A Long Absence and a Trip to Stonehenge

I am not certain that I can claim any good excuse for not posting to this blog recently. I have been enjoying some great new tobaccos recently, and have been thinking what I would write about them. I have also been enjoying some great pipe related fellowship and appreciating the people with whom I can appreciate a good pipe together. My current dream is to find a person that I can share a pipe and a game of cribbage, dominoes and/or backgammon. But I will have to be patient.

I recently spent an evening with a Bible Study/pipe circle that I enjoyed for many years. This group of fellows could not be beat for great conversation and like-minded enjoyment of tobacco and of the Word. Being there and chatting as if no time had passed at all made me think in no small part as to what heaven will be like. This too, however, is a matter for another time. What is on my mind at the moment is: Stonehenge.

I have three major tobacco reviews I am waiting to post, but all in good time, this is the first and foremost. My most avid reader went down to Edwards and boldly picked a blend for me to try (in a large quantity, no less!). The choice: Stonehenge! (Cue the dancing midget and 12" tall replica of Stonehenge descending from the ceiling). This is a great blend. It has that familiar hint of my favorite of all flavors: vanilla! But is mostly a really great lighter blend of tobacco. It doesn't have the same burley flavors that Black Watch has, however it is about the same level (or a bit less) of vanilla. Having tried some really nasty goopey aromatics, I appreciate Edward's natural aromatics a great deal! Just a taste of topping over the more abiding sense of great tobacco. One must be careful as the bowl continues as there is a bit of bite for the careless or "fast smoker", however, if you respect the blend it gets nice and intense about half way through the bowl. I would say it almost becomes pensive, brooding, and serious.

I suppose the parallel to THE Stonehenge (but only in my mind) would be the fact that upon seeing it for the first time everyone is awestruck, amazed and tickled at the curiosity of it...then we begin to wonder about the original purpose for which it was build? Oh, I'm sure we have figured it out, we're just so smart now, aren't we? But if you know, please don't tell me. I am having more fun wondering. Perhaps it was the first bird house that man started and got bored of halfway through construction. Perhaps it was giants playing with their parents dominoes. I could certainly imagine that in the absence of cards this would be the closest these men could come to making card houses. I like the idea of people with enough extra time that they would want to figure out how to put some rocks up on their ends and set others on top of it. I can just see them getting the villages together to dig up the rocks move them all to the top of the hill and saying to themselves, "I hope this whole calendar idea works, but if it doesn't, everyone else will have a heck of a time figuring out what we were doing." It certainly beats the massive wasting of time on the internet!

Additionally, if you would like to get some of this tobacco, you will have to go to the Edwards in Denver, Colorado. For some reason that is fully beyond my comprehension each individual store orders the same bulks AND THEN ARBITRARILY RENAMES THEM! This means that you can't go into your local Edwards and say "give me a pound of Stonehenge" because they will look at you like you have the wrong sort of substance in your pipe! What is yet more uncanny about this process is that they are afraid to tell you any information at all about what the tobaccos make up the blend or give you any sort of code by which you could locate the tobaccos at another Edward's store! It's the funniest, most self defeating thing I've seen in a while! But if you can find the one in Denver, Stonehenge is worth a try!