validity mostly comes down to the individual business and market. Sometimes it's true and sometimes it's not. In my line customers are valuable and the cost of making them think they're right is usually trivial. Herb was all about establishing a culture at SWA, and taking care of his employees was a key component of that. Not to mention that in his business the only thing that matters is price. He could tell a customer to fuck off, and so long as that customer could get from A to B when he needed to for the best price he's be happy to keep flying SWA. Makes his notion really easy to support.