I’m going to a cigar bar tonight. I’m tired of getting ripped off at these places so I’d like to bring my own. Where should I go?
I do not need to go to the trendiest place. But I am looking for quality and value.
Lower Manhattan (below 23rd St.) or Downtown Brooklyn work best for me.
Thanks!
When you go to cigars.com they do not invite you to search by region. They direct you to a list of specific vendors. You have to click through all of them to figure out who does and does not do business in NYC.
JR Cigars is the world’s largest cigar retailer and they have a great selection. They’re on 46th and 5th, but well worth the visit. You have to go to the vault they have downstairs and take a gander at all the boxes of pre-embargo Cuban cigars they’ve got!
Mulberry St. Cigars is a smaller shop but they also hand roll their own house brands.
Unlike many wedding customs, it’s not so hard to get to the bottom of the origin of the bachelorette party. It’s a fairly recent innovation, the result of the cross-breeding of the traditional bachelorette’s tea
with the idea of the bachelor party, with a bit of the even-more-traditional bridal shower mixed in.
The idea of the bridal shower goes back, perhaps, thousands of years; experts attribute it to the need for dowries. In European culture, it was expected that women would begin married life with a dowry – a gift of money or tools (or both) that would allow the new couple to set up their new household together. But women who lacked adequate dowries would be “showered” with gifts by sympathetic friends, which would enable the wedding to go on as planned.
The bridal shower was traditionally, and still is, a fairly staid affair, with older woman friends of the couple or of the bride’s family invited, and the bride-to-be accompanied by her mother. (Increasingly, as traditionally gendered divisions of labor continue to break down, men are involved in the showers as well – after all, if the man will do part of the cooking and cleaning, he has a stake in knowing what presents are received!) They serve a much-needed function, but they may not have the let-your-hair-down appeal of a last night out with the friends of your single years.
The bachelorette’s tea offered some of the peer-to-peer intimacy that may have been lacking in bridal showers, but still – a tea? The highly formal, characteristically Victorian custom of the tea ceremony holds great appeal for many people, as the recent popularity of tea shops and books on tea attest. Still, as women began to learn about the wild shenanigans historically associated with bachelor parties, over the last several decades, they decided they wanted in.
The Bridesmaidaid website compares them to Title IX, the 1972 law that mandated equal federal funding of boys’ and girls’ educational activities. Just as Title IX ensured that girls’ soccer teams and afterschool math programs would receive the same budgetary consideration as boys’ did, allowing young women to attain similar achievements, the new bachelorette party allows women to compete with men in pre-wedding-night partying. As the website’s anonymous author puts it: “Bachelorette parties are like the Title IX of weddings: they’re supposed to make the girls equal to the boys. If the groomsmen can take their boy out for a night of debauchery, so can we, right?”
Bachelorette parties have indeed become associated with bachelor-party-style antics, as illustrated by pop culture and personal anecdote alike. A memorable scene in the movie The Forty-Year-Old Virgin, in which the title character’s friends attempt to set him up with what they expect will be a can’t-miss romantic prospect – a drunken bridesmaid encountered at a bar, where a bachelorette party is underway – affirms the stereotype.
But this custom has changed with time, like its twin, the bachelor party. Bachelor parties have their own Bacchanalian reputation to live up to, but gradually they’re toning down somewhat (while remaining fun). Drinking has been moderated and honoring one’s future bride is a priority; in fact, sometimes the fiance’ and her friends show up, and the party becomes a celebration of marriage, rather than a lament for lost bachelorhood. These combined bachelor-and-bachelorette parties are sometimes called stag and does parties.
One custom that isn’t changing at bachelorette parties is the ritual smoking of cigars. In fact, with the increase in the popularity of cigars over the past fifteen years, lighting up a stogie at a bachelorette party is often encouraged! After all, one feature of the new popularity of cigars has been the fact that women are more often found, today, among the new smokers of cigars. At least half a million American women smoke cigars, according to a 2002 estimate by the Cigar Association of America. That number makes sense in a country where – according to demographic research by Cigar Babes, a nonprofit organization for women cigar smokers’ women make 85% of buying decisions, start 70% of new businesses, and buy 50% of the products classified traditionally as “male.”
Cigars, then, remain a staple bachelorette party gift. For those of you planning a bachelorette party, here are some cigar basics:
1) Choose good cigars. (A wedding is a once-in-a-lifetime event!) Buy well-made, hand-rolled, long-filler cigars from a quality cigar outlet or online store. The better the cigar, the better the taste, and the more permanent the memories.
2) Speaking of taste: the outer wrapper (which gives the cigar its outer color) generally tells you how the cigar tastes. Darker outer wrappers mean sweeter taste; tan- or lighter-colored cigars are drier.
3) How to smoke: Cut off the cap of the cigar, then, using a wooden match or a butane lighter or other full flame (not a paper match), turn the end of the cigar in the flame a full 360 degrees until every part of it is lit. Don’t inhale – this isn’t a cigarette! Pull the smoke into your mouth and taste it thoroughly without allowing it into your lungs. Remember, it’s about the taste.
About the Author:
CigarFox provides you the opportunity to build your own sampler of the finest cigars that include cigar brands like Montecristo, Romeo & Julieta, H Upmann, Macanudo, Cohiba, Partagas, Gurkha and many more. Choose from more than 1200 different cigars! Other cigar products include cigar humidors, cigar boxes, and cigar accessories like Zippo Lighters.
Cigars were brought along during our first road trip through the American West. Our travel buddies were cigar smokers who, inspired by Clint Eastwood in “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly,” brought cigarillos along during our sojourn across the Mohave Desert. At night we camped out, and the cigars were companion accessories to the setting of cold nights out around the fire with the endless sky lit by a melee of diamond stars and surrounded by crisp, dry air delicately scented by the aroma of premium cigar smoke.
The American West has a great tradition of cigar consumption in the old saloons and on cattle drives. From the turn of the 19th century when cattle and railroad barons played poker and spun deals in St. Louis and San Francisco, to the turn of the 20th century when industrial giants like Henry Ford, J.P. Getty and Andrew Carnegie found themselves influencing the century that would see two world wars. The cigar was a companion in smoke-filled rooms and at secret poker tables. There was always a cigar-smoking gambler or two on stage coaches heading west, and after that aboard club cars on transcontinental trains from New York to Chicago to California. Cigars do indeed have a travel history in the American West.
“Cigar store Indians,” originally designed as plaques and statues representing Native Americans, became the symbol of tobacco and tobacco advertising during the early 19th and 20th centuries. These statues and plaques were most often used in stores, hotels and outside restaurants and bars to signal (often illiterate customers) the availability of tobacco, or that smoking was permitted inside the establishment. The complete, life-sized figures of “American Indians” were generally used by tobacco-shop owners, with smaller plaques used in general stores.
Images of Native Americans became connected with the sale of tobacco after American Indians introduced the plant to the Europeans who explored and settled in the Americas. Cigar store Indian statues first appeared in Europe, once tobacco was available there. The wooden carvings were based on images created by artists who matched descriptions, rather than first-hand viewings of actual Native Americans. The figures, which most often ended up looking like Europeans in Native American dress, were clothed in fringed buckskins, were draped in blankets and wore feathered headdresses. They did not actually resemble the members of any particular tribe. The sculptors carved chiefs, braves, princesses and maidens, sometimes with papooses. Most of the figures grasped tobacco or cigars in their hands or displayed leaves on their clothing. There were several artists in the United States who specialized in carving ship figureheads, architectural details and portrait busts, then turned to creating figures of American Indians full-time as demand increased. Names of note in this genre of carving are John Cromwell, Thomas Brooks, the Skillin family, and Samuel Robb, who operated studios in Northeastern cities and put out product catalogues.
Modern times have called for the image of the cigar store Indian to all but disappear, but the Native American will always be remembered as the source of our fine tobacco. When the occasion calls for a fine cigar, enjoy one–especially if you’re under western skies.
When I was a little girl I used to dream about meeting a beautiful rich prince who would save me from misery and protect me. I believed in happily ever after.
At the age of 18 I moved to NYC and met a young good-looking man. He had just started a business & I joined him. After one year the money started to flood in. My boyfriend & I became multi millionaires. He started to smoke cigars, buy expensive cars and receive millionaire magazines. He bought clothes from Louis Vuitton and he simple became a jerk.
I told him go sod off and moved. He had gone through a personality change.
5 years after our relationship had ended I met a new man. He was 2 years younger then I. I loved him. After 2 years I broke up with him. He was immature, irresponsible and I had to pay for everything. I bought him clothes, food, expensive trips. After I finished with him I met another man who ripped me of. He stole a lot of money from me and expected me to pay for everything simply because I was rich. I was an intelligent, kind, beautiful but very naïve woman. I decided that love doesn’t exist. I decided to find my self a millionaire. Someone just like me, that I could marry & have children with. Screw love. Most men leave their wives when they’re too young anyway. It would surely happen to me too. Why would I be an exception? I started to go on millionaire speed dating in Brazil and joined a dating site for wealthy and successful people. I almost gave up when I suddenly found a message from an attractive man in my inbox. He said he had found me interested and attractive. We started to write to each other & speak on the phone. One date he asked me if I would want to visit him in NYC. I really love NYC and had always wanted to return to NY. I said yes. After one week I arrived at the airport in NY. He picked me up in his limo. I knew when I decided to go to NY it might be a bad decision, but when I saw him & his attitude I knew it was a bad decision. He was 10 years older then my. In reality 15 years older then me. It looked like he suffered from a middle life crisis. He had cufflinks & socks with skulls & a white suite and too much gel in his hair. Prayed to god to help me. In the limo he opened champagne and told me I was beautiful. Then he started to smoke weed and that’s when I almost fainted.
The next morning after my arrival I told him I wanted to go home or to go live with friends I had in NY. I told him I didn’t like his attitude.
We argued and discussed, because he felt ashamed and embarrassed I wanted to leave him so soon. We had not had much time to talk. I told him the drugs speak for it. He was crazy. But I had to admit I was still curious about this man. Now when I had established that don’t want to date him and that I will leave I asked him if we could go for lunch and just talk like friends I don’t like harsh endings. He agreed. When he came to pick me up he looked very different, more relaxed, and much friendlier. Not like a mafia boss anymore.
After one week I was leaving. We were both crying. I didn’t want to leave him. He had changed me. I was happy. I used to be very strict while he was more artistic. He made me feel free, and we had so much fun together. He wasn’t a shallow weird crazy person after all. He had just been unsecure. Today we are married and I’m waiting my first child.
Millionaire dating is not a horrible thing. I don’t like men to take advantage over me just because I’m successful & my husband and I are both very similar when it comes to values, education, choice of life and lifestyle. I don’t think I could find a partner as easy on other dating sites.
(Story from an interview with an ex jetsetter)
About the Author:
LA girl, 22 years old, journalist student and dating/relationship expert.
