In my most recent update (XII) regarding my UCD endeavor, I cited issues surrounding the rising price of paper, an important consideration in self-publishing--or at least in making any sort of a profit. This, as pages upon paper pages displayed electronically on my screen, in order to hold endlessly accumulating entries. Cutting the page count seemed at first the proper action. But what to cut? I surely must, I reasoned, provide that one obscure term as it is known in both Cuban as well as Nicaraguan factories.
Right?
Perhaps. But then on the eventual heels of that bit of banging my head against a brick wall, I realized another thing entirely. Many new cigar smokers were making a somewhat similar mistake. They wanted to know everything. Jargo, lingo, trade talk, the whole nine yards--on day one. Sometimes day zero. I love words, language, the whole ball of wax. Maybe I'll just make an ebook, I thought to myself. Take that, Big Paper! It's then that I saw my mistake clearly as I did theirs. Enjoyment had become over-looked.
Cigar smoking is, after all, about enjoyment. Not about definitions. Not about trying to understand how to maintain a 100-count humidor when you're two cigars into your 'smoking career.' It's about the experience, and again, enjoying it. "I can't taste what those other guys taste, and also should I keep my 500 cigars in a wine refrigerator or coolerdor? Just smoked my first one ever." That's a common-place theme. Equally as common as my efforts at playing lexicographer with "Do I include all terms meaning Tobacco House?"
Where did our enjoyment go? Poof, that's where. Some knowledge enhances enjoyment, sure. Like understanding olfactory stimuli and how to fix any of the myriad potential burn or draw issues. Many other bits of information often do not. Some can even hamper. What's that metal clasp on a wooden cigar box called? Brooch. Virtually pointless. Where is this leaf grown and from which priming was it obtained? Less pointless but also not key in the pursuit of pleasure.
At best some info is simply nice to know but in the early game comes off as precocious or worse yet, as the actions of a poseur. I recall writing in one of my UCD entries to not fully worry about whatever it was I was fumbling to succinctly define--as they'd cover that within your probationary training period after getting hired at the cigar factory. Also, it's well and good to learn as you go and grow, and not hit the streets as a theory maven--to instead let the practice unfurl. Again, it is best to learn enjoyment first.
Nevertheless or entirely due to all that, I have begun moving forward in this project from a bit of a different angle. Again, with enjoyment as an educational goal and not jargon. Practice over theory. This shift requires a fair amount of rewriting of what's not immediately chopped and fell to the cutting-room floor. That's on my end. On the user side, the NO TIMEFRAME end result to expect is an A-Z twenty-six essay chapbook (small, stapled book) with hopefully a handful of black and white illustrations.
A is for AROMA, say--with my thoughts as to just that. B is for BURN... So on, and so forth. As to sharing updates as I have been doing with the UCD, I'm quite thinking not. Thanks for bearing with me and if you haven't, thanks for that too. So, I will re-begin and flag everyone down near the end. Then inundate you at the end with desperate pleas for purchase. My goal is to keep the price of the said purchase at around that of a decent cigar.
UPDATED 8/14/2022
I am glad to say that I am now in the home stretch of getting this thing off to the printers. STILL NO TIME FRAME. Of note: it will not be in the form of the ABC essays I mentioned earlier. It will instead be a booklet on how to enjoy a cigar, written to be read as you smoke one. Within that time allotment and at (again) about that same (nice cigar) price-point.
::: very :::