Practical joke on a cigar aficionado wannabe at work.

[tksamtec]

I am thinking about playing a joke on a guy at work who thinks he has a special pallet when it comes to cigars.  The guy even goes as far as to claim that he is a "supertaster."  He smokes mostly junk, and I mean some dog rockets of the worst kind, and claims that he loves them... so much that he stockpiled about 500, $2 dollar cigars in the event that the economy collapses, in the hopes that he could trade his junky cigars for gasoline down the road.  The guy spends hours taking notes and writing in a jornal about his crappy cigars, like he is ready to join the halfwheel crew.  I read his notes and its tough for me to hold back the laughter....he tastes raisins, nutmeg, cashews, and all kinds of stuff that I don't taste.  He always gives me a rating out of 5 stars, and he gives most of his sticks a 4 or 4.5 out of 5.  I asked him what a 5 is, and he can't aswer that, mainly becasue he has never smoked a 5.  He probably never will either.... especially when his price point is about $4 max.

Anyways, he gives me a stick every now and then, and I smoke them, like I do with all gifted cigars (smoking all gifted cigars is just good cigar ettiquette), and I grin and bear it with all of the sticks he gives me, and I rarely say much back about them, except for a thanks for the stick.  To me, most of the stuff he tends to smoke and enjoy tastes like a cowboys saddle would taste if you licked it after a 1000 mile ride through the desert on  a sweaty assed horse.  Basically, most of his sticks taste the same to me...like dirty leather (not even a rich clean leather) and ash, but predominantly ash.

I have given him good cigars, a 3yo Cohiba Secretos, a 5yo Upmann Majestic, a RA SCC, and a RASS, all of which are smokign great and typical flavors developed.... and he finds nothing good in any of those cigars, and looks at me like I have 3 eyeballs when I ask him about the "cuban twang".  He tells me all of the sticks I give him are either bum sticks or taste like ash to him.  He just bashed a 5yo Dominican Cohiba Red Dot last week, that tasted wonderful to me, and even had a slight cuban twang.  I think the guy is a complete whack job, and I am tired of giving him high end sticks that he feels the need to pan and send back his corny notes and reviews about.  I could stop giving him smokes, and put an end to teh madness easily, but thats not how I roll.... I want to end this with a bang.  lol

So, here is my plan.... he typically smokes Robusto sized smokes and he smokes alot of stuff from the Gran Habano line (George Rico), like the Vintage 2002, 3SLS, Corojo #5, etc.  I have sampled all of these, and honestly, the only one I liked (and I did actually enjoy it), was the 3SLS.  This stick used to be called 3 Siglos, but they had to change the name due to trademark infringement or something like that.  I need to find a couple Churchill, Torpedo, Double Corona or any sized sticks other than a Robusto in any of these GH lines.  My end goal is for him to review something that he has smoked before, that has now been unbanded so he cannot easily distinguish a label.... I want to put his true supertaster title to teh test, and have him send me the review to compare to prior tasting notes from the Robusto sized version(s).  My personal feeling is that his new review will be nothing at all like the ones he has been smoking for months.

Before I go hunting for some of the dog rockets this guy typically smokes, does anyone have any better ideas on how to prove to this guy that he is not the cigar aficionado he claims to be and make an attempt at shutting him up and putting an end to the ridiculous reviews he sends ?  I encounter weird people everyday in my line of work (engineering), but I swear this guy parachutes into the office daily....

Thanks for any guidance on how to make this test run any smoother.


:cheers:

[cbradwhitfield]

I have a few different lines & sizes of GH. Shoot me your address & I'll throw some your way.

[Fitze55]

[quote author=tksamtec link=topic=13394.msg68692#msg68692 date=1333040907]
He smokes mostly junk, and I mean some dog rockets of the worst kind, and claims that he loves them... so much that he stockpiled about 500, $2 dollar cigars in the event that the economy collapses, in the hopes that he could trade his junky cigars for gasoline down the road. 
[/quote]

Todd -

Very interesting. What, is he a "prepper" or something. I'll be on the lookout for his appearance on that new show Doomsday Preppers. Wonder how he would be rated, LOL?

[tksamtec]

[quote author=Fitze55 link=topic=13394.msg68698#msg68698 date=1333042383]
Todd -

Very interesting. What, is he a "prepper" or something. I'll be on the lookout for his appearance on that new show Doomsday Preppers. Wonder how he would be rated, LOL?
[/quote]

Oh yeah, he is a prepper alright... not only does he expect to trade cigars for gas, but he cashed in his entire 401k and turned alot of it into a few gold coins.  After paying the early wd penalties, and trading his cash for gold at over 1800 an oz, he didn't really end up with much.  The guy is constant comedy to me, but his reviews of some pretty good sticks that I have given him, really rubbed me the wrong way lately...

He would fit right in on the Doomsday Preppers show....

[tksamtec]

He told me last week, that he has yet to smoke a good CC... so I think I am going to slap a Montecristo band on one of his all time favorite rockets, and let him smoke it and ask for a full report afterwards.  He has told me countless times that the band on a cigar has no influence on his opinion of the smoke... so we shall see how finely tuned in his tastebuds are !

Thanks to cbradwhitfield for helping me out with the smokes I will need to pull this off.

[kingcohiba]

my neighbor is the same way....I've just given up on him.I saw this guy put down a jl2 from a great smoking box and tell me that it tasted like shit.....after smoking it for like 2-3 minutes. I just don't stock the kinda cigars he smokes so he typically smokes Marlboro lights now! I refuse to waste a good cigar on someone  who I know won't appreciate it.

[Brlesq]

[quote author=kingcohiba link=topic=13394.msg68706#msg68706 date=1333048382]
my neighbor is the same way....I've just given up on him.I saw this guy put down a jl2 from a great smoking box and tell me that it tasted like shit.....after smoking it for like 2-3 minutes. I just don't stock the kinda cigars he smokes so he typically smokes Marlboro lights now! I refuse to waste a good cigar on someone  who I know won't appreciate it.
[/quote]

I keep a separate humidor full of dog rockets for those kind of neighbors and friends.  They think they're getting treated like royalty when I tell them to "pick out anything".  Meanwhile I go grab a good cigar and come back out with the band removed so they think I'm smoking from the barf box with them.

I'm interested in hearing the outcome, Todd.  We all know at least one jerk like that! 

[GS-8]

[quote author=kingcohiba link=topic=13394.msg68706#msg68706 date=1333048382]
my neighbor is the same way....I've just given up on him.I saw this guy put down a jl2 from a great smoking box and tell me that it tasted like shit.....after smoking it for like 2-3 minutes. I just don't stock the kinda cigars he smokes so he typically smokes Marlboro lights now! I refuse to waste a good cigar on someone  who I know won't appreciate it.
[/quote]
Sounds like your neighbor is my neighbor. I get a kick outta guys like this. It is annoying though.

[SrsMiscer]

Try to make him puke. Get him something super strong  :bigup:

[tksamtec]

A little update.

First off, a big thanks goes out to cbradwhitfield for sending me some options to prank the guy.  So, things are prograssing and thanks to Brad for helping me out with the sticks I didn't have.

In the past week, I have given him 2 more cigars to try:

-Ave Maria Robusto (AJ Fernandez) - he smoked it, but hated it, and told me that it got so bitter at the end it lost all enjoyability
-Cohiba Red Dot Robusto (Dominican from 2010) - Pitched it before the first 1/3 was done, said it was horrible, bitter and ashy, and he had to spit after every puff  (I smoked one the day before and although it was not a CC, it had a bit of a CC twang to it, and it was an enjoyable smoke)
-La Aurora Preferidos (from 2010) - smoked about half and tosseed it, said it was unsmokeable.

I would love to give him something that would make him puke, but I know he wouldn't smoke it.  Honestly, I can't even stand to talk to this guy anymore unless its work related, and I think he is a total space cadet.  As time goes on, I am becoming convinced that he truly loves the cheap cigars he bought, solely because they were cheap and are paid for... plus, him having 500 of them and knowing that they are worthelss to anyone but himself, means he has to smoke them at some point, so he has totally convinved himself that they are good smokes.

Never in this lifetime will I meet another guy who is weirder....

More to come as the prank unfolds too.