Category Archives: Celebrity Cigar Chat

Celebrity Cigar Chat With Danny Bonaduce – Sunday November 21, 2010

About a year ago it came to my attention that Danny Bonaduce enjoys the occasional cigar.  Most recently Danny has been the morning radio personality on Philadelphia’s 94 WYSP, but has had a storied career in television (Partridge Family, Breaking Bonaduce), professional wrestling and boxing.  His 2002 autobiography, “Random Acts Of Badness” was a New York Times best seller and is quite a good read.  Earlier this week, Danny was kind enough to take a few minutes out of his day and speak to me about cigars and life and was very easy to talk to.  He has some interesting insights on cigars and life.  I recorded our conversation and transcribed it verbatim.

Click here to hear how Danny started the call: Danny_Bonaduce1_answer

I asked if I could record our conversation and Danny responded:

You’re much better off with the pace I talk. Until about 4 o’clock in the afternoon, I can’t turn off the show pace. I speak a thousand miles an hour.

In the course of explaining who I am and what I do, Danny got a head start on the interview:

Interestingly enough, I was out in Reading last night…Reading, Pennsylvania. There’s a place called Landis Corvette and they’re a sponsor of my radio show, and the commercial says “Hi, this is Jimmy Deo, retired wrestler” and I told them “You know, one of these days you should put a wrestling ring in your parking lot and I’ll wrestle you, it’ll be fun” …because I did all that stuff with Hulk Hogan. I ended up doing it last night and got seven stitches to the head, it was a little rough. He just started his own cigar company. I mean literally, he was debuting them last night at the wrestling match.

Interesting…..so did you smoke any?

No, not before the match, but I have one right here. I usually have them with a drink, so I won’t get to it until later in the day. So I can’t tell you if they are good or not, but he seemed incredibly proud of them.

That is a cool coincidence, because Reading isn’t that far away, it’s right up the road.

Oh, you could actually go try one of ’em man, ’cause he started, like, a club and stuff. I mean, I’d never heard of it before last night, so I was getting the run down while I was getting ready to wrestle. He used to be a pro for years and years and years and just because I’ve been on TV wrestling with Hulk Hogan for 8 or 9 weeks that’s all the wrestling I know, so I was like, scared. He was talking about his cigars and stuff and I’m going “wait, wait, wait, what happens after you hit me in the head with a trashcan?”

Are you still smoking a cigar every now and then?

Yeah. Every now and again. But, you know what? Cigars to me are, well, to be honest with you, more significant because I, not that I don’t acknowledge Christmas as a, ah….I was born Roman Catholic, so I acknowledge it as a holiday, I don’t get all crazy about it but I give gifts and stuff like that, but birthdays and Christmas in my own house, not for my kids, or friends, or something like that, I don’t really acknowledge because I was homeless for 2 full years after the Partridge Family and made it back again, so I don’t play the lottery, I don’t buy myself presents on my birthday or Christmas. It’s like, I got all the presents, like, I can go buy anything I want any time I want. These days mean nothing to me because it’s a “special Tuesday”. So, cigars are kind of like that to me, except that I do acknowledge them, but it has to be ‘a very special Tuesday’. There has to me a reason for me to sit down with a brandy or a cognac and smoke a cigar. I just don’t do it in the house for no good reason. There has to be…either I did a personal good job and I’m not celebrating with anyone, or it’s me and a bunch of guys in a cigar club. But, both things are once or twice a year. Cigars are significant to me.

Are there certain cigars you’ve really enjoyed?

You know, in most of the world we don’t….I don’t know how many people are aware of this, but you can go to Cuba, you just can’t spend American money there. We don’t boycott the island; we just aren’t allowed to spend money there. So we go to Mexico, Canada, England or anywhere you can get , you know, Cubanos no problem, which are always good, but, for the most part, I am given cigars, and somebody says that “You’re going to love this”, and I don’t know what particular brand they are. Usually, to my surprise, because often I like a good drink with my cigar, they are often wrong about the drink, but they’re almost always right about the cigar. I’ve never had a cigar from a person who said “You’re going to love this” and not thought, at least, “This is very good”. But the drink they told me to go with it is often a huge miss. It’s funny that people are more accurate about their tobacco than their alcohol.

Taste is so subjective….

It’s completely subjective, but when you come to something as strong as an 80% or an 80 proof spirit, that’s not subjective that’s hit you in the head and if it hits you in the head improperly you notice.

With the cigars, and I have a fairly good palate for both, I would notice a poorly crafted cigar. You could notice it by the way it falls apart…you can notice it by the way it continually goes out or continually stays lit, depending on where you are and how often you’re puffing on it. There’s a lot of significant “tells”, for lack of a better word, with a good cigar. Where, if you don’t like the taste of a drink, that’s that.

Honestly, who’s going to come up to you and give you a cigar and say “Hey, this sucks, your going to hate it”?

Actually, nobody, but there are people, like I said, they’ve been mostly right with cigars, but there are people who, because of my reputation or what people think about me, often recommend to me a recreational past-time of some kind and say “You’re going to love this” and I hate it. People think “Let’s go out and get into a bar fight or take a bunch of drugs.” Things I wouldn’t ever do. I did them when I was in my 20s, but they made the papers. People are going to think being impolite to your wait-staff is cool. You know, I use to be a bartender. There are a lot of things that people think are cool that I do not. But mostly, it’s surprising, and I don’t think I would have even taken notice of this had you not been on the phone, but it’s surprising to me how accurate people are about their cigars. People are mostly inaccurate about everything. If they weren’t I wouldn’t have a radio show to disagree with everything. That’s what I do basically.

What do think is easier to get: Drugs or Cubans?

Drugs. I wanted to answer honestly. In Philadelphia, I’d say drugs by far but that’s only because I never took drugs in my adult life in LA , I’d have told you, no, I’d still have told you drugs, absolutely. I would think anywhere in the US if your a guy who dresses like I do and knows where the neighborhood is, you can get drugs in 5 minutes. I don’t know where they keep, you know, contraband, in the sense of, you’re smuggling in a substance that’s legal everywhere but here. You know, there’s guys in suits and ties doing that stuff, and there’s guys with leather jackets and gloves with spikes on them selling drugs, so I’d pull over to the guy with the gloves and the spikes and go “Whattaya got?” and I’ll get whatever I want. To find a good Cuban cigar, you gotta know where the rich people hang and the rich people are actually still scared…can you believe there are people actually scared of getting arrested for having a Cuban cigar?

There was an advertiser in LA on my radio station of a cigar club and they had like a secret room that you had to know them for years and then they’d break out with the Cubans but they’d clip any band off it, it was very weird. I believe there’s a ton of things that are illegal that I could get you faster in any city in America than I could get you a good Cuban cigar.

What is your favorite place to smoke a cigar?

My favorite place to smoke a cigar? I will give you specifics on this, my friend. On a leather green recliner, that should be red, but they didn’t have any, that are called library chairs, in my library, next to the fireplace, with a glass of something. I’ll say cognac just to be cool, but I’m a much bigger fan of vodka, but I would say they don’t go together as well, but I’m sure they do, I just do that to myself because cigars, like I said, are a celebration, something really happened. Some special guest will come on my radio show and before they hung up the phone instead of me thanking them they said “That was the best interview ever Danny, thank you for not caring about this thing and really…that was great Danny.” I’ll come home and go, “Tom Hanks could not have been more pleased with being on my show today.” That would be an event to smoke a cigar. Winning a boxing match, absolutely, first thing I do after a fight. First thing I do is smoke a cigar. And that’s usually without a drink because I’m in a place that doesn’t serve any kind of alcohol for the most part.

How do you feel about smoking bans?

I think they’re perfectly reasonable, especially here in Philly. In Los Angeles, you know, I was born here in Philadelphia, but I lived for 30 years in Los Angeles, and during that time they put the smoking ban in and there were a couple of restaurants that were grandfathered in because they had an extension where parts of the roof would open, so you could smoke. I wrote my entire book at a bar called Mirabela, I think. I wrote it in a bar, in long hand, and then would dictate it when I got home. But I’d write it while smoking and drinking at Mirabelas. So, I have never boycotted a bar, but I just quit a month ago, a 3 pack a day cigarette habit, but I’ve lived in Chicago in the winter, and the fact of the matter is this is another reason that cigars are a celebration. You don’t go outside in the freezing rain or snow to get a couple hits off your cigar. You don’t do that. You recline, you relax. In my estimation of life, somebody is peeling grapes for you while you’re drinking and smoking your cigar. It’s a moment in time, it’s not a rush outside, get your fix and get inside. I can wait a month, I can go, OK, I’m fighting this guy, or I’m doing this thing or I’m racing this car, and if I win, I happen to be looking at a picture of me winning a race right now, that’s what made me think of it because I don’t really race cars but I just happen to have won once. I will go home and smoke a cigar because it’s called for. That’s the thing about me and cigars. I’m not a casual smoker; my cigar must be called for.

Here’s a question since you brought up quitting cigarettes, are you afraid smoking a cigar will lead you back to cigarettes?

I think in a way, if they’re serious smokers such as I, the fact of the matter is they will. I will take the most gnarly cigar of any kind and pretend I’m not going to inhale it, and inhale it. I think, if you want to quit smoking and your a serious smoker, I think a guy that smokes half a pack a day, first of all, I have no respect for that guy, that guy shouldn’t smoke, he’s not addicted, he shouldn’t even smoke, they’re bad for you. At my point, 30 years of 3 packs a day, I got the shakes when I quit, I went to a doctor. “I can’t shake like this at work. People are going to think something. You have to help me here.” That’s a lot of nicotine, 90 cigarettes a day…wait, 20, 40, 60 cigarettes a day, I’m sorry. You know if you would describe me, they’d say: he’ll be on the corner, he’ll be smoking a cigarette, and he has red hair. The first thing you would say about me is he has a cigarette in his hand. So a guy that smokes that much will immediately inhale cigars. If you were to move from cigarettes to cigars and not continue to damage your lungs and/or throat I’d give it 3 months minimum. Because the joys of a cigar, you know, they’re had in your mouth not in your lungs.

If you could smoke a cigar with anyone in history, who would it be and what would you talk about?

Alright, history is like my favorite thing, man. Your going to have to give me a second…Off the bat I’m going with Thomas Jefferson, but I also might go with Voltaire, but there’s a….OK…no, I’m going with Socrates. Yeah, I’m going to go with Socrates. Because cigars do go out because they don’t have the chemical enhancement that cigarettes do and with a good cigar, with the right cigar, I am going to spend a day in the company of Socrates, and I don’t think you’d come out the same. A good cigar and Socrates… I think therefore I am…I smoke therefore it’s pleasurable. It’d be a nice day. Fuck, I’m really smart. <Laugh>

That’s a great answer. The first two were no slouches….but Socrates is a good one. Jefferson, Voltaire, yeah….

You know what? It’s funny because I often attribute a quote from Voltaire to Jefferson. Jefferson, is, I think, one of the greatest Presidents, obviously, of all time. Most Americans would give you Abraham Lincoln, which I will happily agree with, but, as a matter of fact, a manic depressive, but was known to smoke cigars. But, I found the wisdom of Thomas Jefferson…I mean…I live 4 blocks from the Declaration of Independence…and when you see it holding up, no matter what trials and tribulations hit it, it covers them 200 years later. It covers the FDA, it covers flight, it covers airspace. I mean, how is it possible for a man to have been so ahead of his time? With the tiniest bit of tweaking by mortals a 200 year old document is still exactly appropriate for today. Also, he invented the lazy susan for books and anybody who can read 4 books at a time I’m a fan of.

I think he grew tobacco too.

He did. And probably had it picked by Sally Hemings. <laugh>

Well, that about exhausts my questions for you…

Imagine….I’m getting married next week, the second I hang up with you; I’m going to go tell her something I think is really clever, and badger her like this! Believe me; I am aware that I am exhausting.

Congratulations on your upcoming wedding, and thanks to your fiancé and my wife for setting this whole thing up.

<laugh> So you’re the same guy as me?! We wouldn’t be talking if it weren’t for chicks….Cool! …Gives us time for manly stuff!

Myself, Danny and my wife Jenn last year at Mike's Famous Harley-Davidson in Delaware

Danny can be heard every morning in Philly from on 94 WYSP from 5:30 to 9 and has his own website: http://dannybonaduce.net/ .  Drop him a congratulatory e-mail fro his upcoming nuptials and mention you read about it here!

That’s about it for this installment.  Until the next time,

CigarCraig

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Celebrity Cigar Chat with George Hamilton – Monday, September 20, 2010

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing George Hamilton. He’s not just a Hollywood icon (“Love at First Bite“, “Zorro the Gay Blade” ), author (“Life’s Little Pleasures“, “Don’t Mind if I Do“) and famed ladies man, George Hamilton loves cigars.  Not only does he love them, but his knowledge of the growing and manufacture go well beyond that of even the most hardcore enthusiast. From landing in Havana in January of 1959 and being detained by the revolution (read “Don’t Mind if I Do”!), to having brands of cigars and cigar bars bearing his name,  Mr. Hamilton knows cigars and took some time out of his busy day to speak with me about them.  Here is the transcript of my Q&A with him:

Do you still smoke cigars?

Yeah, I do.  I have really great cigars that I’ve collected over the years.  I don’t think cigars get “better” with age…I don’t believe that.  I think you can preserve them for a long time, and I’ve had very old, pre-embargo cigars that were still hanging on…and I’ve had a lot of Dominican cigars and Nicaraguan ones and even Jamaican that were during the war that were preserved well.  So I’ve always had a collection of great cigars and while I don’t smoke every night anymore, my brother likes it, and I like it. So I find that when I really have something in-depth to think about or ponder, I take a cigar.  Or when I have a meeting with someone where it’s going to be 45-minutes of business, I choose well the cigar, and I try to choose well the person I’m going to smoke it with.

You had the Hamilton’s Cigar Lounge in Las Vegas and the Hamilton Reserve cigars…

I had two lines of them…one of them made by Upmann, and I had made one by Davidoff …Kelners.  And then I developed my own line which was called “Hamilton House,” which was a blend of Dominican with Nicaraguan … perhaps stronger tobacco that was quite good from the old Somoza fields.

I did this in the Dominican, and I think at that time I was fairly accomplished at not only appreciating a cigar but knowing why I appreciated it.

When you enjoy a cigar, you don’t realize how many hundreds of people’s hands touch it before you get to it.

It’s not as much the cigar as it is the tobacco…I mean, what goes into the actual tobacco…the fillers and binders.  The binder’s  another thing, that’s grown in a different way, really.  It is an enormous amount of time that hands are touching it.  It’s incredible to see a torcedor make a cigar properly (and crimp and book it right).  It’s not an easy thing to do, and there’s nothing worse than a cigar that’s badly rolled.  I just want to ditch when they burn quickly.  You can feel a cigar. I can look at it now.  If you can stand it on its ash, you can tell it’s pretty much been rolled right.

That brings up an interesting question: there is a current trend towards short fat cigars, 60 ring gauge, and I’ve seen some manufacturers brag about them standing on their ash.  So it’s interesting that you mention that….

Well, I can do it on a panatela …I mean any one that’s rolled right it’ll stand on its own ash.  If you get a least three-fourths inch to one-inch, you should be able to stand a cigar on its ash in an ashtray.

I like to look at a cigar, and I like to see the combustion ring and look at the magnesium and see how white a ring it is. You can smell a cheap cigar across the room…or these days, across the street. There’s nothing worse than a cigar that’s made with cheap tobacco and green tobacco. The minute you take it in, you know.  I can smell it a mile away, but once in awhile someone will give you a cigar and it’s a “fooler“. You think, “Oh my God, why am I with this person for 45 minutes with this cigar?!”

How do you feel about the Cuban embargo and how that affects things now and how the possibility of it ending will affect things?

Well, I think that Cuban tobacco, just by the nature of the tobacco, (the Vuelta Abajo…in that area) is some of the most wonderful cigar tobacco I’ve ever seen.  And I know for a while they made their Cohibas from there, and I know that Castro’s people rolled from those farms in that area. Tobacco is so personal that you have to know the farm; you have to know the people.  And you can get consistency by going to the same people…knowing their land – if it’s been rotated, if the lands been worn out…you know.

Cuba has incredible tobacco…always has. And it’s not to say that we don’t have it. Connecticut broadleaf binder is incredible.  It has stretch and give to it and feel to it. And they use it in Cuban cigars, but the Cuban tobacco that they have is so incredibly good and so unmistakably Cuban that if you’ve ever smoked them, you get used to them, and it’s a sad loss not to have them.

There are many wonderful cigars in the Dominican. In Nicaragua, the Somoza fields have incredible tobacco…Cuban seed tobacco that was wonderful.  But “the Cubans” are unmistakably Cuban just as a great bottle of Lafite or La Tour or a Chateau Cheval Blanc or Haut Brion or Petrus come from a specific piece of land, and you know why that wine is great. (Not to say California hasn’t got great wines and isn’t getting better, but the price of it doesn’t make a lot of sense – what we’re charging for a lot of the wines.)

I think the art of anything is to find out a price you can live with that suits your habit and suits your “pocket.” Cuba will come in with cigars, and it only costs about 85 cents to roll that cigar…maybe $1.30 – I don’t know what it is now – but they retail these cigars for $30 and $40 in some places.

At some point the embargo will go. The Cuban cigar when there was no embargo was still a great cigar. So it wasn’t just the idea that it was “impossible to get,” it was because it competed worldwide as one of the great cigars, and it’s unmistakable.

You know the difference when you smoke a Montecristo 2 or an Epi or you know when you have …there are 10 or 20 brands of Cuban cigars. I’ve had them in England for periods of time and enjoyed them, and the British love them. The Spanish have better selections of them. And they had them in Switzerland for a while to help Cuba when there was an embargo. So anybody that is a cigar smoker, when they go out of the country, they will try a Cuban cigar… and if they have Cuban cigars, they will know why they match up.

I’ve been fortunate to have sampled many Havana cigars and they do appeal to me…

Now there aren’t many I haven’t had over the years, there are some [about which] we think the tobacco is strong, and it’s all how it’s blended. And there are cigars from Cuba that are incredibly soft and mellow…and there are others that are very strong. I mean, someone who’s never had a Montecristo 2 Torpedo Figurado says their eyes will roll back in their head! <laugh>

The last one I had that came from an English friend. It was very smooth, complex and delicate.  I was surprised by it…it was a shock…

That’s right. There used to be two great guys in England, Desmond Sautter and Edward Sahakian.  Those guys had the best cigars in the world…the best selection of cigars in the world! And they even had ones that were pre-embargo that I tried.  I was always amazed at their cigars. Nothing I had ever measured up to those two fellas cellars.

How do you feel about smoking bans?  Florida is proposing some pretty crazy restrictions and California started out back in the late ‘90s…

California is the one that actually destroyed smoking, and interestingly enough, the Governor smokes cigars…and probably still smokes them…and it crept in and spread like wildfire across the country.

I think… to me, there’s no doubt about it [smoking] being carcinogenic. There’s no doubt about alcohol being bad for your health…there’s no doubt about that, but it’s all in how you do it and the frequency in which you do it, I believe.

People should have that choice in their lives – what they want and what they do. I mean, I want to be informed and make my own decisions.  And that’s not to say an addict can’t be cut off …an addict should be cut off. You do everything can to make sure people don’t drink and drive!

But when it comes to cigars, I think they’ve been around a long time and people have survived to a very late age with them.  And it’s a decision made by the individual that shouldn’t be taken out of their hands, but I don’t disagree with the information.

Yes.  Some could argue that the sun’s rays could be carcinogenic!

There’s no doubt about it.  There’s nobody who’s more…I’m informed about the sun, I know all about it, and I’m probably the tannest white man in America! <laugh> I made that choice.

Well, that’s about it.  I thank you for your time.

I appreciate it and your interest.  My cigars have always been a passion, and I love them…and I have great wines that I love…but they are only an adjunct to my life.

It’s amazing: I believe in dieting, I believe in cutting back on calories and all those things as you get older, health-wise, but another thing that’s terribly important is that there is a balance in your life and that you see the humor in the tragedy and that you get a hold of some sense of freedom in our government’s proposal to clamp down on everything we do!  You can’t live by those laws and really live.

It was really cool to chat about cigars with George Hamilton, he really knows his stuff.  I purchased a box of the Hamilton House Torpedos from Best Cigar Prices in honor of this occasion.  Mr. Hamilton tells me that these cigars were his third line and added Cameroon to the Dominican blend, if, indeed, they are the original.  I received the box today and they look brand new, so I don’t think they are old stock that has been buried in a humidor for years.  They are beautiful looking cigars.

Tell ya what,  I will send a Hamilton House torpedo to 3 random folks who leave a comment on this article.

Many thanks to my wife, Jennifer, for transcribing the recording and making the interview happen. Thank you to Mr. Hamilton who was very generous with his time and I deeply appreciate the opportunity to have had a brief discussion with him.

That’s it for now, until the next time,

CigarCraig

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CigarCraig’s Celebrity Cigar Chat with Jim Babjak of The Smithereens

This is the first in what I hope to be a series of short interviews with famous cigar smokers, CigarCraig’s Celebrity Cigar Chat.   Jim Babjak is the lead guitarist and founding member of The Smithereens, a band from New Jersey who enjoyed success in the  80’s and 90’s and continues to wow audiences to this day.  From classics like “A Girl Like You”, “Blood and Roses” and “Behind the Wall of Sleep”, to full album covers of the Beatles “Meet the Beatles” (Meet the Smithereens) and their latest, and one of my favorites of late, their treatment of “Tommy”, these guys rock with the best of them.  I had the pleasure of seeing them at the iconic “Stone Pony” in Asbury Park, NJ last summer and I think it’s the first time I can remember not standing still for an entire show and singing along with just about every song. Jim and the band still tour as well as enjoy many side projects including Jim’s album “The Music From Jim Babjak’s Buzzed Meg • Part 1”.  Jim is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet, as well as a fellow cigar smoker.  I asked him these questions:

1. How and when did you come to be a cigar smoker?

“In the late 1970′s I belonged to the NY Rangers Hockey fan club. There was a weekend trip I took with a bunch of friends to a game in Montreal against the Rangers in 1977. It cost $50. It included the bus ride, hotel and ticket to the game. I went 3 years in a row. It was a trip sponsored by the fan club and it was a lot of fun. I would bring my guitar and have people on the bus singing songs by the Rolling Stones, Kinks, Beatles, Who, etc.

Someone on the trip said that you can get Cuban cigars in Canada, so I was intrigued by that and picked up a Romeo Y Julieta. I would rarely smoke a cigar back then. It was odd for a 19 year old. I guess I felt like I was more mature than I really was. My wife, who I was dating at the time, bought me my first humidor in 1979 as a Christmas gift. I still use it to this day.

I used to smoke cigarettes and the occasional cigar. I quit the cigarettes over 10 years ago and haven’t had one since. I do not inhale cigars like some ex cigarette smokers do.

When our band would tour Europe in the 80′s I would always pick up some Montecristo # 2′s. They were my favorite at the time.”

2. What is your “goto” (everyday) cigar? What is it you like most about that cigar and how long has it been your favorite?

“My younger brother Bill is also a cigar smoker and he turned me on to the Padron 1964 series years ago.

Pretty much, all I really smoke anymore is the Padron 1964 and 1926 series unless someone gives me a good cigar as a gift. They are expensive, but I would rather smoke less when I can afford it than to smoke more of a lessor quality cigar. It makes me enjoy it and appreciate it more.

My everyday cigar( I don’t smoke everyday, and I generally take a break between November and March, unless I travel to a warmer climate) is the Padron 1926 Principe for about 5 years now. It has a full flavor for a small cigar. It takes about 45 minutes to smoke. It just tastes good to me. I can’t describe it like experts would by saying it has a hint of chocolate, coffee, or whatever. I don’t analyze these things. I just know what I like and what makes me feel good.

Some cigars taste like crap to me and have a foul smell and taste. I will never bother to smoke them.

All the Padrons have a different flavor going on. The draw and pleasure I get from these cigars is very consistent.

When I have the time, it is the 45 Anniversary 1926 Padron. It is my favorite leisure cigar. I like it better than the 40 and 80 Anniversary ones.

I love a full bodied cigar.

I went to the Caribbean recently and I took my travel humidor filled with Padrons. I brought it with me as a backup. I tried the Montecristo # 2 and the Cohibas while I was there, but I prefer my Padrons to the Cubans.

I did have the Cohiba maduro in Spain last year and that was pretty good, but since it’s illegal to bring back I only had one there every day at sound check.”

3. What is your ideal situation for enjoying a cigar?

“Definitely by my pool on weekends in the summer, or at night on my deck.

I’ll usually pour myself a glass of Zaya 12 year old Rum from Trinidad, or 23 year old Ron Zacapa neat with a bottle of Mexican Coca Cola on the side.

I buy the Mexican Coke in bottles from my Sam’s club by the case. It is made with sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup, so it tastes more like the Coke I enjoyed as a kid. I’ll never have soda from a 2 liter plastic bottle or from a can.”

4. Do you have the opportunity to enjoy cigars while touring?

“Absolutely, sometimes before a concert or afterward if the show is outside.”

5. If you could hang out and smoke a cigar with anyone, living or dead, who would that be, why, and what cigar would you smoke?

“Probably JFK smoking pre-Castro Cubans.

Seriously, I meet the most interesting people in my local cigar shop in Jersey City. Great stories and fun conversations are the norm. There are people from all walks of life, profession, age, income level, that have many interesting stories to tell and it’s the cigar that brings us together. It’s an eclectic bunch that under normal circumstances would never be in the same room otherwise. One minute you’ll be talking about Health care and the next minute you’ll be talking about a 3 Stooges episode.”


Many thanks to Jim for taking the time to answer my questions.  I really enjoyed reading Jim’s responses.  If you happen to be at Rock Con in east Rutherford, NJ this weekend (July 29, 30 and August 1, 2010) stop by and say hello.   Give Jim’s “The Music From Jim Babjak’s Buzzed Meg • Part 1” a listen at Amazon.com as well as the a lot of the Smithereen’s music at The Smithereens’ Amazon.com store.

That’s it for now,

CigarCraig

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