There are those who see vaping as a linear trajectory, as kit moves along a path finding better ways to deliver the experience with the goal of a perfect vape. Mods and attys deviating from this trajectory are roundly mocked. Vapers place them in the corner of the online playground and hurl spiteful comments. But then something new takes hold and the line of progress veers off at an angle like a dog spotting a cat licking its balls in the road.

eGo to USA, USA to Pinoy, Pinoy to USA, USA to GB and the slow rise of the regulated device. A couple of ugly boxes later and the market became nothing but C-shapes and rectangular cuboids. Power outputs from chips have become engorged to a level that continually outstrips what is perceived as normal vaping. Virginal atomizer holes followed suit in the quest for increased airflow and most drippers now boast gaping holes to rival blocks of Emmental cheese.

My Dad was a proud man in the late 70s as his the bulk of his wardrobe was adopted by a section of the Punk community. “I’m back in fashion,” he’d exclaim. I remember seeing the smiles on the faces of hippies as they looked on at the resurgence of the flared trouser and my mother’s face when my daughter was decked out in a 50’s dress.

When the DNA40 hit many proclaimed the death of the mechanical mod. Resale values began to drop like a politician’s popularity with WI members after he’s named in porcine shenanigans. Why would anybody bother with a tube where you need to swap cells out because the useable voltage has gone? Why would anyone buy a tube when there are plentiful, useable regulated devices on the market?

But life isn’t linear; life is a coil of wire.

I sold off all bar a couple of mech and proclaimed myself shot of them. Why ride a leaky old Triumph when the Japanese were making two-wheeled machines of destiny? And yet the motorbike market came back around to Triumph, its history and the new iterations of the models.

And so, when faced with the opportunity of getting myself a treat, I looked at the options out there. Something distinctive, something that performed, and something I could get unbridled joy from simply holding. And I went mech.

There’s a beauty in simplicity. Heck, it’s the reason my wife finds me bearable. A good pair of scissors, a functional penknife, a table – forms uncluttered by deviation from functionality. It helps that I remain unconvinced by the temperature controlled mantra combined with a willingness to go low ohm – but I’m getting the vape from a tube that I was getting from a box. No, that’s wrong. I’m getting a better vape because I’ve dispensed with the chip making my decisions for me. I have obtained a Zen-like oneness with my vaping device. I made that coil and wick to perform with the mod; I am tied to it and it to me. If there is something I need to tweak it takes more than the press of a button…and I love that. Again.

This isn’t retro, it’s not grasping at the past to deflect the future from approaching too fast. It’s Tom and Barbara raising pigs in the back garden, it’s embracing a simpler and more fulfilling way of being. Of course it is also waxing lyrical about something that isn’t important but then neither are flared trousers, Triumphs, scissors or…probably…existence.

The mech is back.

Vaping is more than simply a coil heating liquid to evaporation. Sure, it is simply that if we reduce it to its basest function – but to ignore the rest is to cut oneself off from additional delight.

I firmly believe that we are all artists. As children we all had the capacity to wonder at the world, to gaze at things that marvelled us and to get busy with crayons while being instructed not to colour outside the lines. Along the way we switch off and stop noticing things. I’m pretty certain its down to the stuffy nature of the art world and the times we were told we were doing it wrong.

“If I could say it in words there would be no reason to paint.” ~ Edward Hopper

If you have ever stood and looked at Van Gogh’s Starry Night you may, like me, have been blown away by the loops and spirals of thick oil on canvas. It is the same emotional response I get from looking at images of diffraction patterns or the paths traced out in particle physics experiments. Both of which are evocative of the plumes sprouting from a mesh wick.

Spirals and loops of vape, building patterns of waves cascading away from the coil – aggressive, crackling splendour; it interweaves and flows, creating unique patterns in the air. Like snowflakes, no two pulses on the switch of the mod will ever recreate the same image in front of you.

And then there’s exhaling the cloud, as it catches the tiny eddy currents in the room to drift before standing as a metaphor for life and vanishing like it was never there…just a sense of the smell indicating the entity it once was. I can assure you I’ve not been drinking yet, this is a genuine love of the airborne textures I create.

I know I’m not alone, I know you can get this otherwise there wouldn’t be a fascination with subohming or the painstaking efforts to marry the right mod with a fitting atomiser. You love it too; you get the aesthetic of vaping. Like the inspirational Alison Lapper, you paint with your mouth.

But our enjoyment isn’t limited to the visual aspect of vaping. When doing my Art Foundation I discovered a love of aural sculptures and ‘found sound’. It made sense to me that if I adored music then a logical extension is an appreciation of those noises that comfort or challenge us. Waking up to the sound of sheep outside is, to me, as pleasurable as the creaking door in a horror film, I need no image to look at because the sounds are painting pictures in my mind.

Darth Vapous mentioned a similar thing on the POTV forum; the delicious commotion created at the same time of the cloud. The rasp of a Hellfire, the suction of a large-hole dripper – even the whistle of a Kayfun; clicks and snaps, smacks and whooshes fill our ears with the noise of vaping. Pops from flooded wicks that are surprising yet entertaining remind us that the coil is bursting into life and, as the electrical latency of the mod dies away once releasing the switch, the afterburn hiss embraces silence.

Stunning.

*Image of the atomiser from an online vaper called Vape Geek.

Christmas taught me a number of things including (and not exclusively) that a Disney musical can tire the patience of saints, political debates can become immensely heated when fuelled by tequila and I really don’t use gennys that much.

I love a genny, I keep saying how my Origen V2 is my favourite atomiser, but I can count the number of run-outs it had over a fortnight on one hand. Clearly, this doesn’t mean I don’t love it – but I am left wondering why I keep going back to the Kayfun-lite like film producers keep hiring Nicolas Cage.

Like Cage, the Kayfun is pretty much a one-dimensional device (albeit far more rewarding and capable of expressing a greater range of emotions). I know that some people drill theirs out or sub-ohm with them but, frankly, it’s not what it was made for. You can cast Rupert Grint in any number of other roles but he will forever remain that odd looking one who once waved a twig: It’s what he was made for. To do anything else is akin to taking Argentine footy star Lionel Messi and playing him in goal.

I began my break playing with drippers, something I’d not done for most of the year. A new juice arrived from Colonel Boom and it sang in the Igo-W+, I was truly smitten. But, rather than keeping at it in an atty that was working well I insisted on going down the easy route of filling up one of the KFLs. Why? I’ve no idea beyond my latent stupidity and laziness.

It didn’t work; notes vanished from the experience like shifting from Lou Reed to a celebrity-strewn cover of Perfect Day. Did I return to dripping? Nope.

I used put the lack of use the gennys got down to the fact that I have juices dedicated to each one – and those flavours only tend to get a run out when drinking booze. But in a fortnight where I single-handedly raised the share price in several distilleries they still didn’t see the use I’d have expected.

The Heron has joined the list of single-juice attys; the only thing it sees is Powwow Sauce. What helps it is that PWS is pretty much one of my two all-day vapes along with some heavy GVC (residing in a 3.1ES).

The realisation of what type of vaper I am took hold at the outset of a fun festive family game. A delightful coming together of competitive souls that forced me to remember something important I had to attend to in the garage.

Sheltering from the enforced frivolity, I cast a gaze on the workbench littered with woodworking tools and a host of half-finished vape stands. Some had even reached the stage of having patterns burned into the shapes. See, I love the idea of building things but my attention span runs to that of our collection of fish.

I love the idea of atomisers I can build to my requirements but have, more and more, reduced to just swapping out some cotton and burning off the coil. It’s made me realise just how much I could never be a reviewer making videos on a weekly basis. Spending my time wicking and coiling instead of starting blankly out of the window seeking inspiration is just not anything I’d like to do.

So I’m a lazy vaper. I’m a lazy vaper with an aversion to enclosed spaces packed with in-laws. So much so that I’ve found myself frequently looking at pictures of the new Kanger Subtank thinking how brilliant it would be if I could cut the tiresome cotton threading out of my life. It’s not going to happen, I’m too lazy to find out if it works or not – I’ll go see if one of the industrious video makers has looked at one.

If only I could find a similar way of replacing those related to me.

Stealthvape’s helpdesk has been inundated of late. While we endeavour to deal with issues in a timely and constructive fashion we are unfortunately unable to assist with some problems…especially yours Mr R Venn of Bath; you really need to stop emailing that personal graphic picture and go see the urologist.

Let’s be clear here, no one manning the desk has what we would term official medical training. Personally, I’ve read all of James Herriot’s books (except for ‘Blossom Comes Home‘ and ‘Smudge, the Little Lost Lamb‘); Rob has Casualty on Blu-ray and Emma paid close attention when Madge was hospitalised in ITV’s Benidorm. But none of this qualifies us to answer those types of questions, Mr Venn.

We do know our stuff when it comes to Glantzism, though.

Firstly, have you suddenly discovered that you are desperately afraid of particulates? Worse, do you find yourself in a confused state because you are unsure what particulates are, how they got into your house and why the Home Office isn’t putting a limit to the numbers gaining access to the country? Maybe it has happened to someone close to you? Maybe it has happened to someone far away that you don’t like very much?

Particulates are small, foreign bodies, hard to see and almost impossible to have delivered if you live in a village. Stanton Glantz, hence the name of the disease, is petrified about particulates…vaping produces oodles of them apparently and he is overly concerned about the size. Yes, Mr Venn. I am fully aware that we are discussing size but that does not mean I’m going to address your issue – no matter how ultrafine yours is. Men like Glantz have a history of being overly concerned about size. Although commonplace, it is still misguided and irrational. So, could someone suffering from Glantzism rationalise her or his way out of this dilemma?

Let’s try an analogy.

Imagine an obnoxious adult; let’s call them Mr R Venn of Bath for sake of argument. Mr Venn is repugnant, easy to see (albeit offensive to the eyes) and therefore possible to avoid. But now imagine that person as a child. Does being smaller make them more dangerous? Clearly not, unless they remain in charge of an articulated truck doing 58mph on the open road. The size of Venn junior in no way increases danger to others although it makes it easier for him to creep up on you unannounced.

Let’s try another: Imagine being placed in a sealed sauna. In this room you will be breathing in loads of ultrafine water particles. Now imagine the sealed room is filled with water with you in it. If you find that mental image as disturbing as I found Mr Venn’s picture then this is probably an opportune moment to relax and find our happy place: imagine the sealed room filled with water and Stanton Glantz in it.

As Mark Twain said, “It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” It’s not the size of a particle that poses danger to vapers, it’s what that particle is, Mr Glantz. And, if that particle is nicotine then it poses no greater risk to the health of a vaper than has already been documented in the peer-reviewed studies you are choosing to ignore.

So, dear reader, you can see there is no reason to be alarmed at the outbreak of Glantzism. What can not be solved with a liberal application of common sense can always be cured using the sealed, water-filled room.

*Next week: Mr R Venn of Bath raises a question regarding the use of euphemisms and the word ‘mod’.

They were the highlights because my family would attempt to ruin the endless days of bliss by dragging me away to a part of the country where the sun never shone, the portable black and white couldn’t get a signal and the toilet needed emptying far too regularly.

Like all things we go through during those years, you never fully appreciate them until they become distant memories. The Kendal Mintcake, the pokey smoke-filled cinema, the boys at the campsite football match who thought my 70s hair made me a girl – oh, cherished memories.

At my smoking peak I was burning my way through 60 Rothmans a day while working as a sales rep. At no point during this period did I think “Hey, I love this thing so much I ought to hang out with some other people who do it to too.”

Now, fine, smokers do tend to congregate. We did it down the bottom of school playing fields, in works canteens and (for those who carried on into the smoking ban) doorways. The enforced conviviality of standing with strangers in alcoves must have had a lasting impression on us, a desire to share our experience.

Becoming a family man you have to draw up a set of rules, no one issues you with a book on Dadhood and if they did it would probably be a pile of toss written by someone who wants you to indulge in non-competitive games and refrain from using coarse language. It saddens me that while researching this piece a number of such tomes are readily available from your local bookstore. Little do they understand men – we don’t need no stinking instructions.

For anything.

So where do we draw our inspiration from? Well, in my case it is repeating all of those things that I hated as a kid so that my kids can look back fondly on the stupid things I made them do; we share our experiences, we pass down our stories.

The vaping journey has taken me into forums where the notion of “Hey, I love this thing so much I ought to hang out with some other people who do it to too” doesn’t seem as stupid as the fag-based version. And one, the Planet of the Vapes, arranged to hold a big get together for all of us keyboard warriors so that we could stand in the Lake District with a pint in hand and not recognise each other from our online avatars. We don’t share opinions about politics, football or an awful lot – unsurprisingly seeing as we are a cross-section of society. We share vaping and, seemingly, a liking for alcohol.

During one summer I stood at the top of Hardnott Pass holding the dog’s lead. I don’t know what the weather was like back then but I suspect it was raining. Last weekend I stood there with a couple of leads and two kids. And the sun shone on us all.

I have no idea if it is possible to extrapolate that all the vapers I was with were really nice people and therefore all vapers are really smashing types? I’ve no idea if forcing children to revisit the horrors of their parents’ past is as character-building as I’d like to hope even if I feel a failure because they enjoyed it so much.

What I do know is that the primary school notion of  ‘it is good to share’, experiences or otherwise, was deeply rewarding. Sitting sharing beers with vapers while swapping stories of nonsense I wondered if my Dad had felt the same?

It was this love of being a self-appointed moral arbiter and fighter for a just & fair society that led to my father picking up the torch when he complained to the Chronicle & Echo about a popular brand of real ale moving from cask to a pressurised system.

It would have been my shoulders that had to carry the weight of putting the world to rights were it not for the intervention of my brother. An early career in a newsroom opened my eyes to the proliferation of angry old men displacing the regret over the aging process by vilifying everything they once did.

Consequently I was amused to see the reaction to “Vaping Boy” this week.

Anger and notions that this was a clandestine plot by the anti-vaping industry gushed onto the modern day virtual equivalent of the print letters page.

“Ban this filth!” “Disgusting!” “Complain and get it taken down!”

Now I’m not going to judge the lad (aside from a gentle mocking of his inability to differentiate between vape and smoke), I was 12 when I bought 10 Embassy No.6 from a vending machine in the High St. I was a year older when I covered our village bus shelter in graffiti.

The fact is young kids act like this, they explore the world and make a succession of poor choices just like we all did. My wife, from a respectable middle class family, spent her 13^th birthday face down in a pool of vomit and vodka. Lil’ Asap may go on to a lifetime of nicotine addiction, he might even be one of the very few to make the leap from vaping to a more unpleasant alternative, who knows? Despite launching into the mighty world of booze like global stocks of it were more limited than the remaining oil reserves, the wife has cut out a lifestyle drinking culture for herself that involves a half of lager in her slippers and sleep by 9pm.

What is the appropriate response? I’ve no idea, I do know what my response was though – and it was the same as when I saw a comment by Martin McKee: laughter.

He isn’t the first kid to try vaping, there was one walking around Vapefest with his parents in 2012, and he certainly won’t be the last. Pretending it’s not taking place or hoping to hide the activity from the outside world is no better than the lies made up by Glantz. Deal with it and twist it into a positive would appear to be a positive step. Use it to amplify how the industry abhors vendors who sell to children, take it and run with the notion that kids have always experimented with smoking and if this prevents them from doing so then society wins.

Just don’t tell me that insulting him and getting his online account blocked is anything approaching the right thing to do as I would be forced to write a strongly-worded letter of complaint.

*These opinions are my own and do not reflect those held by Stealthvape

In the book, Orwell argues powerfully against the control of language, because those who tell you what words you can and can’t use are automatically dictating how you communicate. Through the censorship of words or by changing their meanings, Newspeak replaces English and thereby limits the opportunity of the individual to express or formulate thought. The endgame for “The Party” is that no one would be able to question its absolute power because they would no longer have the words to do so.

Taking the notion to an extreme end of the spectrum, Chomsky says “if we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.”

On Vaping forums we will happily debate the potential dangers related to coils oxidising and what may be released into the lungs. We will discuss the nature of wicks and the likelihood of particulates finding their way down to our alveoli. But mention the M-word and the ban hammer will loom large.

“Smoke inhalation delivers damaging carcinogens and an onslaught of other damaging materials directly through the bronchial tree and into the lungs. The most immediate effect is the irritation of the windpipe, but long-term exposure to any source of hot smoke is unnatural and very hard on the lungs” – not my words but those of Royal Queen Seeds. Something so strikingly similar to any number of vaping-related forum posts and yet this doesn’t relate to tobacco discussion, it belongs to a comment about the combustion of a different leaf entirely. A leaf consider so taboo for vape-talk I’ve even made up an image through the imaginative use of nettle leaves.

If we are so keen to ensure that others have the opportunity to use nicotine in a manner accepted to be orders of magnitude safer than through smoking then why is it we spurn any direct reference to Mary Jane? When people using traditional means to access cannabinoids are opening themselves up to combustion products (88% of the smoke compared to 95% pure through vaporising) shouldn’t we be more welcoming to these vapers? These are purely rhetorical questions; I am not a user and have no vested interest.

“I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.” ~ Voltaire

Clearly, we are comparing something that is legal (albeit with impending restrictions) to something illegal in most countries but exceptions apply and the technology is the aspect of interest. A reason given online would go along the lines of ‘we are at an important juncture in the formation of legislation and could do without the association to illegal substances.

The response ought to be: but if the argument is about health promotion and harm reduction then surely this transcends legality of substance in the wider interests of society? If we support the idea of vaping for a healthier population and lower costs on the health service infrastructure then should this be restricted only to those who vape the substance we agree with?

Vaping does not encourage people to smoke, the discussion of vaping does not draw people who do not smoke into vaping and, by extension, talking about the use of Maui Wowie in vaporisers will not culminate with lines of new people outside late-night snack shops.

The rights and wrongs of this topic will never be debated in our forums, we will continue to allow ourselves to be censored, which can only be doubleplusbad.

“Take away the right to say “****” and you take away the right to say “**** the government.”  ~Lenny Bruce

Stealthvape’s biggest news of the week has to be ‘The Return of Little Bill’. How wonderful it was to see the mass of messages flooding onto Facebook and Internet forums wishing him a speedy recovery and how understanding customers were that delays might happen. There can’t be many business markets where a vendor is positively encouraged to take time with deliveries because “other things in life are far more important”? We know that vapers are a special bunch of people; this week confirmed it even more.

The launch of the OCD connector has been warmly received by Vapeland’s modders and orders are flying in from all parts of the world. It would be wonderful to see pictures of it in action – why not post a picture or two up onto the Facebook page?

Back out in the real world, NHS Scotland has taken a lead role in standing up for common sense and good science by including electronic cigarettes in its advise to smokers. For the first time in the United Kingdom a health organisation has recognised the popularity of vaping and has instructed all of its smoking cessation services that they should not tell vapers to put down the ecig in favour of NRT products.

Previously, only the NHS Stop Smoking service in Leicester had taken on board such a proactive stance, but now the 24% of Scottish men and 22% of Scottish women who smoke will have the opportunity to vape as part of an integrated policy to reduce smoking-related disease, (figures from ASH Scotland). The guidance sent out states that “current expert opinion on the limited evidence available suggests that they are likely to be considerably less hazardous than tobacco smoking.”

Fiona Moore, public health adviser at NHS Health Scotland, said “increased interest and inquires about e-cigarettes had prompted us to revisit guidance, amid concerns the numbers using quit services were falling, meaning they might be missing out on the extra support these gave.”

Plus, as the saying goes, when America catches a cold Britain sneezes; news from Fortune magazine demonstrates a 24.2% rise in the sales of e-cigarettes and it is predicted that this strong growth will continue at around 25% per annum through to 2018. The market for vaping devices is now conservatively estimated to be worth $1.5billion in the States alone.

Harking back to the research produced by Robert West in the journal Addiction, last month, the progression from 1^st to 3^rd generation devices is marked. It is also confirmed by the findings of the ASH UK report into vaping and so vendors should continue to see increases in trade despite the looming TPD regulations (however they may be interpreted by Parliament).

It will be interesting to see how the 3^rd Gen market develops over the rest of this year as a number of traditionally limited run manufacturers appear to be setting, or have set up an online presence. With Mikro Engineering making the latest run of the Challenger available through Facebook, the Hellfire website advertising atomisers in stock, and new to the market manufacturers set to release products at Vapefest demands for home-made high end devices has never been bigger.

Popping back across the pond there are more positive signs, as reported by Bloomsberg Businessweek. In an interview with Mitch Zeller, head of the Food & Drug Administration, he was quoted as saying that regulators were going to have to keep an “open mind on the potential for these emerging technologies” with regards the health benefits of vaping. That the head of the FDA is now using phrases like “It’s time for us to start looking at nicotine differently” will come as a massive slap in the face for anti campaigners.

Meanwhile, in Boston, gubernatorial candidates were asked for their thoughts regarding the rise and rise of the e-cig. To which one candidate, Mark Fisher responded “I trust that the good citizens of the Commonwealth can decide for themselves how to run their lives and pursue happiness without any interference from the State regarding the sale of e-cigarettes. If the State were to be involved in this, then what’s next, banning Santa Claus because he smokes a pipe, is overweight and has rosy cheeks after enjoying an adult beverage?”

I hope not, Mark, because I’m pretty sure that would upset Little Bill and he’s had enough to cope with this year.

The phenomenal growth in online forum membership and the proliferation of Facebook groups dedicated to vaping stand in testament to position decried by idiots as unproven: Vaping works.

18,434 people belong to Planet of the Vapes, 23,455 people are members of UK Vapers, Vape News Magazine now has a circulation figure over 35,000 and a Google search for ‘facebook’+’group’+’vape’ returns 1,130,000 results.

As we’ve grown in numbers, as vaping worked for us as individuals, we’ve drifted apart along the way. There’s just so much to see and do, there are so many opinions.

I remember starting vaping just over two years ago as a means of not relapsing back into smoking after a seven year break from cigarettes – and I remember feeling how there was so much to learn as I proudly puffed on my eGo and CE2 with a lump of Kuwako plastic stuck on the end. I bought my horrible juice from a market man and worried every time I cut a piece of silica that I was going to kill myself, my children and the dogs with the bits flying off.

And over that time we have seen fashion shift to Pinoy mods, then to ever increasingly pricey American and European models to 2014 ‘The Year of the Box Mod’. Regulated devices have never been more popular as the cloud chasers seek higher and higher outputs and people lust for DNA40-powered kit.

The sheer range of mods and attys now is simply amazing…and no longer is there just a straightforward wick and wire option either: Voodoowool, cotton, Muji and less delectable offerings joined silica; Kanthal can be bought in fancy premade formats, Nickel for the DNA40 crowd and even G-spot welding wire.

Forums have been preoccupied with silica fragments, metal particulates, kitchen sink juice manufacturers, the contents of juice, exploding Gen 2 batteries, sub-ohmers destroying the space-time continuum, more things in juice…oh, and a bit of politics. And so it will continue because we love to talk about vaping stuff.

Whatever confusion I felt when beginning must pale in comparison to the challenges faced by today’s quitters. So welcome to the world of vaping everyone. Sorry I couldn’t say ‘hi’ on your intro thread personally but with the Sun due to expire in 4.5billion years there wasn’t the time to get to you all.

Fortunately, from my experience, the bulk of vapers are enthusiastic and happy go lucky types who adore sharing their knowledge of this absorbing hobby. And it is a hobby, it meets all the criteria: it consumes my free time, almost all of my disposable income and my wife doesn’t understand it.

So, once again, welcome to our wonderful and sometimes frustrating and infuriating world. Welcome to a voyage of discovery where you can just kick back and enjoy. What works for you is always good enough and every analogue you don’t smoke is a win.

If your memory serves you well then you’ll recall that the likes of British Gas had abysmal customer service, premium-rate phone numbers and liked to keep you on hold for as long as possible. I took to reciting a list of possible key words with each call in the hope that it would break me out of the hold queue. Kidnap revolution bomb fatwa plot.

Annoying family members and friends who send me pictures of cats or their children by email now get the same treatment. I make a point of trying to use as many key words as possible so that they can spend a fortnight being followed by a black van with blacked out windows. Lockdown epidemic toxic plague CIKR.

A FOI request to the Department of Homeland Security in 2012 highlighted the (then) 377 words they actively scan for in intercepted emails and social media posts. Giving information like this to someone as “emotionally immature” (not my words, the words of my line manager during an annual performance review) as me is begging for problems. Perica NBIC port heroin worm conflict NH4NO3.

Clearly there is a need to drop a dirty bomb of mischief and I’m the idiot to do it. The point of this? Well, frankly I’m a bit disappointed that you think there has to be one – it places unacceptable levels of expectation on my writing. There is a point, it was reported on Reuters newswires this week:

The Food & Drug Administration is monitoring your Facebooks. That’s right, the American agency tasked with the oversight of US policy on vaping has employed people as part of its $270 million spend over the next five years to snoop. They are going to be sifting social media posts for details of how we vapers are “tinkering with e-cigarettes to make the devices deliver extra nicotine”.

In British contract and case law there is the term invitatio ad offerendum meaning ‘invitation to treat’. This action by the FDA is just that – it’s an open offer to wind them up with a succession of bizarre and outlandish bogus posts demonstrating how we have adapted our Kayfuns to deliver extra nicotine.

The simple fact that they don’t understand someone could just buy a higher strength cigalike says everything about their comprehension of the subject at hand.

I know, it’s a puerile idea. I understand, a man of my years ought to be seeking pleasure in the arms of a good chair and a pair of slippers – or a shed. The thing is when stupid comes knocking on the door I always open it up, invite it in and mess with its head. Think of it as a hobby. A hobby like attacking my dripper with a durka durka screwdriver to increase the Mohammed jihad nicotine output.

Those 377 Department of Homeland Security words in full:

• Department of Homeland Security (DHS)
• Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
• Coast Guard (USCG)
• Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
• Border Patrol
• Secret Service (USSS)
• National Operations Center (NOC)
• Homeland Defense
• Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE)
• Agent
• Task Force
• Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
• Fusion Center
• Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)
• Secure Border Initiative (SBI)
• Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
• Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF)
• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS)
• Federal Air Marshal Service (FAMS)
• Transportation Security Administration (TSA)
• Air Marshal
• Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)
• National Guard
• Red Cross
• United Nations (UN)
• Assassination
• Attack
• Domestic security
• Drill
• Exercise
• Cops
• Law enforcement
• Authorities
• Disaster assistance
• Disaster management
• DNDO (Domestic Nuclear Detection Office)
• National preparedness
• Mitigation
• Prevention
• Response
• Recovery
• Dirty bomb
• Domestic nuclear detection
• Emergency management
• Emergency response
• First responder
• Homeland security
• Maritime domain awareness (MDA)
• National preparedness initiative
• Militia Shooting
• Shots fired
• Evacuation
• Deaths
• Hostage
• Explosion (explosive)
• Police
• Disaster medical assistance team (DMAT)
• Organized crime
• Gangs
• National security
• State of emergency
• Security
• Breach
• Threat
• Standoff
• SWAT
• Screening
• Lockdown
• Bomb (squad or threat)
• Crash
• Looting
• Riot
• Emergency
• Landing
• Pipe bomb
• Incident
• Facility
• Hazmat
• Nuclear
• Chemical spill
• Suspicious package/device
• Toxic
• National laboratory
• Nuclear facility
• Nuclear threat
• Cloud
• Plume
• Radiation
• Radioactive
• Leak
• Biological infection (or event)
• Chemical
• Chemical burn
• Biological
• Epidemic
• Hazardous
• Hazardous material incident
• Industrial spill
• Infection
• Powder (white)
• Gas
• Spillover
• Anthrax
• Blister agent
• Chemical agent
• Exposure
• Burn
• Nerve agent
• Ricin
• Sarin
• North Korea
• Outbreak
• Contamination
• Exposure
• Virus
• Evacuation
• Bacteria
• Recall
• Ebola
• Food Poisoning
• Foot and Mouth (FMD)
• H5N1
• Avian
• Flu
• Salmonella
• Small Pox
• Plague
• Human to human
• Human to Animal
• Influenza
• Center for Disease Control (CDC)
• Drug Administration (FDA)
• Public Health
• Toxic Agro
• Terror Tuberculosis (TB)
• Agriculture
• Listeria
• Symptoms
• Mutation
• Resistant
• Antiviral
• Wave
• Pandemic
• Infection
• Water/air borne
• Sick
• Swine
• Pork
• Strain
• Quarantine
• H1N1
• Vaccine
• Tamiflu
• Norvo Virus
• Epidemic
• World Health Organization (WHO) (and components)
• Viral Hemorrhagic Fever
• E. Coli
• Infrastructure security
• Airport
• CIKR (Critical Infrastructure & Key Resources)
• AMTRAK
• Collapse
• Computer infrastructure
• Communications infrastructure
• Telecommunications
• Critical infrastructure
• National infrastructure
• Metro
• WMATA
• Airplane (and derivatives)
• Chemical fire
• Subway
• BART
• MARTA
• Port Authority
• NBIC (National Biosurveillance Integration Center)
• Transportation security
• Grid
• Power
• Smart
• Body scanner
• Electric
• Failure or outage
• Black out
• Brown out
• Port
• Dock
• Bridge
• Cancelled
• Delays
• Service disruption
• Power lines
• Drug cartel
• Violence
• Gang
• Drug
• Narcotics
• Cocaine
• Marijuana
• Heroin
• Border
• Mexico
• Cartel
• Southwest
• Juarez
• Sinaloa
• Tijuana
• Torreon
• Yuma
• Tucson
• Decapitated
• U.S. Consulate
• Consular
• El Paso
• Fort Hancock
• San Diego
• Ciudad Juarez
• Nogales
• Sonora
• Colombia
• Mara salvatrucha
• MS13 or MS-13
• Drug war
• Mexican army
• Methamphetamine
• Cartel de Golfo
• Gulf Cartel
• La Familia
• Reynosa
• Nuevo Leon
• Narcos
• Narco banners (Spanish equivalents)
• Los Zetas
• Shootout
• Execution
• Gunfight
• Trafficking
• Kidnap
• Calderon
• Reyosa
• Bust
• Tamaulipas
• Meth Lab
• Drug trade
• Illegal immigrants
• Smuggling (smugglers)
• Matamoros
• Michoacana
• Guzman
• Arellano-Felix
• Beltran-Leyva
• Barrio Azteca
• Artistic Assassins
• Mexicles
• New Federation
• Terrorism
• Al Qaeda (all spellings)
• Terror
• Attack
• Iraq
• Afghanistan
• Iran
• Pakistan
• Agro
• Environmental terrorist
• Eco terrorism
• Conventional weapon
• Target
• Weapons grade
• Dirty bomb
• Enriched
• Nuclear
• Chemical weapon
• Biological weapon
• Ammonium nitrate
• Improvised explosive device
• IED (Improvised Explosive Device)
• Abu Sayyaf
• Hamas
• FARC (Armed Revolutionary Forces Colombia)
• IRA (Irish Republican Army)
• ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna)
• Basque Separatists
• Hezbollah
• Tamil Tigers
• PLF (Palestine Liberation Front)
• PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization
• Car bomb
• Jihad
• Taliban
• Weapons cache
• Suicide bomber
• Suicide attack
• Suspicious substance
• AQAP (AL Qaeda Arabian Peninsula)
• AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb)
• TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan)
• Yemen
• Pirates
• Extremism
• Somalia
• Nigeria
• Radicals
• Al-Shabaab
• Home grown
• Plot
• Nationalist
• Recruitment
• Fundamentalism
• Islamist
• Emergency
• Hurricane
• Tornado
• Twister
• Tsunami
• Earthquake
• Tremor
• Flood
• Storm
• Crest
• Temblor
• Extreme weather
• Forest fire
• Brush fire
• Ice
• Stranded/Stuck
• Help
• Hail
• Wildfire
• Tsunami Warning Center
• Magnitude
• Avalanche
• Typhoon
• Shelter-in-place
• Disaster
• Snow
• Blizzard
• Sleet
• Mud slide or Mudslide
• Erosion
• Power outage
• Brown out
• Warning
• Watch
• Lightening
• Aid
• Relief
• Closure
• Interstate
• Burst
• Emergency Broadcast System
• Cyber security
• Botnet
• DDOS (dedicated denial of service)
• Denial of service
• Malware
• Virus
• Trojan
• Keylogger
• Cyber Command
• 2600
• Spammer
• Phishing
• Rootkit
• Phreaking
• Cain and abel
• Brute forcing
• Mysql injection
• Cyber attack
• Cyber terror
• Hacker
• China
• Conficker
• Worm
• Scammers
• Social media