Three members of my family are smokers. As one of the non-smoking family members, one of the challenges of comingling with my smoking family members it to not breathe their smoke. One of their challenges, of course, is not being able to smoke inside their own home. Sometimes, at night when I'm upstairs watching TV with the window next to me open for some fresh air, I will unintentionally smoke half of somebody else's cigarette who is sitting outside on the patio. On a clear, calm, beautiful evening, cigarette smoke has an uncanny way of finding its way across the yard and into an open window. I try to be tolerant, just as I hope others are tolerant of me and my weaknesses. Besides, everyone deserves the right to cause their own cancer and the cancer of the people around them, right?
Well. Worse than the smoke are the overflowing ash trays and the littering of cigarette butts. It really chaps my hide when I have to end up cleaning up somebody else's overflowing ash tray or scattering of butts all over the yard. I was just outside doing some watering and I found little white butts here, there, and everywhere; in the bushes, under the tree, in the gutter. You may say, "Well, Jason Show, nobody is making you clean it up." True. Nobody is forcing me with a gun to clean their butts. But I DO have to look at it, which, really, is there anything uglier than a full ash tray? And when we have little ones around, the butts have to be cleaned so they don't get into them.
Now. It is a known fact that some of my favorite bloggy friends are smokers. I'm certain that none of you make others clean your butts, right?
You clean your own butts, right? Right? Right?
37 comments:
I used to smoke, in high school and college (mostly at the bars or smoke breaks at work). I just kind of quit at some point before my daughter was born 23 years ago or so. I was lucky that I wasn't addicted.
I did and would clean up my own butts!! Just as I clean up my own wine bottles today. : /
As a reformed smoker, yes I did clean up my own butts but more because I was a closet smoker. I do have family members who do smoke, and when I go to their homes, there aren't the ashtrays full of butts, nor do they have them in their yard.
Funny story: While growing up, we had a sheep that loved to eat cigarette butts. She was great for getting rid of the evidence of the older siblings who were sneeking in their smoking habit.
I have zero tolerance for being around smokers. I don't know what I would do in your position--you are very tolerant and kind.
Having watched three people close to me die a terrible death from lung cancer I just can't put myself at risk for the same kind of death--any more than genetics and growing up in the 70's already has.
I'm with Jenn. You are VERY tolerant and kind. Like her, I have ZERO tolerance, and smokers, in general, just PISS ME OFF!
That being said, my own mother smokes. Yes, that WOULD be the same mother who was diagnosed with cancer a few years ago. But, let's not go down that road, lest I blow up your blog with f-bombs! The reason I even mention it is because I discovered this spring, while cleaning up my flower boxes and getting ready to plant this year's flowers, that my mother had been using one of my flower boxes for her ashtray! I don't allow her to smoke in my house (naturally!) so she goes out to my deck. Imagine my surprise when I found about 20 butts in my planter box. She's got some nerve, wouldn't you say? So, I guess, like you, I DO clean up other people's butts. And it sucks!!
Ugh I hate smokers - well no that's not true b/c my sisters and brother and dad smoke. But we make them smoke outside, even in Connecticut in the dead of winter. Which only makes them sneak inside because yeah like duh we can't smell it. what peeves me is I bought ashtrays and painted my patio furniture so they'd be all comfy outside. And I have a puppy who eats everything. so they throw their butts in my yard for the puppy to eat, bypassing the perfectly good, new ashtray. Grrrrrrrrrrr
When we moved into this rental house, we signed a lease that we would smoke in the house. Well, whoever lived before us smoked wherever they wanted. There were hundreds of butts in the yard. It bugged me so much I spent hours walking around stooped over hand picking up the butts. I don't like it when smokers throw their butts in the grass and the bushes. That is still throwing trash and being a litter bug. Hubby's brother worked with mentally challenged children and he said he never realized how many cigarette butts were on the ground until he had to keep a child from eating them. Yuck.
I haven't smoked in ::adding/subtracting::: nearly 18 years.
But I was always responsible for keeping my butts all cleaned up.
I hate the smell of cigarettes now.
And don't like dirty butts any more than you do.
You are a very tolerant man! I wouldn't put up with it because of the bad effects and smelly air. I hate it when neighbours use those dryer thingies that smell like a very tacky perfume and it goes all over the neighbourhood.
I believe air should be as clean as we can possibly get it.
Cleaning little white butts? What a picture that just gave me!
My mom smoked and would only do it at the open kitchen window. However, I am sure I ended up smoking a lot of cigarettes' worth of smoke during my 18 years living there.
Cleaning up the butts is just common courtesy.
Jason, my friend, I am in the same boat as you. My dear sweet sexy husband whom I ADORE smokes a pack (and sometimes a pack and a half) a day. He has smoked for 30 years. It's effing disgusting. I HATE IT more than I can put into words. (He would get MANY more passionate kisses if he would STOP... but that's another post for another day...)
However, when we bought our first house I told him I didn't want to live inside an ashtrash and he agreed that all smoking would be done outside. To this day (17 years later) he has kept his promise.... and let me tell you... on Winter days when the temps are in the single digits and he's freezing his patootie off smoking, I ask him "Is it REALLY worth it?!"
But he's a very polite smoker. I never touch his butts or his cigarettes.
But boy, I wish he'd quit.
PS: Your smoking family members should do ALL the cleaning related to their dirty habit (and that's what it is... a dirty habit). You should not see ANY butts, ashes, or cigarette wrappers or boxes around.... PERIOD!!
I have never smoked and I thank my parents for that. It was my job to clean out the overflowing ashtrays when I was a child and I found that to be so gross, I never had any desire to smoke. I suppose it was a good thing that my folks didn't clean their own butts, right?
IF I were a smoker, I would totally clean my own butt. But, having you do it might not be so bad either.
Bummer about the butts, you know how I get all "Jersey" about people littering with their smoke and butts.
I clean everyone's butts around here.
However, I don't know any smokers.
(Save me.)
ugh this just gags me jason. my parents were chain smokers and mom died of emphazema n dad of heart attack. i hated it so bad and they would smoke where ever, when ever, in the car.. with the windows up... because i complained about it to her growing up, she would blow smoke in my face and tip her ashes on my head... just to be a bitch.
i used to get the belt because i wouldnt do dishes because my mother used her dinner plate and left over food as an ashtry. and she's light up even as we were still eating. it gagged me so bad i'd rather be hit than touch her dishes. i wont touch ashtrays and i cant be in a smoky room. there is NO way in hell that i would do what you do, or allow anyone to be careless wiff their butts. be strong honey and go on strike!!!!
yeah its a wonder i dont get lung disease from second hand smoke as a kid. my moms walls were so yellow that if you moved a picture on the wall it would be white behind it. and the smell in your clothes after being in a home like that... oh god the nightmares...
c
My ex leaves butts all over my yard. He didnt' smoke when he was with me. Gross.
wait, who else in your house smokes? 3? I only know of 1?
I clean my own butt, thank you very much
Arg! I share your antipathy toward cleaning up other people's butts and I especially hate finding them in the yard. They can't just be tossed into the yard waste so it's not like I can just rake them up with the leaves or toss them into the pile of weeds.
That picture of the ashtray at the top of this post makes me feel hungover.
I've been smoke free for 18 months. I loved smoking and stopped because it really dictated my life. I adjusted my life so I could smoke. I hated dirty ashtrays and butts when I smoked and I hate them more now.
I was a polite smoker, watching where my smoke went. I would stride to keep it away from others. I smoked outside in Florida heat. I smoked outside during hurricanes.
I recently blogged about yelling at a smoker who through their butt on the ground. People - it might be small but it's still litter. Next time you're in a lane next to a median, look at the collection of filth from smoker's who disrespect property.
I am a reformed smoker and yes, there is nothing worse than having to clean someone else's butt!
I have an award for you on my blog (I am posting it tomorrow). Please come by tomorrow and pick it up, ok?
Jason, I totally clean my own butt. Though in the past, I have cleaned the butts of my daughters and their boyfriends. Yes, I have cleaned all their butts. It's time I became butt-free, don't you think?
No butts here....but if there were I wouldn't clean them.
Last summer when my son was home he and his friends smoked a little. I got angry at him - I said, I don't care if you try a little pot, but don't you know better than to smoke cigarettes?????? Talk about mixed Mom messages.
His college roommate smoked like a fiend. I'm glad he's out of that apartment now.
I clean no butts. I am firmly in the camp that does not allow a co-owner of this house to smoke in his own home. Oh well.
I am in a constant state of quitting which means that I've given up on ever believing that I'm completely done with them. I clean up my own butts, and I did when I smoked full time. I think this is because my father has 5 pound (is coffee measured in pounds?) coffee cans from years of smoking about his house. It's gross.
I love that you said, "chaps my hide." That's all.
I used to smoke, and I had a little container that I put them in because I was so scared of offending people. I was mostly embarrassed of my habit the entire time that I did it. It was as much a stress to me that I wanted to quit as trying to quit and the guilt from smoking was consuming. I am so relieved to be a non smoker!
I clean my own butts and so-called "reformed" smokers are the worst whiners.
As you know we had 3 builders building our house..before we took over. One day we had a clean up after they had finished and besides pieces of timber etc that we collected, we picked up around 300 butts...as a non smoker, this made me sick as well as pissed me off.
My name is Eternally Distracted, I am a smoker and I am a cleaner of my own butt ;0)
One could say that I was a smoker for the first 24 years of my life. That's because I lived at home and my parents and grandparents all smoked - all day long. YUCK! I never realized how horrible it was until I moved away. When I would come for dinner and then go back to my place I would wonder "What IS that smell?" Then I finally realized it was the cigarette smoke. I was horrified when it dawned on me that I smelled like that for the first 24 years my life. DISGUSTING.
Anyway - dirty ashtrays and cigarette butts thrown about the yard. Ick! You're a good man, Jason. I agree with the others who said you are very tolerant.
Wow. Lots of strong comments about smokers... well I won't go there. Yep, I clean up after myself and usually others as well but it doesn't bother me that much. My daughter FC NEVER empties the ashtrays, and these are big ashtrays. I swear she's going to start a fire in the house one day... and ya its gross...
: ( Smoking is so bad!
Boo to all smokers.
I wish we could help them stop!
Throwing cigarette butts on the ground is just bad taste, no matter what side of the fence you're on. Send them out in the yard to clean up their own crap!!
Something I have never understood is why butts are somehow not considered liter. Why, if it is unacceptable to throw your candy wrapper on the ground or leave it on a table, are butts somehow seen as an exception?
You've hit on one of my pet peeves...smokers!! There's nothing I hate worse than someone smoking outside and the smoke working its way inside. We had a neighbor who would stand outside their door and smoke, and the smoke naturally drifted right down and into our open windows, making it nearly impossible to leave our windows open in beautiful weather. In a matter of seconds, the inside of our apartment would stink like smoke. UGH. And yes, they flick their butts everywhere. Once we had an upstairs neighbor who smoked, and he would sit out on his balcony and flip his butts right down onto our patio. Rude!
I feel your pain, Jason... truly.
Well, I may have to admit that when I was back in the US a couple years ago, staying with my mom, when all of my brothers and sisters got together, drank too much and all smoked together on the front porch, we may, MAY, have hidden our butts behind the bushes when my mom wasn't looking.
Post a Comment