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Iranian Crown Jewels Are Comprised of World's Greatest Treasures One of the worlds largest and most valuable jewel collections, the Imperial Crown Jewels of Persia, or Crown Jewels of Iran, consists of a mind-boggling number of treasures On display at the Museum of The Treasury of National Iranian Jewels in Tehran, Iran, the collection ranges from breathtaking tiaras to jewel-studded swords to princely thrones, and much more Stogies and Slots: How to Plan a Cigar-Friendly Gambling Vacation For many of us, casino gambling and cigar smoking go together like Frank and Bing Generations of first-time Vegas visitors have enhanced their experience via frequent applications of cigar smoke, just like those iconic Rat Packers of yesteryear with their impeccable suits, suave manner, and constantly-replenished supplies of alcohol and tobacco The Politics of Cigars: Don't Box Me In! Cigars have long been a part of the iconography of American politics On the negative side, early-twentieth-century newspaper cartoons symbolized the greed of villainous "party bosses" and robber barons by showing fat men lighting their stogies with one-hundred dollar bills What to Do With a Misbehaving Cigar The best-laid plans of mice and men Even the most careful cigar smoker - the one who only buys premium cigars, keeps them stored in a humidor at around seventy percent relative humidity, and lights them slowly and carefully, turning the cigar in the open flame to achieve an all-over even burn - sometimes winds up with a dud The Proper Care and Feeding of Cigars Picture this: You're going to have dinner at the home of a famous wine collector - somebody famous for the quality and discrimination of his or her palate, perhaps a wealthy person who can afford to buy those vintages the rest of us can only dream of savoring You arrive Mixing it Up: Food and Drinks That Go Well With Cigars Premium cigars are many peoples' idea of the ultimate inexpensive luxury item So with more and more Americans putting more thought into their meals - as the proliferation of magazines such as Food and Wine, Cook's Illustrated and Food, as well as the new popularity of cooking shows and books attests - it's natural enough to wonder how these two pleasures might combine A Rich Variety: How to Choose Your First Premium Cigar The rebounding of the premium-cigar market is one of the oddest business success stories of the past fifteen years With an aging customer base, decades of competition from cigarettes and overall consumer trends indicating a decline in smoking in general, many observers had written off premium cigars as yesterday's luxury item—until 1992, when the industry showed significant fourth-quarter growth The Science of Smoking: How Taste Works For most smokers, the science of taste is like the innards of your cigar lighter - you don't care how it works as long as it does Still, it is - along with smell - the critical sense that allows you to enjoy the sensation of smoking, and learning more about how taste works may enable you to get more from your cigars Have a Small Cigar: Some Anthems For Cigar Smokers igars are part of the world of music - or vice versa After all, a lot of great pop and jazz music has been created by people who cut their teeth playing in ultra-smoky bars, and Cuban folk music features an entire tradition of songs about cigars A Smoke at Sea: Cruise Ships Offer Smoking Vacations For Cigar Fans A few years ago, in 2006, the Nevada legislature imposed a public smoking ban The new rule doesn't apply - as yet - to the storied casinos of Las Vegas, where smoking is still allowed on gaming floors Cigar Festivals Make Your Calendar Go Up in Smoke Cigar smoking is the most social of pleasures And with bans on public smoking enacted in almost thirty states, covering half the United States population, cigar smokers must be feeling more and more like an embattled minority Cigar Destinations: Festivals That Cater to Dedicated Smokers Cigar smoking is all about shared pleasure After all, it swept Victorian England and became a national pastime in part because it gave men something to do with their hands while they talked after dinner Around the World in Three Tobaccos Many of us live, and think, as if "nature" and "culture" were separate things, kept apart by a porous but clear boundary In fact, it’s usually hard to tell where one ends and the other begins Cigar History Destinations: Florida Cigars have been with us for thousands of years - far too long for any historian, however dedicated, to trace Tobacco may have grown on this planet (according to current speculation by paleontologists) for as long as eight thousand years, and archaeological data suggests it's been smoked for at least four thousand Cigar-Loving Cities in a Smoke-Banning World However others may feel about them, there's no doubt that public-smoking bans, and other restrictions on tobacco use, leave cigar aficionados burning up Anyone who reads cigar magazines, for example, will know that - however politically unpredictable they may be in other areas - this is one legislative trend all those magazines' writers seem to agree on Plays and Movies For Cigar Lovers Since so many artists, writers, and other creative folks have been cigar smokers, it’s perhaps no surprise that some wonderful—as well as not-so-wonderful—films and plays center on the world of cigars Some of these works are already well-known, while others might require a little help reaching their audiences Writers (And Their Books!) For Cigar Lovers In his essay "Sifting the Ashes," the writer Jonathan Franzen has the following to say about the smoking habit he struggles to quit: "[W]hen you're smoking, you're acutely present to yourself: you step outside the unconscious forward rush of life" Beautiful words, with which many cigar smokers would agree A Cigar Sampler Party: A Great Party Idea For those who do a lot of entertaining, it’s hard to come up with new party themes But the recent popularity of cigars offers a great creative party idea for stressed-out would-be party hosts Celebrate With Cigars It’s no surprise that we tend to give cigars as gift items at weddings, bachelor parties, bachelorette parties, and new births, or that cigars remain popular gift item ideas for new dads, new moms, new brides and grooms, and newly engaged couples After all, cigars have been associated with celebration and ceremony, with marking the moment, for as long as they’ve existed Cigar-Loving Heroes of Television It's tough being a TV character Whether you're a crime-solving supersleuth or a wacky next door neighbor, the pressures are intense—villains that refuse to be caught, friends who don't share your enthusiasm for celebrating Festivus Four Famous Fictional Cigar Smokers Cigar smoking enjoyed an abrupt, and steep, spike in popularity during the 1990s, after years of decline Cigar bars and shops sprang up even in midsize towns and cities, while profits experienced heady growth Cigars 2.0: Facebook for the Cigar Lover In a few short years, http://Facebookcom has become a popular social-networking web site What Drinks Go Best With Cigars The signs are everywhere: more and more Americans are interested again in the idea of using their homes to entertain friends and associates An Amazon search for books on "entertaining" calls up over 468,000 hits, while—if you search "party ideas" on Google—you get nineteen million How to Plan a Smokin' Vacation The 1990s were the best of times—and the worst of times—for the premium cigar industry On the one hand, the previously near-moribund pastime suddenly experienced huge growth in profits, garnered new publicity, and racked up all sorts of hipness points as a stressed-out workforce turned to cigars for that little touch of luxury that makes a day complete How to Plan a Smoke-Friendly Trip From one perspective, the dramatic rebound of premium cigars couldn’t have come at a better time After decades of competition from cigarettes, the gradual deterioration (through age) of its customer base, and decreased consumer interest in tobacco products generally, the sudden early-nineteen-nineties resurgence of interest in premium cigars was instrumental in keeping the industry alive How to Smoke on the Road: Finding a Smoker-Friendly Airport In the past fifteen years, the premium-cigar industry found itself in rebound After decades of competition from cigarettes, the aging of its customer base, and overall consumer trends indicating a decline in smoking in general (we'll return to this in a moment), many observers figured cigars were done for Cigar Bars to the Rescue When, in the early 1990s, the premium cigar industry rebounded after years of stale sales figures and slackening consumer interest, it faced a new social climate More and more municipalities and states had passed anti-smoking legislation throughout the eighties, and this trend only continued through the 1990s and beyond Novelists and Cigars: A Long-Running Romance Like coffee, alcohol and other, somewhat more illicit pleasures, cigars have a longtime fascination for certain kinds of creative folks Perhaps this is especially true of novelists, whose work compels them to sit staring at a page for hours a day, typing, looking for any small pleasure to momentarily enliven their bored senses What to Serve With Cigars The signs are everywhere: America is, increasingly, a taste-conscious country After decades of fast food, people are talking about the “slow-food” movement Ways to Prevent and Eliminate Cigar Breath Newton’s third law puts it this way: For every action there's an equal and opposite reaction But the old '70s soul song says it all much more colorfully: You always have to pay for the fun you've had Alpine Skiing: A Sport for the Bold Downhill skiing requires a combination of athleticism, leisure, privilege, and the devil-may-care attitude that allows participants to enjoy the thrill of, essentially, falling down a steep snow-covered mountain, over and over again It's not a sport for the faint at heart Camping: A Necessity and a Luxury Camping—it's a brute necessity, and one of the most refined and civilized of pleasures Our remote ancestors would never have survived and evolved without the ability to build strong and protective shelters in the wild—the wiliness and courage to gather or track down their food—and, perhaps most of all, the resourcefulness to entertain themselves and each other in the infinitely long evenings before civilization Humidors to the Rescue: A Necessity For Every Cigar Smoker Perhaps the movies are to blame All those scenes where the powerful businessman or politician says to the ingenuous hero, "May I offer you a cigar," then—without missing a beat—brandishes a gold-embossed cigar case It's a Cigar World After All Though the first country many of us think of when it comes to great cigars is, of course, Cuba, the fact is that great tobacco, skilled rollers and serious craftsmanship can be found all over the world So here, whether you're a newer smoker ready to move on from the few you've tried or a cigar aficionado, who'd like to change it up a little, is a guide to the some of the best cigars in several cigar-producing regions, both well-known and lesser-known Cigars From Everywhere: A Look at the Best Cigars From Two Nations The best cigars in the world, if you're just looking at rankings, tend to come from only a few countries, most of them Latin American: Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and those banned-in-America Cuban cigars that everyone talks about However, excellent tobacco is grown all over the world—some regions that you might not immediately think of include Connecticut, the American South, and the Middle East, home of a delicious sweet-smelling tobacco that makes those country's open-air markets such a joy for those who love to smoke Where Do All the Cigar Aficionados and Tobacco Smokers Live? For the cigar industry, the past fifteen years has been the best of times—and the worst of times On the one hand, the 1990s saw the renaissance of cigar smoking in the United States after decades in which competition from cigars, an aging customer base of cigar aficionados, and lack of interest in cigars among younger smokers all took their toll on the industry The Wide World of Cigars To look at the rankings, the world's best cigars seem to come from only a few countries: Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and (unfortunately for Americans, who can't buy the country's products) Cuba But excellence actually comes from all over the world—and in fact, some of the tobacco that makes many of the most highly-ranked cigars comes from places you might not immediately think of: Mexico, Brazil, the Middle East, Connecticut, and the American South The Stogie Diaspora: How Revolution and Embargo Created Today's Cigar Industry Among cigar smokers, it is always just "the embargo" After all, though governments declare trade and other kinds of embargoes for various reasons all the time, no other such order has so affected the lives of those who smoke cigars as has the United States' trade embargo against Cuba, created by executive order by John F Nicaragua: The Tobacco-Producing Country That Endures To cigar smokers, Nicaragua is already legendary Through regime change, social upheaval, and revolution, this Latin American nation has produced some of the world's finest tobacco Sport Shooting: We Owe it All to the Civil War We all know about the important role that guns play in American recreation Consider such facts as the profusion of hunting magazines available on any newsstand; the huge number of duck blinds that can be seen in any woods; the fact that every town and hamlet has its driving range; the size and power of the NRA (National Rifle Association); or the wide availability of gun-safety classes to American youth V-Cutter, Cigar Guillotine Or What? A Cigar Smoker's Weapon of Choice The Boy Scout motto says it best: "Be prepared" Many first-time smokers don't even realize that good cigars (and even bad ones) have to be cut open before they're smoked What Do You Get the Cigar Smoker Who Has Everything? Cigar lovers—by reputation—tend not to be the kind of people it's hard to buy gifts for After all, cigar smoking is an activity commonly associated with class, a sense of affluence, an interest in the finer things in life Yachting: A Sport for the Leisured Boating is perhaps the most romantic of all sports, with its aura of long days on deck, of old sea salts' talk, of rope-related knowhow and words like "keelhaul" and "stern," its echoes of Melville and Popeye and of Robert Shaw's character in the movie Jaws ("I'll get the shark fer yeh, Chiefie Famous Modern Male Icons Who Enjoy Cigars After years of decline, cigar smoking abruptly returned to popularity in America in the 1990s, with cigar bars and shops springing up even in smaller towns and cities Some of America's great male icons of sports and entertainment were quick to pick up the habit, while others had been closet cigar smokers for years Cigars and Music: A Natural Combination Perhaps it's because there's a close cultural connection between great music and smoky bars Anyone who knows anything about jazz knows that its truly legendary improvisers—Coltrane, Bird, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie—cut their teeth playing in bars so smoky that it's a good thing everybody was too busy improvising to need sheet music Cigars in Brazil: An Uncertain Future? Those who know their cigars well also, by that same token, know Brazil—albeit as a source of great tobacco rather than as a top cigar-producing nation Brazilian tobacco, mainly produced in the country's temperate northeastern and southern regions, turns up in such world-class cigars as Carlos Torano's Toro, but the country's cigar producers themselves haven't always gotten the same respect Honduras: The Home of Tobacco Those who love cigars know that Honduras is one of the world's best places to make them After all, this Latin American country has been a prime tobacco-growing location for centuries, and its cigar industry boomed again after 1959, when many longtime Cuban cigar makers fled the Castro regime for neighboring countries—including this one Hunting and Survival: Some Tips For Beginners Hunting is as old as humanity—older, in fact—and as new as the latest high-tech gear they're selling at your local sporting goods store Fossil evidence indicates that early humans were hunting with spears as long as 16,200 years ago, and scientists estimate that we've been eating meat much longer than that—for nearly two million years, a span of time that long predates the emergence of homo sapiens History And Popularity Of Cigars Who smoked the first cigar We'll never know, of course, but archeological finds suggest an early date indeed Tips For Novices On How To Smoke Cigars Many novice smokers have embarrassed themselves trying to smoke a cigar with the same frantic, huff-and-puff energy that goes into cigarette smoking But cigars aren't cigarettes, any more than cheap beer is fine wine, and just as you'd never guzzle a fine Cabernet Sauvignon, you shouldn't just inhale a cigar The ABCs Of Cigar Humidors Casual cigar owners often ask themselves: is a humidor really necessary The answer is: only if you care about the quality and taste of your cigars The History (And Value) Of Cigar Bands For many cigar smokers, the small paper band encircling their stogy is just a piece of trash, to be discarded along with the shrinkwrap around the box But for others that cigar band is a bit of history - a collectible that adds immeasurably to the romance and mystique of smoking How Do Cigars Get Rated? The cigar ratings supplied by publications like Cigar Magazine and Cigar Aficionado form an important part of the modern cigar industry For cigar smokers, these ratings provide guidance in a crowded market The Cigar Boom: What It Was (And Is) As the 1990s dawned, few industries seemed deader than cigar sales and manufacture From its height in the 1850s - when Cuba alone exported 356

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