I have never smoked a straight cigarette in my life. (And I gave up smoking anything more interesting eighteen months ago.)

As I've made clear on this blog, sometimes quite pompously, I hate strangers smoking anywhere near my face . In thoery, I'm an anti-smoking militant.

Yet, if a woman friend is smoking it's an entirely different matter. Then, cigarette smoke feels full of promise and lacks all tar.

I don't think I have ever gone out with a woman who didn't smoke. Smoke getting in my eyes has been part of the deal. And even if a venereal relationship is totally off the agenda, inapproriate even, it still feels illicit and erotic to have a bit of smoke wafting up my nasal paasages and into my lungs.

Yes, I'm am really screwed up.