Cigar Salutations From The Old Glory Society*
There was a time when the funniest guy in the room was a short Jewish guy holding a cigar. It’s possible that cigars make you funnier. Or maybe cigar smokers are just lazy and instead of getting a real job they first try to make a buck by telling jokes. When’s the last time someone came up to you and asked (someone other than your five-year-old), “Hey, wanna hear a good joke?” Shit, I get it, if someone offers to tell you a good joke in 2017 you figure he’s gonna drop his pants or something. Still, life would be simpler, more enjoyable if we told more jokes and smoked more cigars.
George Burns said a lot of funny things.
- “Happiness is a good cigar, a good meal, a good cigar, and a good woman … or a bad woman. Depends on how much happiness you can handle.”
- “First you forget the names, then you forget the faces, next you forget to put your zipper up, and finally, you forget to put your zipper down.”
- “Sex at age 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.”
- “When I was a boy, the Dead Sea was only sick.”
George was born Nathan Birnbaum. He never laughed at his own jokes, he was always deadpan. He made people laugh because he was willing to make himself the butt of a joke, because he had cadence and style. He projected seriousness, he was wise and calculating, possessing comedic timing that he could deliver with surgical precision. He joked about his age, about growing old, almost incessantly, using himself as the target to disarm the audience and get them on his side. Genius. I must admit, I love George Burns in no small part because of the cigars. A man who smokes a cigar is a man unafraid of life, a man willing to fully commit to those things in life that bring enjoyment.
When you hear the name George Burns you think Gracie Allen and cigar smoker. George used the cigar masterfully as a prop, but he was a serious cigar man. He smoked between ten and fifteen cigars a day for seventy years. Surprisingly, his go-to brand was a pretty cheap machine-made cigar called an El Producto. Fittingly, he said it was his cigar of choice because it helped the act, as it was the only cigar he found that would stay lit during a running monologue that could take an unexpected turn or two.
W.C. Fields was a cigar smoker, “Once during Prohibition, I had to live on nothing but food and water,.” And so was Redd Foxx who said, “The trouble with unemployment is the minute you wake up, you on the job!” On why money is green Redd Foxx said, “Jews pick it before it gets ripe.” Foxx’s friend, Flip Wilson said, “I believe in Irishmen running the company, Jews running my business affairs and black guys running the hundred-yard dash.”
That’s funny shit, or maybe it’s only funny shit to a cigar smoker. Oh well, maybe comedy and cigar smoking aren’t related, but if you took time out to smoke a cigar on occasion, you’d have a few minutes to consider the lighter side of life. Maybe you could learn a few jokes of your own and people would like you more … here’s one, “What’s the difference between a pickpocket and a peeping tom? A pickpocket snatches watches.” You’re welcome! I hope you enjoy your smoke.