Smoking is Very Bad for You

If you care enough to spend your hard-earned money on such a rarefied tome as this magazine, you obviously have given at least some thought to the concept of self-reliance and personal defense. We fret endlessly over carry gear, sighting systems and, stopping power. To be prepared for a defensive encounter, it behooves us also to invest a little thought in maintaining this remarkable human machine.

The human body is the most extraordinary mechanical contrivance ever devised. It metabolizes, reasons, avoids danger, produces art, builds stuff, tears things up and procreates. Like any machine, however, to operate at peak efficiency the human body requires regular maintenance.

They told us in medical school about 85% of what determines how healthy we are later in life is established at the moment of conception, so you should choose your parents carefully. While genetics do play an undeniably large role, there yet remains a great deal of life over which we have quite a bit of control. Most of this is made manifest in our lifestyle choices.

The Apex Predator

We recently broke 350,000 COVID deaths in America. SARS-CoV-2 was sufficient to trash the economy of the entire planet. During that same period we lost 480,000 Americans to cigarettes, and nobody cares. The Left wants to shred the U.S. Constitution over a dozen or so black rifle fatalities, but cigarettes kill more Americans in a year than we lost in all of WWII and they really can’t be bothered.

Lung cancer, heart disease and diabetes complications are the major players in my experience. However, today I’ll give you another reason not to smoke. You don’t want to catch on fire and be thrown from a speeding car.

’Twas a Dark and Stormy Night

Our hero presented to the busy urban emergency department where I lost my youthful innocence. He was badly burned over his lap, chest, arms, hands and face. He was also broken absolutely to pieces. He looked as though he had run through some kind of machine. Surprisingly, he was both conscious and lucid. My first questions was, “Wow. What happened to you?”

He had been driving down the Interstate alone when he retrieved a Marlboro along with his trusty Zippo. Try as he may, he couldn’t get the lighter to perform. As nicotine dependence is one of the most powerful physiological addictions extant, he was in no mood to wait until he reached his destination. He therefore retrieved his bottle of Ronsonol lighter fluid and proceeded to recharge his Zippo enroute while driving with his knee.

This is a pretty high performance task and the traffic was thick, so he naturally spilled the volatile stuff everywhere. When he subsequently went to activate his cigarette he quite unexpectedly set himself alight. Stuck inside a speeding car and now fully conflagrated he did what any reasonable person might do under similar circumstances — he opened the door and leapt into the ether.

It’s honestly a miracle the poor guy survived. The violence of his ejection did thankfully extinguish the flames though at great cost to his person. But for the grace of God he did not spill his brains on the asphalt or end up underneath a semi-truck. There’s no telling what became of the guy’s flaming car.

So plan well, prepare thoroughly and train hard. Life can be pretty relentless at times, and it behooves us all to face its many manifest challenges soberly. Above all else, however, just don’t smoke. Otherwise you might find yourself bouncing along the Interstate on fire.

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