Monday, February 04, 2013

Hookah Row

Apparently the "hookah lounge" is all the rage now and yet somehow I had entirely missed out on this until this past weekend when I went to my Citibank on Steinway Avenue. Right next to the bank were five or six of these hookah lounges, all right next to each other. They each have their own theme - if you click on the photo you can see the one at the end of the hookah row appears to be a "Mexican Grill Hookah Lounge." It seems to be a fancy way to say "you can smoke in this restaurant."

Speaking of smoking, I'm old enough to remember when a good percentage of Americans smoked cigarettes - I smoked when I was a teenager and so did most of my friends. But now... I was walking home from the subway the other day and suddenly I was aware of this funny sensation around my nose - and I started to kind of panic about it, like "what's wrong with me? why do I feel this funny sensation around my nose?" for a few seconds and then I suddenly realized, oh, somebody a half-block ahead of me was smoking a cigarette.

Yes, things have definitely changed, vis-a-vis smoking habits in this country.