To Buy A Rolls Royce, Or A Few Reliable Honda's?

[Kyle Weiss]

Well, one thing's for certain: RustyMouse knows how to jump in with both feet to stir up some discussion on BoB. :lol:


If you spend $5 on a cob or $500 on an artisan pipe and only look at it, it's just art.

If you spend $5 on a cob or $500 on an artisan pipe and it just sits in a box someplace, it's a waste.

If you spend $5 on a cob or $500 on an artisan pipe and you use it and enjoy it, you've done the right thing.

The way I see it, having stuff is okay: provided you use it. It's a fine line between collecting and hoarding, and an even finer line if you can justify either (or both). The purpose of the thing(s) in question is always the bottom line, and if enjoyment isn't common or a part of your daily life, it's just expensive rubbish.

Bonus points: always live and spend within your means.

8)

 

[Storm_Crow]

Get a Honda, but don't get the base model. Treat yourself a little and go for the EX trim. I wouldn't want a pipe without a moonroof, alloy wheels, and bluetooth. :lol:

 

[user 2031]

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[Natch]

Remember to "invest" some of your funds in good Virginia based tobaccos to age. A pound or two jarred up will be a wonderful treat in ten years, regardless of the pipe it's smoked in?

Oh, and if you don't own any cobs yet, get a couple MM Country Gentlemen, both straight and bent. Great pipes.

Natch

 

[riff raff]

If you are new to pipes, I'd go easy on the pipe purchases. What I liked a year ago, has no appeal to me at all. I managed to turn around some purchases and not lose too much if any. I love my estates, and ones I refurbish myself have even more appeal and value to me. I've settled in with some good name British makers and classic shapes. Five years from now, will I be eyeing Danish freehands? Who knows. At least with my estates, I'll break even or in many cases be able to enjoy and sell them at a profit, if need be.

 

[Kyle Weiss]

If you are new to pipes, I'd go easy on the pipe purchases. What I liked a year ago, has no appeal to me at all. I managed to turn around some purchases and not lose too much if any. I love my estates, and ones I refurbish myself have even more appeal and value to me. I've settled in with some good name British makers and classic shapes. Five years from now, will I be eyeing Danish freehands? Who knows. At least with my estates, I'll break even or in many cases be able to enjoy and sell them at a profit, if need be.

Brilliant thoughts. 8)

 

[Rusty Mouse]

If you are new to pipes, I'd go easy on the pipe purchases. What I liked a year ago, has no appeal to me at all. I managed to turn around some purchases and not lose too much if any. I love my estates, and ones I refurbish myself have even more appeal and value to me. I've settled in with some good name British makers and classic shapes. Five years from now, will I be eyeing Danish freehands? Who knows. At least with my estates, I'll break even or in many cases be able to enjoy and sell them at a profit, if need be.

Brilliant thoughts. 8)

Definitely. I may need to be babysat for the first while so's not to break the bank on a bunch of pipes I may turn a complete 180 on later.

 

[Zeno Marx]

It's interesting. I wonder if I would have been all about a buying frenzy had I started when the internet was like today. I think I purchased three pipes in the first year of finding the pipe, and two of those were in the first sixty days. I then think only a total of five pipes in the first two years, and we had a great b&m with a nice selection. Those first couple years were more about exploring tobaccos and flavors. I really enjoyed the pipes, but I didn't fiend for new ones. I eventually did find myself with a lot of different pipes once I was in a group of smokers who were also mad traders, but that had a lot to do with convenience.

I question how much you can learn about a pipe if you don't have time to really break it in and develop and an intimacy with it. If I'm right about that at all, you aren't even really learning about pipes; not makers, shapes, or craftsmanship. Back to my own learning process of just having more stuff and not gaining any good, solid, applicable knowledge. Different deals for different folks. Someone in another thread said they bought nineteen pipes in the first sixty days of picking up a pipe. I thought they were joking or that I misunderstood.

 

[Kyle Weiss]

Everyone also has their own goals and learning curve, Zeno. Not much anyone can do about that. 8)

 

[riff raff]

While on one hand, I'd have spend less money buying less pipes, I might not have discovered my love for vintage British pipes without some experimenting.

 

[Zeno Marx]

I'm certainly not advocating for less experimenting. I hope I didn't imply that.

 

[jlong]

I am in agreement with Monbla on learning to smoke right. When I look at the charred rims on my pipes, I feel I am not worthy of a $300 pipe quite yet. This isn't to say Rusty chars his rims. Just something to think about.

 

[riff raff]

I'm certainly not advocating for less experimenting. I hope I didn't imply that.

I didn't take it that way. I heard, "learn to appreciate how a pipes smokes and your let tastes develop" which is good advice.
I made some questionable pipe choices early on and wish I'd have showed a little more restraint. Choosing tobaccos is lot easier on the wallet than pipes! I almost gave up on a Chartan After Hours billiard and put it up for sale. Fortunately, no one bought it. I gave it another try and when it was properly broken in, smokes very well. Patience is a virtue!

 

[Zeno Marx]

Remember to "invest" some of your funds in good Virginia based tobaccos to age. A pound or two jarred up will be a wonderful treat in ten years, regardless of the pipe it's smoked in?

This got me thinking. Aren't pipe collecting, multi-hundred dollar artisan pipes, and cellaring all advanced stages of the hobby? I'm well aware that we live in a hare society, but pastimes such as pipe smoking are of the tortoise. Taking a mason apprentice class or two with a final project of making a fire pit out of rectangles and then rushing out to build an arched and flying buttressed chapel. Finishing the bunny hill for the first time ever skiing and then talk about booking a chopper for some heli skiing the next morning. Doesn't it all sound like ill advice? Doesn't it sound like a recipe for something you might do for a year or two and lose interest because it becomes a series of achievements and not something to savor and build experience and workable knowledge?

I'm not claiming to have any answers. I do see this happen a lot, though. I've seen it in music circles. I've seen it in outdoor circles. Unfortunately, I have to say it is pretty damn common. Jump in deep. Jump in real deep. Quickly. Take a lot of the richness and whatnot for granted. Wanting to have an instant collection or be an instant expert or...just plain being in a hurry about everything. It IS our culture, and it is difficult to swim against such a fast current. We have the attention spans of gnats because of it. That's why I fear if we encourage this quickness to collecting and cellaring -to skip the many positive elements of a slow, steady learning curve- that the likely consequence is a shortlived interest. There's less true satisfaction and reward because there is less investment.

I don't know. Maybe my calculations are off.

 

[riff raff]

This thread started with a car analogy and folks in the car/motorcycle world also tend to jump in the deep water as fast as they can, despite their swimming skills or lack thereof. Modern sport-bike motorcycles have the steepest learning curve and are the easiest to acquire. A 19 yr old kid with no riding skills can purchase and ride home a 175 (or more) 1,000 cc race-replica bike. Sadly, unlike pipe collecting, sometimes those results are tragic. So, in some regards/comparisons, pipe smoking is actually healthy!

 

[monbla256]

With a paycheck that will put me in the "shopping spree" category this week as a result of working long hours I am in a comfortable position to buy one mind blower of a pipe OR a few pipes that may not have the visual appeal of said mind blower but will certainly get the job done and done well. A workhorse, if you will.
What would you do?

I've given your question some further thought and realized I was responding out of an out dated generational thought process. This is the 21st century and we are in the era of "Just Do It" so that is what you should do, ANYTHING in ANYWAY YOU want to ! It's YOUR mouth, YOUR tobacco, YOUR pipe rack/space and definately YOUR pocketbook And it is YOUR right to engage in IMMEDIATE personal gratification as is want in the 21st century

 

[Kyle Weiss]

Gosh, more esoteric personal stuff.

There certainly is a push for "getting it now, getting it good," because of two things: increasing prices on EVERYTHING, pipes included and a tactical move due to future tobacco legislation/regulation/taxing scares. I could find 500 posts on BoB alone repeating, "Get it now, get a lot," in regard to tobacco, and that puts a lot of us "kids" in a tight spot, financially and through lack of experience: we didn't have the opportunity to have it while it was relatively stable and good. Hey, sorry about that--believe me, we're sorry too--now $50 Peterson's are pushing $100, tobacco tins are not $5, they're $10, and I don't think many of us are optimistic for things returning to the past.

So, I do pardon the criticism of the seasoned veterans in lieu of giving a break to the brats like us--what else are we supposed to do? Gratification is one thing, but if we're into this hobby, there's certainly a quickening happening. While there's truth to the "cheeseburger drive-through" mentality (as I like to call it, "me me me, now now now"), there's also a push of fear related to reasonable availability, whether we're conscious of it or not, it's a factor.

Just my take.

8)

 

[Rusty Mouse]

With a paycheck that will put me in the "shopping spree" category this week as a result of working long hours I am in a comfortable position to buy one mind blower of a pipe OR a few pipes that may not have the visual appeal of said mind blower but will certainly get the job done and done well. A workhorse, if you will.
What would you do?

I've given your question some further thought and realized I was responding out of an out dated generational thought process. This is the 21st century and we are in the era of "Just Do It" so that is what you should do, ANYTHING in ANYWAY YOU want to ! It's YOUR mouth, YOUR tobacco, YOUR pipe rack/space and definately YOUR pocketbook And it is YOUR right to engage in IMMEDIATE personal gratification as is want in the 21st century

DON"T TELL ME THAT NOW! Jeez, I'm impressionable!
Maybe we can find a happy median between your original advice and your recent epiphany?
Kyle makes a good point in that I find we newbies are being a bit scared into buying big and buying now for fear of what may or may not be available in the future. I know as a Canadian we're already paying ridiculous prices for tobacco and furthermore for pipes imported from distant lands, 'tis why online pipe shopping is a beautiful, though dangerous thing.
Even having watched the "Pipe Smoking 101" series on Youtube way back when and he stressed to NOT jump into having a huge rotation of crappy pipes off the bat, as well as the fine folks of BoB providing similar advice I still find myself in a bit of a hurry to get a lot done very quickly and obtain the best of the best, new to the hobby or not. It's a habit I really want to break but without a doubt it's been developed as a result of the world Kyle described that we live in.

 

[monbla256]

With a paycheck that will put me in the "shopping spree" category this week as a result of working long hours I am in a comfortable position to buy one mind blower of a pipe OR a few pipes that may not have the visual appeal of said mind blower but will certainly get the job done and done well. A workhorse, if you will.
What would you do?

I've given your question some further thought and realized I was responding out of an out dated generational thought process. This is the 21st century and we are in the era of "Just Do It" so that is what you should do, ANYTHING in ANYWAY YOU want to ! It's YOUR mouth, YOUR tobacco, YOUR pipe rack/space and definately YOUR pocketbook And it is YOUR right to engage in IMMEDIATE personal gratification as is want in the 21st century

DON"T TELL ME THAT NOW! Jeez, I'm impressionable!
Maybe we can find a happy median between your original advice and your recent epiphany?
Kyle makes a good point in that I find we newbies are being a bit scared into buying big and buying now for fear of what may or may not be available in the future. I know as a Canadian we're already paying ridiculous prices for tobacco and furthermore for pipes imported from distant lands, 'tis why online pipe shopping is a beautiful, though dangerous thing.
Even having watched the "Pipe Smoking 101" series on Youtube way back when and he stressed to NOT jump into having a huge rotation of crappy pipes off the bat, as well as the fine folks of BoB providing similar advice I still find myself in a bit of a hurry to get a lot done very quickly and obtain the best of the best, new to the hobby or not. It's a habit I really want to break but without a doubt it's been developed as a result of the world Kyle described that we live in.

After all is said and done, this "pastime" or "hobby" or "lifestyle" is one of awareness of time, the time it takes to enjoy the tin aroma, the time it takes to decide which pipe to smoke, the time it takes to load and light the pipe and lastly, the time it takes to smoke the pipe. All of this shouls teach you something that a Bhuddist monk I met over in Siagon back in '69 told me "... you have all the time you need to do what needs be done". Take your time, decide what YOU want, then go about doing it

 

[Kyle Weiss]

This just in: All tobacco and pipes, as of tomorrow, will be gone forever.

Been nice knowin' y'all. :lol: