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The Fear

Posted on September 5, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

I think an additional worry from many is the introduction of maths. Delving back into the mists of time I remember how worried parents were coming to parents evenings (when I used to teach) in case they were asked questions. My wife ran out of her ability to help the kids with science and maths homework somewhere around Year 5. It was clear that many adults out there struggle with mathematical operations. Taking the (to some of you) simple V=I.R may as well be written as follows for some people as:

Looking over some threads on an online forum I am struck by the number of people seeking reaffirmation for their coils, praise from their peers for a job well done but more so by the volume of vapers seeking help with their ecig wire woes. One of the lovelier aspects of online forums is a sense of community, a place where those with experience or knowledge can give others a helping hand or moral support.

It does worry me though; there are many vapers who do not interact online and the ease of buying cheap mods from China is ever-present. Even with forums and Facebook we see people charging their Egos in odd ways not to mention the ability for people to not realise the information they are being given may not be the wisest advice:

See, the thing is, fear is a good thing. Our ancestors were either fantastic at fighting or, more wisely, even better at hiding because they were afraid of being killed. Fear is the thing that is hardwired into us to protect us from ourselves.

Take the wobble of an atomiser on top of a mod due to a gap, for example. We are afraid that this wobble may end up ruining the threads of the atty or the mod and so we try to obtain a flush fit – and for those unable to do so there is always the OCD washer.

Part of our brain, the bit we really don’t have much control over, a relic from our primal selves gives us this ability to recognise danger and avoid it. This said, I can’t count the number of times I have touched a wick to adjust the coil and left myself with a cool mini-branding. Luckily the thalamus clicked into gear, got in touch with the sensory cortex, used the hippocampus and activated the hypothalamus faster than it took to write that and yanked my hand away from searing my flesh.

So it’s fine to fear your coils, it’s OK to find the maths perplexing; it’s just not OK to allow your child to purchase One Direction CDs. That scares me. And those of us with knowledge to share, don’t grow weary when seeing that question posed for the millionth time – it’s because there’s now 2.1million of us out there, each at a different stage in their vaping journey.

And let’s stop telling people that boiling batteries is good for extending the mAh rating no matter how much I may have tittered at the notion.

Dave Cross

Tobacco is good for you

Posted on August 8, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

For sure there’s the 4,000+toxins and buckets full of carcinogens but everything has a good side. Well, apart from wasps and chicory.

Take, for example, the West Nile virus and at this point West Nile virus needs to be added onto the list after chicory. Spread by mosquitos (damn, yet another addition to the list) the disease can develop polio-like symptoms and, finally, acute flaccid paralysis.

Hang on two ticks; I just need to check on my daughter as all summer holiday she has been limp and barely moving so I’m concerned that she has contracted WNV. Crisis over, it appears she has only contracted teenager syndrome.

It’s been found that monoclonal antibodies developed from tobacco and lettuce attacks and neutralises the West Nile virus. In order to prove it works mice were injected with a lethal dose of WNV before being served up a portion of monoclonal antibodies with 90% surviving. Brilliant news if you are a sub-Saharan mouse.

It doesn’t stop there either.

Rabies may have fallen out of the Top 10 Fashionable Diseases but it’s still no laughing matter as, for humans, it’s invariably fatal. It is being reported that genetically altered tobacco plants have delivered monoclonal antibodies that prevent the virus from attaching around nerve endings of the bite wound.

Given, what the researchers don’t say is that you need to carry it around with you and inject yourself shortly before being bitten so you’ll need to plan those rabid dog attacks into your holiday diary. Given the noxious gases emanating from my elder Springer over the last two days I’m pretty close to thinking that contracting rabies from him might be a preferable alternative.

But wait, right at the top of the current news pops is Ebola; a disease so nasty people are worrying they might be able to contract it from public toilets and speaking on the phone to call centres. Mapp Biopharmaceutical Incorporated have been working hard on press releases on behalf of Big T “we’ve got a monoclonal antibody to treat anything” Reynolds American Inc. Mapp claim that these monoclonal antibodies will attach themselves to the Ebola virus an immobilise it.

Oh, now I’m worried my daughter might be an Ebola virus being attacked by monoclonal antibodies.

But here’s the kicker, the final claim being put forward by the champions of tobacco recently is that it will use these monoclonal antibodies to cure cancer by stimulating the body’s immune system to destroy cancerous cells.

All of this science may well be true and not just a tobacco company on a huge publicity drive. If it is, brilliant, it’s great to have the positive spin put on something lambasted for so long. Just as long as no one tries this positive spin out for traffic wardens, Justin Bieber or people who eat with their mouth open.

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Fashion

Posted on August 8, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

The messianic scenes held fervour normally reserved for Bible-belt Sunday services, the home end of any football ground and late-Friday night city centre kebab shops.

When it comes to things like this I have form, I am not an early adopter by nature. It wasn’t until the 3GS that I got on board the Apple bus and sucked into the notion we had to replace everything we own that works with something newer that might perform better but probably won’t.

After countless declined opportunities to see The Smiths play I realised I quite enjoyed the music the day after they split, stupidly late adoption. Wicks are proving to be a lot like Morrissey; there was something simple and it just worked. Then it tried to become more profound and resulted in becoming a pain in the neck.

Silica, simple silica.

Back when I had my first genny, an Aga-T2, I became perplexed and vexed with mesh. Silica was such a delight; it worked in my Evods, it worked in the T2, it worked in drippers and when I finally bit the bullet and bought a SvoÃ«fun it damn well worked in there too.

But then stuff began to get silly.

I managed to keep up with a transition from round wire to flat and even managed to work through a learning curve to build microcoils and use cotton but what the flip is going on now? Wire with fancy names is appearing all over the shop and I’m left feeling like a Dad at a teen pop concert.

Not content with cotton there’s now rayon. Rayon? I don’t care if the pleasure vaping with it rivals that of being pleasured by the entire troop of the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders – it’s bloody rayon. Rayon is the fabric that destroyed my eyes in the 1970s. My mother, on a saving money tip, made me a pair of garish blue shorts out of the stuff. A pair of shorts that tried harder through their tightness to emasculate me than a van-load of stereotypical militant feminists.

The very last thing I want while vaping is a head full of Chessa Davis and the fear that by vaping I may contract a serious case of flares.

I tried to build a Dragon coil, I’ve watched a video about making a Tiger coil but rayon is just a step too far for me. What is coming next? Muff, that’s what; a cotton-like wick made from the discarded pubic hair of body fascists. But why stop there – we can weave Muff in with asbestos to improve durability and wicking even further so that the vape is so good the cloud transforms into a time portal.

I understand this is The Smiths and the Apple launch all over again. I just can’t get my head around wanting to vape at .00003Î© but I just bet that if they ban vaping then that will be the day I really want to try it.

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Winning the ASHes

Posted on August 5, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

Previous studies carried out estimated that there were between 900,000 to 1.3million vapers (electronic cigarette users) within the UK. The striking lead finding from ASH’s most recent survey is that there are now 2.1million vapers within the UK.

This figure is broken down into 700,000 ex-smokers who now only use electronic devices in place of cigarettes and 1.3million vapers who use vaping devices in addition to their smoking habits.

ASH contrasts the number of smokers who have tried an electronic cigarette. They state that in 2010 only 8.2% had tried one while this figure has now exploded to almost 58%. Of these smokers they note a rise from almost 3% regularly vaping had increased to almost 18% by this year.

They discovered that the figure for the non-smoking general public who knew about electronic cigarettes and vaping now stands at 90% of the population and of those almost two fifths agreed that vaping was a good thing for public health while only one fifth disagreed.

While debate still appears to focus in the media on the topic of vaping being a gateway into smoking ASH report that around 1% of non-smokers had ever tried an electronic cigarette and next to none of them continued to do so – destroying any gateway argument and supporting the findings from 2013.

For the second year running they found that the main reasons for vaping were to use as a tool to stop smoking, to remain from smoking and, for people who dual-fuel (vape and smoke), to cut down on the number of cigarettes smoked.

This turns the gateway argument on its head and amply demonstrates that vaping is not a gateway into smoking cigarettes but a gateway out of smoking cigarettes.

Despite all the arguments that banning and controlling when and where vaping can take place (because it looks like smoking a cigarette), ASH released findings demonstrating that this is far from the case. It stated that only 8% of people who vape use cigalikes (electronic cigarettes that look like cigarettes); these are also known as 1^st generation devices.

Of the rest, half vape using second generation devices (a small Ego-type battery and a small tank like an Evod). The other half use 3^rd generation devices such as mechanical mods and variable voltage/wattage devices along with genisis or silica tanks and drippers.

The third generation devices were most popular with ex-smokers and so there is a clear progression away from smoking through the three generations of electronic cigarettes.

Repeating the findings of 2013, ASH found that knowledge and understanding of electronic cigarettes was high among children and teenagers. They also demonstrated for the second year running that vaping in children and teens was restricted to a statistically insignificant number – and those who did either dual-fuelled because they were smokers or were ex-smokers. Again, this adds huge weight to the argument that vaping is a gateway out of smoking and not into it.

The report was released on the same day that ASH USA made the following statement: “While the FDA proposal is an important step, ASH is disappointed that the proposal does not include the regulation of the marketing of e-cigarettes nor the banning of flavors, such as bubble gum, that specifically target young people. Even if electronic cigarettes prove to be an effective tool for adults who are trying to quit, they should not be marketed to children.”

The disconnect between the two positions, one founded in research and the other not, could not be more contrasting. All of ASH UK’s evidence points to the fact that neither are electronic cigarettes marketed to young people nor are young people adopting electronic cigarettes. While ASH USA provide a caveat of “if” ecigs are effective quitting agents, ASH UK’s research amply demonstrates they are working year on year.

Sources for further reading:

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Vaping Types

Posted on July 11, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

17. The Chancer Vaper

“Hello everyone, I’m new to the forum and I’d just like to say that this looks a great place. I don’t fancy working for a living or paying my own way so can someone send me a Hana mod and an Origen dripper. Genuine mind, none of that cheap stuff coz I support makers innit.”

You spend your online time avoiding conflict and refusing to invoke Godwin’s Law but The Chancer will raise your blood pressure as you lift a pet to throw it at the screen.

Seriously, put this person on ‘ignore’ now because their second post will be in a Pay It Forward thread where they’ll be accepting a lifetime’s supply of Japanese cotton and offering up a cracked CE4.

18. The Illiterate Vaper

*We are on holiday for two weeks*

**You decided to ignore the message on the Homepage, no worries. But seriously, we’re backpacking in eastern Syria for fourteen days.**

***You appear to have scrolled to the purchase button. Do not order, we’ve no Internet or anything. We can’t sell to you.***

****YOU HAVE ATTEMPTED TO PURCHASE. LIKE, DO NOT CLICK PURCHASE AGAIN. JUST DON’T!****

*****Oh, you appear to have reached the basket page because you have mistakenly ordered something. You must have missed the many messages on the website telling you that armed with nothing but a three week old piece of haddock we’re taking on Islamic State single-handed. Still, at least you’ll now have read this message and so you know not to bother placing your £4.25 (after discount) request. Are you reading this? Hello? Hello?

DO NOT CLICK ON PROCEED UNLESS YOU ARE HAPPY TO WAIT FOR DELIVERY!

It’s probably best if you just empty your basket and return when we’ve liberated the world from extremism. Thanks. 🙂 *****

Vendor returns home to find inbox full of angry emails demanding to know where their orders are.

19. The Litigious Vaper

“Dear vendor/manufacturer,

I have spent fifteen minutes watching Watchdog and feel suitably qualified in telling you that you are in breach of Section 19, subsection 2, clause b of the I’ve Got The Right To Get My Money Back Act 2014.

At no point did the item come with instructions not to insert it into our pet ocelot and then place said item and ocelot into the microwave.

Not only do I demand a replacement item but a £50 gift voucher for my anguish and a pair of chinchillas to make up for our broken ocelot.

Er, within seven working days.

Not only am I looking forward to going to court (as I might appear in the local paper) but my wife’s cousin has a mate who writes a blog and he will destroy your reputation within the emu-riding vaping community.

Yours very serious,

Etc.”

It is highly likely that the Litigious Vaper will have now wound himself to fever pitch. Within seconds of sending the email he will have reported the transaction to Paypal and tried to make contact with the spirit of Lynn Faulds Wood (using a ouija board, two cups and a length of string).

20. The “I May As Well Go Back To Smoking lol” Vaper

The use of ‘lol’ in written text ought to be justification for compulsory euthanasia. The chances of the writer actually laughing at the time are bleaker than Sophie Raworth knocking at my door in the next 3 seconds.

3…2…1…Nope. Gah. Another Friday full of crushing disappointment.

The IMAWGBTSL vaper uses this catchall phrase to combat any and every vaping eventuality. From proposed legislation to being told his kitchen sink mod improvements is liable to take him and half of Stroud out in a ball of smoke; “Ha ha,” he will affect, “IMAWGBTSL!”

See also Insufferable Vaper, Tedious Vaper, Humorless Vaper and/or Lives With His Mum Vaper.

Part 2 of Vaping Types is available next month (with a collectors edition of belly button fluff wick for £19.99) from newsagents everywhere. *Except Stroud.

If you would like to find out more about Section 19, subsection 2, clause b of the I’ve Got The Right To Get My Money Back Act 2014, my online course is effort-free and affordable. Successful completion entitles you to attempt to get your money back.

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Celebrity Vapers

Posted on June 11, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

I don’t.

In fact I’m pretty sure I have the least amount of interest in celebrities it is possible to hold. Consequently I have had to enter the realm of celebrity gossip entertainment websites. The trauma is likely to keep me from sleeping without access to serious celebrity-style medications.

Most vapers I’ve met are equally disinterested in celebrities too so I’ve compiled this comprehensive list. Not for our interest but benefit. If your partner is anything like mine she abhors discussing mesh gauge, Clapton coils or the mad things sub-ohmers have done this week. Well, if she does like to then she clearly prefers just to listen while resting her eyelids.

As I crack open a tin of Guinness on Friday night I’ll point to the region of vapid on the television and say: “See her? See that Lohan? She’s a vaper she is”, and conversation will flow. And a moribund marriage will form new bonds of common interest.

That list in full:

Katy Perry, famous for being able to recite one line over and again while music plays.

Johnny Depp, famous for being a cool drunk pirate in every film he’s ever appeared in.

Leonardo DiCaprio, famous for being one of the few people not to have died on the Titanic. Unless he was one of the people who died on it, I don’t know, I’m one of the seven people who have never watched the film. He’s renown for not being as crap as Nicolas Cage as he has three expressions.

Lindsey Lohan, famous for being a drug-addled car crash of a human being. I thought her bottom gave an Oscar-worthy performance in Herbie.

Paris Hilton, famous for appearing in an online video so badly filmed it could have starred Nicolas Cage.

Britney Spears, famous for not being Mylie Cyrus like a music version of Leo DiCaprio.

Sean Penn, famous for becoming a much better actor thanks to divorcing Madonna (who is Britney Spears’ mum or something).

Jack Nicolson, famous for being one of the few celebrities who is genuinely great at his job. He must be as he has played the same person in all 45 of them.

Courtney Love, famous for being “the best **** in the world” (Â© Kurt Cobain). My grandma, mum and rabbits have all denied any carnal knowledge of Mr. Nirvana so I’m not sure how he calculated this.

Robbie Williams, Britain’s most famous fat man; due to him supporting the despised Stoke City FC everyone dislikes him.

Gok Wan, famous because his parents ran the chippy up the road from my mate’s café. I’ve not met any other sons of chip shop owners who have managed to get so many Rubenesque ladies to go naked on TV so he must be the best.

Charlie Sheen, famous for probably being the person who told Kurt that Courtney was good at sex as he’s slept with everyone in the world. Twice.

Kate Moss, famous for being my wife. Well, the publishing company she worked for told her that she was Kate Moss for the purposes of signing hundreds of copies of an autobiography.

Jenny McCarthy, Stephen Dorff, Kevin Connolly, Bruno Mars, Katherine Heigl, Cheryl Cole, Zayn Malik, Alexa Chung, Isla Fisher, Bradley Cooper, Zoe Kravitz, Spencer Matthews, Robert Pattinson and Rosie Fortescue are all famous for being a group of people in this list. Beyond that I have no idea who any of them are although Rosie Fortescue may have discovered a cure for cancer.

According to Bloomsburg Business Week, “public health officials fear (celebrities vaping) might not just spark e-cig sales but could reverse the decline in cigarette smoking as well.”

Are people that easily led by what the celebs do?

I’d formulate an answer but I’ve got to shoot off to dress up as a pirate, have sex with Charlie Sheen and watch Stoke City pitifully attempt to play football.

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Roobarb and Custard

Posted on June 6, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard

It makes me chuckle to see how easy people are offended in comparison to the insults that used to be traded on Usenet bulletin boards and newsgroups. That, and how feeble the insults are posted underneath Youtube videos and BitTorrent magnet links.

Ahh, I’m going all mushy remembering the days when ISPs hosted Usenet binaries.

Anyway, lists. Of all the lists I’ve added to my favourite has to be the “Things You Don’t Like” type of threads. As a person who naturally hates everything this is quite easy for me.

Stuff I’ve never liked includes things like AOL, Windows operating systems, period dramas, celery, DC comics and custard.

Custard – why? Like mosquitos, wasps, Celebrity Big Brother and chicory, what ungodly purpose does it serve being on the planet? School mealtimes always ended with an indeterminate lump of something in a bowl with jug upon metal jug of the congealed stuff sitting on tables. Before we became proper Middle Class and had brandy butter with our Xmas pud it was always destroyed by a sea of yellow muck.

Truth told, if Room 101 really existed and I was tied to a chair a tin of powdered Birds would be enough to reduce me to a gibbering wreck.

And then I took up vaping.

I held off trying some for ages, but the longer I was interacting with folks on the friendly forum the more people waffled on about GVC. As time clicked by I became convinced that either there was the most elaborate Internet hoax of all time taking place (that I was blissfully unaware of) or I needed to bite the bullet.

If I were to contribute to a thread of things I like then the first few slots would go the vaping way. I’ve found a real spirit of generosity and good spirit within the online vaping community, learnt a great deal and made some great friendships that have broken out into real life.

But, anyway, custard:

I’m no stranger to playing with words, I’ve got a reasonable vocabulary, but I’m buggered if I can put into words why I adore vaping custard so much. Plain custard, custard with banana, rhubarb and custard or tobacco & custard – it doesn’t matter, I love them all. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

Is it all down to the cartoon? Is it because it would take a stone-heart not to love Bernard Cribbins?

I have grown to adore it so much I asked the wife to whip up a bowl of her finest that the kids woof down in seconds. And what do you know? Yep, it remains as odious and repugnant as the sight of a politician trying to smile at normal people.

So here I sit, listening to Roxy Music typing away while tugging on a Kayfun loaded with custard from Vapertrain. And tonight, once I’ve got some Thursday beers on the go, I’ll recoil a Taifun with .28 Kanthal, 2.5mm Voodoowool and fill it with PowWow Sauce.

And the world will be as one; peace will reign

unless someone posts a thread asking where they can buy some GVC because then it’ll be a flame waaaaaaar!

Phreaking

Phreaking according to Wiki

Forget torrents – go Usenet

Delia’s recipe for proper custard

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Corruption

Posted on May 6, 2014February 19, 2024 by Rob Ellard

With relief, I discovered that throwing my music onto the new iTunes was easier than getting murdered on Coronation Street [insert Brookside for older readers]. The same could not be said for the hard drive with all my films on and other assorted docs. I tried different USB leads, different power supplies, spilling the blood of a goat and incantations to Satan – nothing. The thing has flat-lined.

Corrupt data is something you can at least play with and work around but when a drive resembles Monty Python’s parrot it’s beyond my abilities to control.

It seems to be beyond our collective abilities to control the actions of pharmaceutical companies too. It’s not like they’re new kids on the block; we’ve known for ages that they have all the morals of a city investment banker combined with the caring nature of Mother Teresa and Pol Pot.

One of the phenomena I’ve noticed from organisations pontificating on the need for e-cig/vaping regulation is that they tend to cite each other as examples as to why we should hold back from accepting them as part of a harm reduction strategy and they all reference the Food & Drugs Administration (FDA) in the States.

Why?

I can only speculate to this, but my feelings are that it comes down to an arse-covering policy found in middle management the world over. As long as we can point the finger of blame at a minimum of one other person we might be able to sneak out of the building job intact.

The problem is that the FDA and Big Pharma have history. Given that, the lack of anyone doing anything about it and Pharma’s opposition to e-cigs eating into their profit margins on NRT therapies and grossly over-priced cancer medication, is it wrong to suspect they’re still at it?

In 2013 there was a succession of stories implicating the FDA allowing Parma to pay to play. Pharmaceutical companies paid for seats on the committee that decided on the advice to give the FDA when weighing up the results of clinical trials of pain medication.

Documents uncovered demonstrated that up to $25,000 was paid to attend each meeting they sent representatives to, along with annual fees of $35,000. Craig Mayton, the lawyer who made the FOI requests, said “These emails help explain the disastrous decisions the FDA’s analgesic division has made over the last 10 years”.

The two professors arranging the meetings both received up to $50,000 per meeting, paid into their research fund accounts. Of the thirty to forty people attending these meetings only the pharmaceutical companies paid to attend. Other academics received up to $3,000 to attend meetings.

All of this is chump change to the pharmaceutical companies when dwarfed by the $9 billion value of the painkiller market.

Everyone who frequents forums or can remember the Stealthvape website a few months ago will recall Rob’s problems with back pain. I’d like to think that he and everyone else suffering from chronic pain were receiving medications that had been through the most stringent peer-reviewed clinical trials not bumped onto the market because palms were greased.

And yet we have the wonderful Professor Stanton Glantz who, if you peek at print media every now and then, is more omnipresent than a deity on a public relations campaign.

Last week confirmation came that he receives an honorarium from the World Health Organisation to slant his studies to match WHO’s objectives.

Clearly, I have no evidence of Glantz possessing a bulging research bank account but I am minded of a scene from Hamlet, after Horatio and Marcellus spot his dead Dad:

Horatio:
He waxes desperate with imagination.

Marcellus:
Let’s follow. ‘Tis not fit thus to obey him.

Horatio:
Have after. To what issue will this come?

Marcellus:
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. [that it festers with moral and political corruption]

Horatio:
Heaven will direct it. [that God will sort it all out]

Marcellus:
Nay, let’s follow him. [that we have to sort it out ourselves] [Exeunt.]

Consequently, I feel a wash of FOI requests need to be brought to bare who is funding the man. The only problem with this is that the tobacco industry did just this quite extensively in the 1990s to tie the man up in red tape.

I do tend to side with Marcellus on this, it’s something we need to sort out ourselves – just like what I need to do with the black box that used to be a hard drive

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The 12 Days of Stealthvapemass

Posted on April 12, 2014February 27, 2024 by Rob Ellard