nicotiana

“You do not need another USB charging cord,” she said.

“But —”

“There are seven of them here. Seven! Why do you need another?”

Well, uh, because we have other outlets, and they are very useful, and... oh, OK, fine, you win. But it seems like such a shame to pitch out a perfectly good power cord.

(The lightbulb goes on.)

Instead of throwing out this innocent and perfect USB charging cord, I can just do what I do with everything else no one knows what to do with. You have heard of “pay it forward”? This is called “kicking it forward,” meaning why fix a mess today when you can leave it for the future, maybe sometime when I have infinite time to engage in boring tasks, like retirement or Christmas holidays? In our guest room slash office slash exercise room, the builders installed a gigantic walk-in closet for reasons unknown to gods and humans. I open the door and toss it in.

Ominously, it bounces right back out. I doubt the closet is haunted, so this means that the giant heap of stuff — clothes, books, gear, fishing gadgets, tech, heirlooms, old art projects, white elephant gifts, those bok choi we canned back in '02 — has grown to the point where it is pushing up against the door. I cannot just chuck stuff back in there anymore, but (groan) have to find a place. I reach in a tentative hand, feeling around for a place, smushing aside old jackets and wires, and then... my hand closes on a tin.

What could this be? It is thicker than most tins... I can hear something rattle. I know right away that this is “3P,” the Peterson's “Perfect Plug” that delivers UK plug flavor made of Virginias and dark fired Kentucky Burley with a slight fruity top note to mimic Perique. These are high-involvement tobaccos because you have to cut off little shavings and fill your pipe, but then you get a few hours of easy smoking. I recommend not compressing much and definitely leaving room on the sides and bottom, since flake expands as it burns so unless you like dottle, you want the tobacco loosely toward the middle of the bowl both vertically and horizontally.

If you were in my position... I like to think that you would do what I did in this situation, which was to grab that tin and run quickly off to my workbench and desk, an old door stretched over two file cabinets. Taking out a strip of cardboard I keep around for this purpose, I whip out the sharpened 1980s pocketknife I inherited from someone who left it here over a beer-soaked weekend, and start whittling off little feathered strips of plug. Once I have enough I cup them in a hand, dump them in a pipe, then gravity tamp with a thumb. Where is that lighter... oh right, under the field manual for VAX terminals. Flame leaps into the leaf with a quick puff, a cloud rises, and then the process is repeated until the top layer glows. At this point, I start wandering around and doing fun and not-so-fun things until it is time for lunch, at which point the smoldering leaf is guttering just above the base of the bowl. What a glorious smoke on a sunny weekend day. I look briefly into the bowl, somewhat chastened and melancholic at its end, but cheered by the thought of the other thirteen fourteenths of the plug back on the desk, when a black soft flying object hits me in the face.

Was it a fruit bat? A demonic hand? No, it was the USB charger. Time to go back to the closet, but I would be lying if I did not admit that I am gonna scout around to see if there are more of these little tins, probably bought on sale sometime between 2007 and 2014 back when our currency was worth something. Whether I find one or not, I know I am going to hide this USB charger inside Aunt Martha's old tea cozy so that when someone digs it out in 2034 they can be puzzled for a few moments before throwing it where everything else humanity does goes, the landfill.

Like most of the UK blends, 3P shows us not compromise but balance. We like sweet Virginias as a genre, pipe smokers do, but we also like a little strength, and bowls of this blend like a cigar get stronger as they burn down. They also caramelize brilliantly. Apparently selected Virginias from Brazil and Africa, favoring the red more than the bright in my tasting, get combined with Burley from Malawi which tastes dark fired to me, then “lightly cased” with some fruitsauce and pressed under heat, making a solid plug. You can carry it in your pocket next to your penknife, lighter, and pipe cleaners. Shave off enough to fill a bowl and you have a very slow-burning, sweet and strong smoke that tastes a little like spicy molasses with some berry juice mixed in. The strong Burley balances the sweet Virginias for a full flavor with lots of depth and nuance, sort of like a Doom map with little niches of flavor popping up as you venture deeper into the maze.

The “cellar” (closet) bestows many miracles. It might be a modern oracle, since it delivers only what is needed when it is needed, often in the form of a jar or tin that was bought long ago when the online sales hit in September and filed away in case I needed it someday, sort of like this blasted USB cable which will join its four thousand brothers in the closet lest in future times unknown some outlet somewhere will be unable to charge a device, even if most of these mobile devices make me want to make them very mobile as in flying out the window. Often just opening the door a crack — one does not dare open it more, lest the conglomerated aggregate of forgotten stuff comes crashing out into the room, necessitating the unholy horror of Cleaning — stimulates a jar to come rolling out or the delightful music of a tin falling within reach of the greedy hand of a lone smoker. Today the closet delivered exactly what was needed, which will be further enjoyed once I find someplace to hide this USB cable.