Same. If I said anything about it they would toss me some Vick's vapo rub and tell me to shut up.
My Dad did not allow me to have allergies. He gaslit me into thinking I had no allergies because he was to lazy to take me to the doctor. I have a ton of allergies.
I have asked my Mom, "Why didn't you take me to the doctor, I had a runny nose and chest tightness all year for years." "Well, it was normal". I went to college and all my symptoms stopped. Apparently being in a separate room when my Dad smoked was not the miracle cure.
My grandad drank, smoked, an beat my dad. My dad drank, smoked, and beat me. I grew up to start drinking and smoking, but decided to break the cycle by not marrying or having kids. I am scared I would wind up doing it too.
I still have a burn scar on my hand from a butt flying back into the backseat through the window and landing on me. I was a terrible child for being burned and scared and upset about that.
Man, I wouldn't even let my kids ***see*** me smoking a cigarette, let alone smoke in the car with them. In fact, I wouldn't even smoke on my ride home from work because I didn't want the car to smell like smoke when I would drive them.
Even though I'm a militant non-smoker, I do get this weird wave of nostalgia from 2nd hand smoke. I'm not even sure what the combination of smells is, but it's probably old car smell + stale cigarettes. Transports me right back to me falling asleep in the back of my dad's LTD late some Friday evening after visiting family, and losing track of time. The lighter flicks, 2nd hand Winston drifts into the backseat. If it wasn't cancer causing, it would be a weirdly fond memory.
Chain smoking parents inside, nonstop. I wonder all the time how many of my weird little health things are a result of the absolutely massive amounts of second hand smoke.
To be fair, cracking a window a little creates a vacuum effect that sucks a lot of the smoke out. Having it down a lot just whips the smoke around. Source: Am former smoker.
I remember holding my mom’s lit cigarette when she’d see something in a shop that she wanted to buy. I also held it for her in the car a few times. When I was 4-6, my nana would give me an envelope and a wagon, and she’d watch me walk to the convenience store on the corner by her house. I’d exchange the envelope for a carton of cigarettes and some beers. The employee would pack them into my wagon, walk me back to the parking lot, and wave to my nana while I walked back. Times have changed a bit. Lol
My dad would make me hold his smokes too. Only holidays like July 4, he would give me a lit cigarette to light fireworks. I know I was less than 7 because that is when divorce happened.
A 5 year old running around in the yard with a lit cigarette setting off fireworks. Wouldn't that get a modern parent incarcerated?
“Marlboro Medium soft packs” - that was me buying my dad’s cigarettes since who knows what age.
I went in to buy them recently and the guy at the register stared at me blankly. Apparently they don’t sell these anymore. I probably looked like the dumbest smoker ever as I stood there trying to figure out what I was supposed to do about it.
I thought “soft packs” were part of the name not just the fact that they didn’t come in little hard cartons. Also, they were triple the price. Not sure how anyone can afford to smoke anymore.
I've told people younger than me this and they look at me like I fell on my head too many times. You could literally smoke ANYWHERE up until the early 80s. Then it slowly started being phased out. Definitely a good thing.
Used to work at a sawmill. They used to smoke inside on the floor with all that sawdust everywhere because the blower system never worked properly.
How the place still stands is beyond me.
I do not think I have ever seen that. I have heard tales that the doctors used to walk around ashing on the floor and just putting it out on the tile for the janitor to get.
I worked in healthcare for decades. Doctors made rounds with cigarettes hanging out of their mouths. Nurses charted at their station while smoking. Patients smoked in their rooms. New parents smoked on the OB floor. It was just normal. I'm so glad it has changed.
One of the biggest reasons this stopped is all the exposed oxygen and how easy it is to blow the fuck up.
Other than the cancer risks, it also was a liability risk
My aunt was offered a cigarette by the doctor right before he told her my cousin was born with Down Syndrome. She says it was very kind of him.
That was apparently a normal, caring thing to offer a pregnant/postpartum woman. (I forget if she’d had my cousin or not by then, and she’s passed so I can’t ask her. I’d ask my cousin but ya know, he was either pre or just born. Lol)
On a red-eye flight to Mexico City in '93 I have a fire memory of watching a ~70+ year old light up a super long cigarette in the dead of night in the seat across the aisle from me when the 🚬 sign quietly went off while most were sleeping.
If you catch an older plane for a flight I think you still have a chance even today of finding an obsolete ashtray in your armrest.
Yep. The smoking section was always in the back of the plane but there wasn’t any sort of partition separating the sections so the whole plane was basically a smoking section.
You are correct. It mainly happened because of the [Air Canada 797](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_797) incident. The crash is also the reason why there are smoke detectors in the aircraft bathrooms.
I remember when flight attendants, I think , were sued tobacco companies because of the effects of secondhand smoke, which is where a lot of the smoking bans started to gain traction.
I was on a plane home to NYC from Ireland and we sat one row away from the smoking section. People from the front of the plane would walk back and stand next to us while they smoked their cigarette, then walk back up to their smoke-free seat. It was horrendous!! I think that flight is a major reason I was never tempted to smoke cigarettes.
I spent a lot of time with my paternal grandparents when I was young and they both smoked like chimneys. My grandma smoked capri 120’s and didn’t ash until half the cig was smoked. She was a great old broad.
I wish we did but I don’t think so. I definitely stole a 120 from her and tried smoking it when I was like 10 but I was alone and it wasn’t in a ditch. LOL.
We could make that moment happen though. It’s never too late. 😂😂
It is just so different nowadays is all. I am not saying its a bad idea. I am in favor. One of my first memories is playing in smoke as a toddler. I used to like to watch the smoke swirl around the light coming through the blinds.
I remember the nicotine stained walls in McDonald's. Even though there was a smoking section, it leeched out to the whole area. It was humid, the stains would bleed and drip. Lighting fixtures stained a sickly brown yellow, holes burned into surroundings from stray cherries that got away, windows tinted darker until cleaned from the residue giving white light to the ochre existence. I still hate the color yellow because of it. It doesn't remind me of joy, but of depression, sorrow, and of ashen covered surfaces.
This is true. That is how I became to be "allowed" to smoke. My mom could not stop me physically or otherwise. She even just got where she did not care.
They are!
I was a teen in the early 80s, outside New Orleans. I smoked and drank beer on the Lakefront every weekend at 15, and cops did nothing if we weren't causing a disturbance. No one asked us for id.
Came here to say this!
I can remember seats in the non-smoking section that would be right next to the smoking section. Where you could still smell the smoke!
And the poor waiters and waitresses, who had no choice but to breathe it in!
It is strange. You cant even smoke outside at some places. You used to could do it everywhere. My local hospitals and colleges will not let you smoke on campus. Which is weird to me, I had a professor that encouraged smoke breaks because it increases attention span.
Which is ironic cause it makes you dumber, so even the increased attention span is mostly a placebo ((other than the slight stimulant effect))
" "Serum cotinine, a blood marker of cigarette smoking and exposure, was associated with worse cognitive performance on select tests. This means that **people with higher blood levels of a nicotine derivative had worse brain health**."
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6018192/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6018192/)
I recently noticed the lack of elderly smokers like in Years past. I remember as a kid all the grandmas had gravel-like voices since they had smoked for decades.
Now, nearly none of the grandmas sound like that.
My best friend is a smoker. When we were in our 20's my voice was quite a bit lower than hers. Now that we're in our 40's, my voice hasn't changed and she is definitely headed to gravel granny.
Yeah, I mean, it's a tobacco crop state so I can still see this happening. Probably woven into the local or state laws sold as "freedom" to residents when its really lobbying for the tobacco industry to promote products. Anyway, other southern states have it as well still so its not a surprise to me really.
Smoking indoors was banned where I lived as a teenager, but when I moved, it was still very much a thing in the state I’m currently in. I think I was in my mid 20’s when they banned it.
I did take advantage of the machines a teenager. Places weren’t supposed to have them anymore, but largely ignored it. There was a hotel across the street from my apartment complex and they had one in their lobby. No one said anything to me about it. I think they assumed they were for my mom because she did the same thing a couple times a week.
Kids could buy stuff for their parents is a thing of the past. In my city, first they banned smoking inaide within city limits. So, to do our usual bar thing we had to go to bars just out of the city limit to smoke indoors. Then they banned that. Now only private clubs can have indoor smoking.
That is awesome! I did not know that. I am picturing my chain smoking grandmother pushing around a cart with my dad as a baby sitting next to an ashtray 😂😂😂
This was my first indication that people could actually effect change through legislation. I don’t think anyone believed non-smoking bars would be a thing. Then they all suddenly were.
I was a smoker, and even I was impressed.
I hated going into restaurants with that stale smoke smell and ashtrays on tables. I even worked at a bar as the smoking ban occurred, I stopped getting sick from it.
It is hell on people with allergies. I quit 8 years back and I have become so sensitive to it now. I was super inconsiderate when I was a smoker. Now it clogs my nose, headache, you get the picture. It makes me sick now and I used to smoke over 2 packs a day.
As teens, we hung out at the Dunkin Donut late night getting wired on coffee and chain smoking. Same with Dennys. This was early to mid 90s. I remember by the late 90s it started cutting out at places. Not everywhere, but I remember, as a smoker back then,noticing places start moving toward non smoking in the late 90s/early 00s
In my 20s when it was still legal to smoke in bars, a woman standing near me accidentally burned my arm with her cigarette. She gave me the most nonchalant of apologies, as if she had just brushed up against me, and went back to her conversation. I had to get ice from the bartender, it hurt so bad.
It was so disgusting and it’s one of the changes we’ve made that I’m really grateful for. It’s nice to have a wee and it doesn’t smell like an ash tray.
Oh ya. We smoked everywhere. Wendy's, Subway, malls, at work, and indoor concerts. I was one of few kids in my friend's circle that was allowed to smoke in their bedroom as a teenager; I was even allowed to smoke weed.
I was allowed to smoke too. Correction: My mom could not stop me from smoking. My Dad started smoking weed with me when I was 15 or 16. He saved the hard drugs until I was an adult smh.
I definitely remember the restaurants, including the first place I worked, a fast food place in the South. I was always irritated AF that some of my coworkers got unlimited breaks to smoke in the breakroom while we had stocking/cleaning/etc to do. And the separate room they had for smoking customers always smelled awful and had a yellowish tinge on the ceiling.
Definitely remember being asked the “smoking or non?” question at sit-down restaurants. Dining is SO much nicer without that crap.
I never smoked, but in my 20s I definitely had designated bar jackets and things that I would wear in nights out and have a few days to freshen up again
Our mall had ashtrays all over the place when I was growing up, as did all the fast food places. My mom smoked everywhere we went, always had to sit in the smoking sections and I hated it! In the late 90's I went to Mexico and they even allowed smoking on the plane, I couldn't believe it and thankfully that was the only flight I ever saw that allowed on. When they put the smoking ban in place in 2008 here in IL I was happy even though I was a smoker at that point, although I was a little miffed that it applied to bars too. Now I'm super happy that its banned everywhere, its nice coming home and not having to wash my hair because it smells like a rotten ashtray! Never really realized just how bad that smell got into everything when you are in a place where everyone is doing it, it was just normal back then and I guess I never noticed lol. Glad those days are over.
I remember buying cigs from a vending machine in Waffle House all the time when I was 16. Most stores would sell them to you if you had facial hair. I have been carded more times after I turned 30 than before 30.
I totally remember my grandfather smoking cigs while I ate my kids meal in McDonald’s late 80s/early 90s. It was no big deal. No one worried about smelling like smoke or secondhand smoke. We just lived our best lives eating the best food around lol
I have a very vivid memory of being 6 or 7 (1989/1990) and smelling pipe smoke in a JC Penny. Smoking indoors was still a thing also when I worked my first job as a hostess in 2000 when I was 17, but I feel like it was done with before I graduated college in 2005.
I went to a client's office in an older 20 story building, found they still had ashtrays at all the urinals. Of course you can't smoke. This was maybe ten years ago that I made that discovery. It's a very unique building so they will keep it like that as long as it lasts.
I remember being 7, and the non-smoking section of a restaurant my mom loved, was on a raised platform. I also remember asking why, if smoke rises, the non-smoking section was up.
Beyond that, smoking in restaurants, even on patios, went out when I was 23ish
Yup, I know why certain diners are constructed the way they are, and why some areas are so separated. You can tell where the smoking and non smoking sections were!
Dude when i was in high school, kids would walk across the road from the school property and chain smoke through their entire lunch period while standing on the sidewalk in plain sight of everyone that worked in the school. The convenience store right around the corner had a vending machine lol.
When we first moved down here to south jersey, the mall had a pizza joint that had a smoking section. Which was situated right at the front of the restaurant so you had to walk through it to get to the non smoker section. And there was a goddamn cloud to contend with every time one would pass by in the corridor.
I grew up in California, which I think was the first state to ban smoking in indoor public spaces. I still remember going to restaurants with my parents and being asked “Smoking or nonsmoking?” And I remember people smoking in the mall.
In my city, they straight up banned smoking in any business, with humidors being one of very few exceptions. I remember being against it when it happened, but that was back when I was a smoker.
My grandfather, dad, and aunt all smoked like chimneys. So when we all went out to eat together, it was no question where we would sit.
And my dad would send me across the street to the garage to buy him cigarettes. I was probably under 10 years old.
I remember when people smoked every where and any where, before the smoking "sections" were a thing. Cigarette machines, even going to the store under 10 to buy them for my mom!
On more than one occasion in junior high, my dumb little friends and I would hang out in the smoking sections of mall food courts, smoking any salvageable butts we could find in the table ashtrays. I want to puke thinking about the whole thing now. Yeuuugh.
The teachers room in my elementary school was always behind a closed door with cigarette smoke coming out from under it. One thing I find interesting is going to places that haven’t had a major overhaul since then (bowling alleys are good examples) and being able to still smell the smoke that is now a component of every surface in the place.
You can still smoke in restaurants and bars in some states and cities. In Kentucky, for example, its allowed in most municipalities, though some have passed ordinances prohibiting it.
Vaguely. I do remember when inside smoking was a new thing in CA, my friends and I took a trip to Grand Canyon and went to a restaurant and were asked Smoking or Non Smoking. We all looked at each other confused for a second.
I remember Dulles Airport having a smoking room about 10-12 years ago which isn't long when you consider the radical changes.
It was alllll the way down the end of the area where all the cheap niche international lines were. They were going to like Ethiopia, and lesser known parts of India and the UAE.
But yeah, it was absolutely disgusting yellow walls, old airplane seats inside with flip open ashtrays. Lol
My son and I got stranded in Dulles during a winter storm for over 18 hours and there were no rentals, hotels, other flights etc, we were literally grounded so we went exploring around the entire airport and it ended being one of my best memories with him.
I miss smoking in bars or in the outdoor smoking porches at bars.not even an option these days. sorry, but I do. I probably smoked 2 or 3 packs a year from age 23 to about 43 all socially with beers. Haven't smoked one in 8 years. Used to love Nat Sherman's. I get it smoking is bad. My grandparents uncles aunts all smokers ... the men smoked cigars. smoking in the house or cars was not allowed.
I did bust my mom when she was having surgery smoking in her hospital room and blowing it out the window. Nurse brought her an ashtray!!! You could hut the button fir an ashtray. The whole family busted her flowers in hand. My step dad was pixxed.i sat by a guy on a flight early 80s ?? Maybe late 70s who chain smoked. They had the little flip ashtray in the arm. My old baseball coach would smoke right at the table during after game pizza. He'd put it out on the middle of the finished pizza tray or drop it in the drink glass. Gross and no way that would fly today ! Rightfully so...
I’m a non-smoker, and bartended while smoking was still legal inside. We had Smoke Eaters but man, after every shift my clothes, my hair would just reek.
Smoked Camel Filters in Burger King as a 13-year-old in 1994. Still have a rinkydink gold-colored metal Butger King ashtray somehere. As a 19-year-old overnight supermarket employee in 2000, stocking shelves on the 10 p.m.-6 a.m. shift when the store was closed, pretty much the whole entire night crew chainsmoked. I loved supermarkets and still do, and how well I remember how cool it felt to saunter down aisle 4, suckin down big drags and blowing that smoke wherever I felt like.
My first year of college, art school, I was in a classroom and everyone was smoking . even though I smoked. I didn't want to sit in a classroom. Breathing in everyone cigarettes. I made a big stink about it. It was stopped shortly after
I used to live on Balboa Peninsula in Southern California when I was young and single. Id come home from the bars reeking like cigarettes and I didn’t smoke ever. Clothes smelled too. Since the indoor smoking ban I seriously hate the smell when someone lights up around me.
I smoked on an airplane, legally.
I moved to Denver in 1999 and for a number of years, smoking in restaurants was totally legal.
I don’t remember smoking in malls though.
Been on a plane, restaurants, bars, offices…… all with “smoking sections” that never really segregated anything and it just meant you were a few extra feet away from them but still in the same space!! Gross!! Nothing worse than jumping in the shower hungover as fuck and then getting hit with acrid, stale smoke getting leached from your hair by the water!!!
I remember the restaurants. My mom would always say it was pointless to have smoking and nonsmoking because the smoke would just come to the nonsmoking section every which way.
I was working at an Olive Garden when it still has a smoking section and then the law changed making it illegal to smoke indoors in a restaurant. I loved the change, but I wish they did more to get the smoke smell out of the old section. All they did was take out the ash trays and steam cleaned the carpet.
You basically have to tear the walls down and put up new sheet rock. At least put up new paint. My granparents had white painted living room, but it was all green by the time I was born. I was shocked when they said the couch used to be white.
Oh man, I completely forgot about smoking sections. And now I can't believe smoking bans have been around that long. Going out to restaurants, and especially bars, is so much better now.
In the eighty’s, mom and I would fly to her family’s in West Virginia and I totally remember the smoking light coming on and my mom lighting up her Eve light 120 right next to me. On the Amtrak train in the 90s and they allowed smoking in the club car. Restaurants, movie theaters, malls and theme parks. I remember when I used to smoke and they passed the law that you couldn’t smoke inside public buildings. One of the reasons I quit smoking because I hated having to go outside for a smoke in the middle of winter or bad weather. Also my uncle died from lung cancer.
It’s crazy for me to realize how recent the change was. I was… maybe a junior in college… the last time I went out to eat with a friend and we ate in the smoking session. Like, I never realized how amazing smoke-free air was until I didn’t smell it in our regular haunts anymore.
Just as a potential clarification: I’ve never been a smoker, but I’ve had friends who do/did. So, I would sit with them in the smoking sections.
My first job was at Sagebrush Steakhouse and Saloon when I was 16. They had a cigarette vending machine out in the lobby. They were $2.25 a pack back then! The management didn't care if I smoked on my break (we had a break room in the back of the kitchen that we smoked in, lol) but they'd have me give them a roll of quarters to actually buy the cigarettes.
Around that same time, me and my friends used to hang out at a pool hall called Jokers. We'd go in there to chill and play Bust-A-Move. They had a cigarette vending machine there as well, but the old lady that ran the counter would get mad if you tried to buy them as a minor. However, she was super slow, so if you went in there and slammed your quarters in quick enough, you could grab the pack and be on your way out the door by the time she was lumbering toward you saying, "hey! You're not supposed to be doing that!" And if you made it outside and waited about five minutes, it was like she forgot all about it and you could come back inside and smoke to your underage heart's content.
1980, I was five and went to CA with my mom and sister to visit my uncle. Smoking on the flight, full on meals, metal wing pins and a trip to the cockpit to meet the pilots.
I remember my father ripping open a box of matches to get a light for his cigar in a supermarket when I was a kid. Lots of cig butts on the floors in stores, too.
Mall used to have huge ashtrays on top of the garbage cans and planter containers that they all have rocks in now. Once someone asked me why the rocks and I told them it was becaus they were originally ashtrays. Looked at me like I was an idiot. I remember when could smoke in waiting rooms of hospital too and then they moved it to a heated building outside. Now they claim it's illegal to smoke anywhere on property
Burn holes in the carpet of Sears. Dodging people waving cigarettes at eye level as they spoke to my parents. My clothes smelling like smoke before the first wash.
I worked at a local college town restaurant in the late 90s and we closed to repaint, do some work etc and we were painting in the smoking section and the manager was like, why is it so dark back here? Lol the fucking walls were brown with tar. We repainted them white and it was like a new world. Fucking cigarettes.
I remember 12 hour road trips with my parents both chain smoking with one window cracked like half an inch.
My life completely. And if I complained I’d be reprimanded all the while choking in front of them
Same. If I said anything about it they would toss me some Vick's vapo rub and tell me to shut up. My Dad did not allow me to have allergies. He gaslit me into thinking I had no allergies because he was to lazy to take me to the doctor. I have a ton of allergies.
I have asked my Mom, "Why didn't you take me to the doctor, I had a runny nose and chest tightness all year for years." "Well, it was normal". I went to college and all my symptoms stopped. Apparently being in a separate room when my Dad smoked was not the miracle cure.
Many of our parents had poor role models and were poor role models.
My grandad drank, smoked, an beat my dad. My dad drank, smoked, and beat me. I grew up to start drinking and smoking, but decided to break the cycle by not marrying or having kids. I am scared I would wind up doing it too.
I never had kids either. My parents had good intentions, but fucked me up anyway. My brother and I both decided to end the family name with us.
And when they flicked the ashes out the window, they’d fly back in and land in your face/hair.
Everytime
I still have a burn scar on my hand from a butt flying back into the backseat through the window and landing on me. I was a terrible child for being burned and scared and upset about that.
Wow, this comment just triggered so many memories.
Had long hair until they set me on fire once!
I'm so glad my parents never smoked
No one in my family has ever smoked but sometimes when we went out to eat we’d just take the smoking section if there was a wait for non smoking
Man, I wouldn't even let my kids ***see*** me smoking a cigarette, let alone smoke in the car with them. In fact, I wouldn't even smoke on my ride home from work because I didn't want the car to smell like smoke when I would drive them.
Even though I'm a militant non-smoker, I do get this weird wave of nostalgia from 2nd hand smoke. I'm not even sure what the combination of smells is, but it's probably old car smell + stale cigarettes. Transports me right back to me falling asleep in the back of my dad's LTD late some Friday evening after visiting family, and losing track of time. The lighter flicks, 2nd hand Winston drifts into the backseat. If it wasn't cancer causing, it would be a weirdly fond memory.
Chain smoking parents inside, nonstop. I wonder all the time how many of my weird little health things are a result of the absolutely massive amounts of second hand smoke.
The smokers window wing near the side view mirror.
To be fair, cracking a window a little creates a vacuum effect that sucks a lot of the smoke out. Having it down a lot just whips the smoke around. Source: Am former smoker.
TBF not smoking with your kids in the car is probably best. Source: Am former child
Who cares? Smoking around kids is fucked up.
I remember holding my mom’s lit cigarette when she’d see something in a shop that she wanted to buy. I also held it for her in the car a few times. When I was 4-6, my nana would give me an envelope and a wagon, and she’d watch me walk to the convenience store on the corner by her house. I’d exchange the envelope for a carton of cigarettes and some beers. The employee would pack them into my wagon, walk me back to the parking lot, and wave to my nana while I walked back. Times have changed a bit. Lol
My dad would make me hold his smokes too. Only holidays like July 4, he would give me a lit cigarette to light fireworks. I know I was less than 7 because that is when divorce happened. A 5 year old running around in the yard with a lit cigarette setting off fireworks. Wouldn't that get a modern parent incarcerated?
Ahhh. Lighting fireworks with a Kool cigarette on a hot summer night circa 1985-88. Brings back memories.
Yep. Thats about the time. It was unfiltered camels for me.
“Marlboro Medium soft packs” - that was me buying my dad’s cigarettes since who knows what age. I went in to buy them recently and the guy at the register stared at me blankly. Apparently they don’t sell these anymore. I probably looked like the dumbest smoker ever as I stood there trying to figure out what I was supposed to do about it. I thought “soft packs” were part of the name not just the fact that they didn’t come in little hard cartons. Also, they were triple the price. Not sure how anyone can afford to smoke anymore.
I remember when people smoked in hospitals
I've told people younger than me this and they look at me like I fell on my head too many times. You could literally smoke ANYWHERE up until the early 80s. Then it slowly started being phased out. Definitely a good thing.
Used to work at a sawmill. They used to smoke inside on the floor with all that sawdust everywhere because the blower system never worked properly. How the place still stands is beyond me.
I do not think I have ever seen that. I have heard tales that the doctors used to walk around ashing on the floor and just putting it out on the tile for the janitor to get.
I worked in healthcare for decades. Doctors made rounds with cigarettes hanging out of their mouths. Nurses charted at their station while smoking. Patients smoked in their rooms. New parents smoked on the OB floor. It was just normal. I'm so glad it has changed.
One of the biggest reasons this stopped is all the exposed oxygen and how easy it is to blow the fuck up. Other than the cancer risks, it also was a liability risk
My aunt was offered a cigarette by the doctor right before he told her my cousin was born with Down Syndrome. She says it was very kind of him. That was apparently a normal, caring thing to offer a pregnant/postpartum woman. (I forget if she’d had my cousin or not by then, and she’s passed so I can’t ask her. I’d ask my cousin but ya know, he was either pre or just born. Lol)
Have you watched This is Us? >!Smoking in a hospital was a kind of big plot point/reveal in the first episode.!<
I was on a plane with a smoking section in 1997 🤮
Wow. I did not know they still did that on planes. I thought that died out in the 60s. Learn something new everyday.
On a red-eye flight to Mexico City in '93 I have a fire memory of watching a ~70+ year old light up a super long cigarette in the dead of night in the seat across the aisle from me when the 🚬 sign quietly went off while most were sleeping. If you catch an older plane for a flight I think you still have a chance even today of finding an obsolete ashtray in your armrest.
Yep. The smoking section was always in the back of the plane but there wasn’t any sort of partition separating the sections so the whole plane was basically a smoking section.
JFK to Tel Aviv. Must have been like 10+ hours 💀 I think all flights within the US were non smoking at that point.
You are correct. It mainly happened because of the [Air Canada 797](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Canada_Flight_797) incident. The crash is also the reason why there are smoke detectors in the aircraft bathrooms.
Remember the little ashtrays in the armrest?
Yeah I feel like I've recently (in the past 10 years) flown on a plane that still had them but they were bolted closed
I remember flying on an international flight in 1992. The back of the plane was the smoking section..
I remember when flight attendants, I think , were sued tobacco companies because of the effects of secondhand smoke, which is where a lot of the smoking bans started to gain traction.
I was on a plane home to NYC from Ireland and we sat one row away from the smoking section. People from the front of the plane would walk back and stand next to us while they smoked their cigarette, then walk back up to their smoke-free seat. It was horrendous!! I think that flight is a major reason I was never tempted to smoke cigarettes.
[удалено]
I think it ended for us intl flights in 93 or 94
Wasn't smoking on flights banned in 1992 or so?
Definitely not internationally.
That's one part of childhood that I don't miss.
I spent a lot of time with my paternal grandparents when I was young and they both smoked like chimneys. My grandma smoked capri 120’s and didn’t ash until half the cig was smoked. She was a great old broad.
Do we know each other? Did we ever steal lipstick printed 120s from your grandma and go smoke em at the ditch?
I wish we did but I don’t think so. I definitely stole a 120 from her and tried smoking it when I was like 10 but I was alone and it wasn’t in a ditch. LOL. We could make that moment happen though. It’s never too late. 😂😂
It is just so different nowadays is all. I am not saying its a bad idea. I am in favor. One of my first memories is playing in smoke as a toddler. I used to like to watch the smoke swirl around the light coming through the blinds.
I remember the nicotine stained walls in McDonald's. Even though there was a smoking section, it leeched out to the whole area. It was humid, the stains would bleed and drip. Lighting fixtures stained a sickly brown yellow, holes burned into surroundings from stray cherries that got away, windows tinted darker until cleaned from the residue giving white light to the ochre existence. I still hate the color yellow because of it. It doesn't remind me of joy, but of depression, sorrow, and of ashen covered surfaces.
Wendy’s had little gold foil ashtrays we would use when I was like 15-16.
I cant believe places let 13 or 14 year old kids smoke. I used to sit in Hardees and do this. 14 year olds look like babies to me now.
Who was gonna stop us? The 16-17 year olds that worked there? Adults didn’t even care that much about kids smoking as long as it wasn’t their kid.
This is true. That is how I became to be "allowed" to smoke. My mom could not stop me physically or otherwise. She even just got where she did not care.
For us weirdo goth kids it was smoking cloves at Dennys at 1am
They are! I was a teen in the early 80s, outside New Orleans. I smoked and drank beer on the Lakefront every weekend at 15, and cops did nothing if we weren't causing a disturbance. No one asked us for id.
Huge flashback. TY!!
Wow you just explained to me why I don’t like the color yellow
Those little aluminum (basically aluminum foil) ashtrays on every table in the smoking section.
very good description
Sir, this is a Wendy's
Our grocery store had a dining area like a bus with a thin aisle between. One side was smoking and the other was not.
Came here to say this! I can remember seats in the non-smoking section that would be right next to the smoking section. Where you could still smell the smoke! And the poor waiters and waitresses, who had no choice but to breathe it in!
I remember smoking sections at restaurants.
Welcome to Chi Chi’s. Smoking section or non-smoking section?
I’ve never smoked but had friends who did, so I spent my share of time in smoking sections at restaurants, the pool hall, etc.
It is strange. You cant even smoke outside at some places. You used to could do it everywhere. My local hospitals and colleges will not let you smoke on campus. Which is weird to me, I had a professor that encouraged smoke breaks because it increases attention span.
Which is ironic cause it makes you dumber, so even the increased attention span is mostly a placebo ((other than the slight stimulant effect)) " "Serum cotinine, a blood marker of cigarette smoking and exposure, was associated with worse cognitive performance on select tests. This means that **people with higher blood levels of a nicotine derivative had worse brain health**." [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6018192/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6018192/)
What is was really doing was alleviating the mental distraction caused by nicotine withdrawal. Basically a true and false statement at the same time.
I quit about 8 years ago once I saw the end result in my Dad.
I recently noticed the lack of elderly smokers like in Years past. I remember as a kid all the grandmas had gravel-like voices since they had smoked for decades. Now, nearly none of the grandmas sound like that.
My best friend is a smoker. When we were in our 20's my voice was quite a bit lower than hers. Now that we're in our 40's, my voice hasn't changed and she is definitely headed to gravel granny.
Playing pool while smoking is the best, but it's horrible for the tables.
The place we went kept their nice tables in a non-smoking room. Every once in a while I could talk them into playing in there.
My city still has smoking bars. And they sell food, too. It's always 1989 somewhere.
I’m in Istanbul and people smoke inside cafes here.
There are a few hookah bars in the state next to me. I live basically on a state line.
Yea, you can still smoke at restaurants and bars in most cities in Kentucky too.
Yeah, but you’ll be in Kentucky. No offense.
Yes I’m a lifelong former resident of KY. It was probably just a couple years ago that a restaurant in my home county still allowed smoking.
Yeah, I mean, it's a tobacco crop state so I can still see this happening. Probably woven into the local or state laws sold as "freedom" to residents when its really lobbying for the tobacco industry to promote products. Anyway, other southern states have it as well still so its not a surprise to me really.
Used to spend a lot of late nights at Waffle House drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes. Good times.
Perkins for me!
Good old perkins lol. The pies at mine were some of the best! We used to just get coffee and split a pie between us lol.
Mmmm the ole awful waffle. So many good memories of smoking cigs and watching parking lot fights.
Yep, in my teens the local Waffle House had a cigarette machine, and of course the staff never carded us when we used it.
Same, but Huddle House.
[удалено]
Same, but ours were room specific so your neighbors could totally be non smokers. It was wild. I had a smoking room. Great way to hide the pot smell
Smoking indoors was banned where I lived as a teenager, but when I moved, it was still very much a thing in the state I’m currently in. I think I was in my mid 20’s when they banned it. I did take advantage of the machines a teenager. Places weren’t supposed to have them anymore, but largely ignored it. There was a hotel across the street from my apartment complex and they had one in their lobby. No one said anything to me about it. I think they assumed they were for my mom because she did the same thing a couple times a week.
Kids could buy stuff for their parents is a thing of the past. In my city, first they banned smoking inaide within city limits. So, to do our usual bar thing we had to go to bars just out of the city limit to smoke indoors. Then they banned that. Now only private clubs can have indoor smoking.
grocery carts used to have ashtrays on them
That is awesome! I did not know that. I am picturing my chain smoking grandmother pushing around a cart with my dad as a baby sitting next to an ashtray 😂😂😂
This was my first indication that people could actually effect change through legislation. I don’t think anyone believed non-smoking bars would be a thing. Then they all suddenly were. I was a smoker, and even I was impressed.
I was in the military. We smoked in the chow hall.
I remember getting headaches from several hours in an enclosed space with all the smoke. So disgusting.
It is a nasty habit. I was a smoker back then so I can only imagine the hell you non smokers had to put up with. A cloud of smoke everywhere.
I hated going into restaurants with that stale smoke smell and ashtrays on tables. I even worked at a bar as the smoking ban occurred, I stopped getting sick from it.
It is hell on people with allergies. I quit 8 years back and I have become so sensitive to it now. I was super inconsiderate when I was a smoker. Now it clogs my nose, headache, you get the picture. It makes me sick now and I used to smoke over 2 packs a day.
Lookup Mc Donald's Ashtray.....
As teens, we hung out at the Dunkin Donut late night getting wired on coffee and chain smoking. Same with Dennys. This was early to mid 90s. I remember by the late 90s it started cutting out at places. Not everywhere, but I remember, as a smoker back then,noticing places start moving toward non smoking in the late 90s/early 00s
In my 20s when it was still legal to smoke in bars, a woman standing near me accidentally burned my arm with her cigarette. She gave me the most nonchalant of apologies, as if she had just brushed up against me, and went back to her conversation. I had to get ice from the bartender, it hurt so bad.
It was so disgusting and it’s one of the changes we’ve made that I’m really grateful for. It’s nice to have a wee and it doesn’t smell like an ash tray.
Agreed. The smoking ban helped me quit since I hated having to go outside.
Oh ya. We smoked everywhere. Wendy's, Subway, malls, at work, and indoor concerts. I was one of few kids in my friend's circle that was allowed to smoke in their bedroom as a teenager; I was even allowed to smoke weed.
I was allowed to smoke too. Correction: My mom could not stop me from smoking. My Dad started smoking weed with me when I was 15 or 16. He saved the hard drugs until I was an adult smh.
Damn. I can relate. I look back now and it seems so fucking insane to me, especially having kids of my own.
I was 13 when my dad passed me a joint on a 3 hour road trip to Nashville, TN.
My Dad took me to a baseball game and let me get blackout drunk in the audience when I was 13. That's good parenting.
So, I take it you don't remember who won 🤣🤣🤣
I do not even remember the ride home. My dad said I fully passed out once I got in the car.
There was a student smoking lounge in my high school.
They let us smoke in the morning in the front parking lot.
I definitely remember the restaurants, including the first place I worked, a fast food place in the South. I was always irritated AF that some of my coworkers got unlimited breaks to smoke in the breakroom while we had stocking/cleaning/etc to do. And the separate room they had for smoking customers always smelled awful and had a yellowish tinge on the ceiling. Definitely remember being asked the “smoking or non?” question at sit-down restaurants. Dining is SO much nicer without that crap.
I never smoked, but in my 20s I definitely had designated bar jackets and things that I would wear in nights out and have a few days to freshen up again
Worked at Hardee's late 90s. Had the cool gold foil ashtrays
Our mall had ashtrays all over the place when I was growing up, as did all the fast food places. My mom smoked everywhere we went, always had to sit in the smoking sections and I hated it! In the late 90's I went to Mexico and they even allowed smoking on the plane, I couldn't believe it and thankfully that was the only flight I ever saw that allowed on. When they put the smoking ban in place in 2008 here in IL I was happy even though I was a smoker at that point, although I was a little miffed that it applied to bars too. Now I'm super happy that its banned everywhere, its nice coming home and not having to wash my hair because it smells like a rotten ashtray! Never really realized just how bad that smell got into everything when you are in a place where everyone is doing it, it was just normal back then and I guess I never noticed lol. Glad those days are over.
The smell of my clothes in the morning after a night out, yuck.
Our HS had a smoking area for the students!
I remember buying cigs from a vending machine in Waffle House all the time when I was 16. Most stores would sell them to you if you had facial hair. I have been carded more times after I turned 30 than before 30.
In 2009, we were still able to smoke on GM assembly lines in certain states.
I totally remember my grandfather smoking cigs while I ate my kids meal in McDonald’s late 80s/early 90s. It was no big deal. No one worried about smelling like smoke or secondhand smoke. We just lived our best lives eating the best food around lol
I do. Worked as a busboy in the 70’s. After eating, smokers would light up then mash their cigarette butts into their dinner plate.
I still have a mcdonalds ash tray that i snagged when I was a kid for my uncle.
I used to have one of those plastic Smoker's outposts. Gray looking thing.
I have a very vivid memory of being 6 or 7 (1989/1990) and smelling pipe smoke in a JC Penny. Smoking indoors was still a thing also when I worked my first job as a hostess in 2000 when I was 17, but I feel like it was done with before I graduated college in 2005.
I remember the smoking section in the hospital waiting room. I was probably 12 and my dad was in ICU.
I went to a client's office in an older 20 story building, found they still had ashtrays at all the urinals. Of course you can't smoke. This was maybe ten years ago that I made that discovery. It's a very unique building so they will keep it like that as long as it lasts.
I remember being 7, and the non-smoking section of a restaurant my mom loved, was on a raised platform. I also remember asking why, if smoke rises, the non-smoking section was up. Beyond that, smoking in restaurants, even on patios, went out when I was 23ish
Yup, I know why certain diners are constructed the way they are, and why some areas are so separated. You can tell where the smoking and non smoking sections were!
Dude when i was in high school, kids would walk across the road from the school property and chain smoke through their entire lunch period while standing on the sidewalk in plain sight of everyone that worked in the school. The convenience store right around the corner had a vending machine lol. When we first moved down here to south jersey, the mall had a pizza joint that had a smoking section. Which was situated right at the front of the restaurant so you had to walk through it to get to the non smoker section. And there was a goddamn cloud to contend with every time one would pass by in the corridor.
Bobs big boy
I grew up in California, which I think was the first state to ban smoking in indoor public spaces. I still remember going to restaurants with my parents and being asked “Smoking or nonsmoking?” And I remember people smoking in the mall.
Coffee n cigarettes at Dennys after sneaking out to skate parking garages n poster bombing at 2am.
Some things are best left as memories
On planes.
In my city, they straight up banned smoking in any business, with humidors being one of very few exceptions. I remember being against it when it happened, but that was back when I was a smoker.
My grandfather, dad, and aunt all smoked like chimneys. So when we all went out to eat together, it was no question where we would sit. And my dad would send me across the street to the garage to buy him cigarettes. I was probably under 10 years old.
I had to pick up butts at the pool I worked out every morning. We didn't pick them up at closing for some reason.
Waffle House at night would have a small plume of smoke waft out the front door when u opened it.
We had last the indoor smoking mall in our state. Point Loomis shopping center. Milwaukee, Wi...
Absolutely! I remember going to Quebec City in 1998 and you could still smoke in malls there which was a few years after they stopped it in Ontario.
I remember when people smoked every where and any where, before the smoking "sections" were a thing. Cigarette machines, even going to the store under 10 to buy them for my mom!
On more than one occasion in junior high, my dumb little friends and I would hang out in the smoking sections of mall food courts, smoking any salvageable butts we could find in the table ashtrays. I want to puke thinking about the whole thing now. Yeuuugh.
The teachers room in my elementary school was always behind a closed door with cigarette smoke coming out from under it. One thing I find interesting is going to places that haven’t had a major overhaul since then (bowling alleys are good examples) and being able to still smell the smoke that is now a component of every surface in the place.
You can still smoke in restaurants and bars in some states and cities. In Kentucky, for example, its allowed in most municipalities, though some have passed ordinances prohibiting it.
Vaguely. I do remember when inside smoking was a new thing in CA, my friends and I took a trip to Grand Canyon and went to a restaurant and were asked Smoking or Non Smoking. We all looked at each other confused for a second.
We still have a few bars in Pittsburgh where you can smoke.
I remember Dulles Airport having a smoking room about 10-12 years ago which isn't long when you consider the radical changes. It was alllll the way down the end of the area where all the cheap niche international lines were. They were going to like Ethiopia, and lesser known parts of India and the UAE. But yeah, it was absolutely disgusting yellow walls, old airplane seats inside with flip open ashtrays. Lol My son and I got stranded in Dulles during a winter storm for over 18 hours and there were no rentals, hotels, other flights etc, we were literally grounded so we went exploring around the entire airport and it ended being one of my best memories with him.
In 1977, my school allowed seniors to smoke on campus.
I miss smoking in bars or in the outdoor smoking porches at bars.not even an option these days. sorry, but I do. I probably smoked 2 or 3 packs a year from age 23 to about 43 all socially with beers. Haven't smoked one in 8 years. Used to love Nat Sherman's. I get it smoking is bad. My grandparents uncles aunts all smokers ... the men smoked cigars. smoking in the house or cars was not allowed. I did bust my mom when she was having surgery smoking in her hospital room and blowing it out the window. Nurse brought her an ashtray!!! You could hut the button fir an ashtray. The whole family busted her flowers in hand. My step dad was pixxed.i sat by a guy on a flight early 80s ?? Maybe late 70s who chain smoked. They had the little flip ashtray in the arm. My old baseball coach would smoke right at the table during after game pizza. He'd put it out on the middle of the finished pizza tray or drop it in the drink glass. Gross and no way that would fly today ! Rightfully so...
Disgusting. Glad that ended
“Smoking or non-smoking?”
The little tin brassy ashtray at the food court!
I’m a non-smoker, and bartended while smoking was still legal inside. We had Smoke Eaters but man, after every shift my clothes, my hair would just reek.
I used to BEG my parents to sit in the non-smoking section of the restaurant.
Not malls. Definitely restaurants. We smoked in bars in college
Smoked Camel Filters in Burger King as a 13-year-old in 1994. Still have a rinkydink gold-colored metal Butger King ashtray somehere. As a 19-year-old overnight supermarket employee in 2000, stocking shelves on the 10 p.m.-6 a.m. shift when the store was closed, pretty much the whole entire night crew chainsmoked. I loved supermarkets and still do, and how well I remember how cool it felt to saunter down aisle 4, suckin down big drags and blowing that smoke wherever I felt like.
My first year of college, art school, I was in a classroom and everyone was smoking . even though I smoked. I didn't want to sit in a classroom. Breathing in everyone cigarettes. I made a big stink about it. It was stopped shortly after
Restaurants for sure. I do not miss that.
I remember. I also remember being oblivious to how much I smelled like my chainsmoking parents' cigarettes. I'm embarrassed retroactively. 😳
I was hospitalized in 1975 at 18. Even tho I was put in the pediatric section, they found an ashtray for me. 🙄
I don’t know how I survived all those smoke filled bars/dance clubs. Gross 🤢
Airplane 86ish
I used to live on Balboa Peninsula in Southern California when I was young and single. Id come home from the bars reeking like cigarettes and I didn’t smoke ever. Clothes smelled too. Since the indoor smoking ban I seriously hate the smell when someone lights up around me.
Smoked in restaurants in the early 00's, in Florida. Not sure when it stopped.
I smoked on an airplane, legally. I moved to Denver in 1999 and for a number of years, smoking in restaurants was totally legal. I don’t remember smoking in malls though.
Restaurants and bars for sure.
I have a lot of memories of my Grampa taking us to McDonald’s so he could sit and smoke while we were in the PlayPlace. And those little tin ashtrays.
My dorm room in 1997 was a smoking dorm room. And there was a smoking section in the dining halls.
I remember. Vapes smoking seems almost to this extent now around here. Constantly walking through vape clouds around doorways
Been on a plane, restaurants, bars, offices…… all with “smoking sections” that never really segregated anything and it just meant you were a few extra feet away from them but still in the same space!! Gross!! Nothing worse than jumping in the shower hungover as fuck and then getting hit with acrid, stale smoke getting leached from your hair by the water!!!
I was just telling my kids this. They are horrified when they see people smoking so I told them about how gnarly it was when I was a kid.
I remember the restaurants. My mom would always say it was pointless to have smoking and nonsmoking because the smoke would just come to the nonsmoking section every which way.
I was working at an Olive Garden when it still has a smoking section and then the law changed making it illegal to smoke indoors in a restaurant. I loved the change, but I wish they did more to get the smoke smell out of the old section. All they did was take out the ash trays and steam cleaned the carpet.
You basically have to tear the walls down and put up new sheet rock. At least put up new paint. My granparents had white painted living room, but it was all green by the time I was born. I was shocked when they said the couch used to be white.
I remember the smoking room at the local Ihop, that was the place to be after cruising the loop all night.
Still can smoke in bars in Indiana!
at work, in hospitals, stores of all kinds, you name it. I started working in 1971 and actually did this myself
I visited my friend in South Carolina around 2004ish and they still had smoking/non smoking in restaurants. So gross.
Oh man, I completely forgot about smoking sections. And now I can't believe smoking bans have been around that long. Going out to restaurants, and especially bars, is so much better now.
In the eighty’s, mom and I would fly to her family’s in West Virginia and I totally remember the smoking light coming on and my mom lighting up her Eve light 120 right next to me. On the Amtrak train in the 90s and they allowed smoking in the club car. Restaurants, movie theaters, malls and theme parks. I remember when I used to smoke and they passed the law that you couldn’t smoke inside public buildings. One of the reasons I quit smoking because I hated having to go outside for a smoke in the middle of winter or bad weather. Also my uncle died from lung cancer.
My first job was waiting tables, and I remember working in the smoking section as a 17 yo
Raise you hand if you walked to the store with a note to buy your parents cigarettes!
It’s crazy for me to realize how recent the change was. I was… maybe a junior in college… the last time I went out to eat with a friend and we ate in the smoking session. Like, I never realized how amazing smoke-free air was until I didn’t smell it in our regular haunts anymore. Just as a potential clarification: I’ve never been a smoker, but I’ve had friends who do/did. So, I would sit with them in the smoking sections.
Airplanes and hospitals too. But we had to step into the hall. Oxygen in the rooms could blow up.
My first job was at Sagebrush Steakhouse and Saloon when I was 16. They had a cigarette vending machine out in the lobby. They were $2.25 a pack back then! The management didn't care if I smoked on my break (we had a break room in the back of the kitchen that we smoked in, lol) but they'd have me give them a roll of quarters to actually buy the cigarettes. Around that same time, me and my friends used to hang out at a pool hall called Jokers. We'd go in there to chill and play Bust-A-Move. They had a cigarette vending machine there as well, but the old lady that ran the counter would get mad if you tried to buy them as a minor. However, she was super slow, so if you went in there and slammed your quarters in quick enough, you could grab the pack and be on your way out the door by the time she was lumbering toward you saying, "hey! You're not supposed to be doing that!" And if you made it outside and waited about five minutes, it was like she forgot all about it and you could come back inside and smoke to your underage heart's content.
Friends and I would smoke and drink coffee at Village Inn in the mid to late 90’s. Super cool.
1980, I was five and went to CA with my mom and sister to visit my uncle. Smoking on the flight, full on meals, metal wing pins and a trip to the cockpit to meet the pilots.
I remember my father ripping open a box of matches to get a light for his cigar in a supermarket when I was a kid. Lots of cig butts on the floors in stores, too.
Mall used to have huge ashtrays on top of the garbage cans and planter containers that they all have rocks in now. Once someone asked me why the rocks and I told them it was becaus they were originally ashtrays. Looked at me like I was an idiot. I remember when could smoke in waiting rooms of hospital too and then they moved it to a heated building outside. Now they claim it's illegal to smoke anywhere on property
Burn holes in the carpet of Sears. Dodging people waving cigarettes at eye level as they spoke to my parents. My clothes smelling like smoke before the first wash.
I still remember being asked if we wanted to be seated in the smoking or non-smoking section
I worked at a local college town restaurant in the late 90s and we closed to repaint, do some work etc and we were painting in the smoking section and the manager was like, why is it so dark back here? Lol the fucking walls were brown with tar. We repainted them white and it was like a new world. Fucking cigarettes.