I have a lot of opinions but not a lot of patience to write them all out. So, instead of making a new post for every review (like I have been doing), I’ll instead collect them all on this page and only add short little explanations if I feel like it. Here, then, are my thoughts on cigars, movies, books and booze.

Books

• Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
• Miracles by C.S. Lewis: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
• Moby Dick by Herman Melville: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
• The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
• The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
• The Sea Wolf by Jack London: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
• The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway: Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Booze

• Glenfiddich Single Malt Scotch Whiskey (80pr, 15y/o): Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
• Grant’s Blended Scotch Whiskey (80pr): Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
• Goslings Black Seal Rum (80pr): Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
• Redrum (70pr): Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
• The Singleton Single Malt Scotch Whiskey (80pr, 12y/o): Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Cigars

• 5 Vegas Classic: Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
• Bahia Blue: Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
• Bahia Trinidad: Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
• Free Cuba: Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
• Gran Habano 3 Siglos: Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
• Indian Tabac Cuban Corojo Arrow: [Rating 3.5]
• La Aurora Barrel Aged: Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
• Nica Libre 1990: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
• Oliva Serie ‘G’: Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
• Perdomo Reserve Oscuro: Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
• Puros Indios Viejo: Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
• Victor Sinclair: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Movies

• Dinner for Schmucks: Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
• The Atonement: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
• The Other Guys: Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

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The Perdomo Reserve Oscuro (the band reads La Tradicion, Perdomo Reserve, Cabinet Series) had a very easy draw. Probably the easiest draw of any cigar I have had to date, which is a nice thing in my book. I hate having to sit and puff on a cigar just to squeeze a bit of smoke out of it. Even though the draw was nice, it still felt like a fairly solid cigar. It was smaller than most, maybe a Robusto.

The wrapper was dark and oily. It had a fine taste before lighting with not a hint of bitterness, and I saw only a few veins in the leaf. Sadly, it was a very dry cigar, the kind you have to enjoy with a drink. After each puff I was compelled to take a sip just to wash the dry out. The taste was not bad, but it was bland—I couldn’t even distinguish any memorable taste. The burn was even at first but became rough about halfway through, necessitating some touching up.

A cheap smoke that started out promisingly and ended mediocre.

Classy Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

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The 3 Singlos is a handsome cigar with a cool band, but that’s where it’s outstanding qualities end. It isn’t a bad cigar, but it is simply mediocre.

It started out well enough with a nice white ash, a lovely weight and it felt like a well-built cigar. It was nice and sturdy, showing few veins in the leaf. The burn was even, requiring no touching up and the ash stuck around for well over an inch, burning nice and solid.

The flavor was a bit spicy for my linking. It didn’t taste bitter but it did taste “hot” which is an unpleasant sensation, in my view. A decent smoke for a good price, but nothing stellar.

Classy Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

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I’m a big fan of Lewis, but after reading The Abolition of Man, I think I have finally figured out his problem. Lewis always casts too wide a net. He is so knowledgeable, and has debated the issues with so many people of vastly differing opinions, that he tries to counter every argument, predict every objection, and wrap it all up by the end of each chapter. He enters the parking lot and circles every light post before exiting. When compared with the notes he must have had while writing, it probably made perfect sense, but for those of us who are deprived of his notes, never had the conversations he had nor heard the counter arguments he had, we get a bit lost.

His general gist was that Traditional Morality (which he calls the Tao) is a universal Law of reality that demands no proof, evidence or reason. He calls it one of those things that “just is”, like common sense, and it is such a firm-rooted law that every society on earth, regardless of its religion or culture, has recognized it (he then gives examples of cultures recognizing the Tao from ancient Egyptian to Christian, Babylonian to African, which is very handy).

He goes on to argue that no one can debunk the Tao because in order to have a defensible position against it, one must actually invoke it (for example, my argument is against the Tao and my argument is true, presupposing that Truth is good—a traditional moral found only in the Tao).

The Abolition of Man comes in when one tries to excise the Tao from humanity, because one finds that man can not be man without it—it is a defining characteristic of man, found in no animals, and nowhere else in the universe that we know. To become a race that rejects the Tao is to become something other than human.

I really respect Lewis’ argument and I think he is, of course, correct. I’m just sad that he packaged such a great message in a book that was originally written as a series of three lectures, read to an audience that was trained to read ancient Greek and Latin, and therefore he makes many presupposition about his audience’s reading, education and the things they take for granted. This produces a book that is hard for the layman to apprehend.

Anyways, it was good but reading a synopsis of the book would work for most people.

Classy Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

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I recently smoked the Bahia Blue and gave it a poor review on this site, so I came to the Trinidad, made by the same company, with low expectations. I was, however, surprised, and it ended up being a decent smoke.

The Trinidad had a tapered torpedo end, a style that isn’t my favorite, but for some reason the way this one was pulled off was actually quite nice. I think it might be that the tapered end was more blunt than regular torpedoes. The wrapper was light and smooth. I found no ugly veins in the wrapper, it was not bitter to the taste like many cigars and it had a nice, solid construction.

The ash was ok. It was a darker gray color instead of white. Due to its solid construction, the ash hung around for over an inch before finally falling off. The cigar burned fairly evenly, though it was slightly wavy, until the very end of the cigar when the burn collapsed—one half of the cigar burned faster than the other half. When I got to the band and tried to take it off, despite my careful handling of it, the band ripped the outer leaf—a bad sign. Not surprisingly, it began to unravel and the last inch of the cigar was a poor experience.

The draw was medium-easy, just what I like to see in a cigar. The taste was bland but nice, mild at the beginning, but it sadly turned spicy towards the middle, and became very harsh at the end.

A decent cigar for a fair price, but I have smoked better that cost the same.

Classy Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

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Christians are sometimes characterized as people who believe in an afterlife because they cant cope with the thought of there being no point to life and nothing to look forward to after death besides rotting in the ground. They are also sometimes characterized as deeply troubled people, who only do good on this earth because they fear that if they don’t they won’t see heaven. This characterization is often intended to make the Christian appear to be cowardly and fearful, reacting out of that fear in his
belief in Christ and an afterlife. One will often hear, if my experiences are any indication, an atheist tout with great pride his fearlessness, how the thought of death doesn’t phase him, and how he does good things of his own will without counting on rewards in the afterlife—a much superior motive for doing good.

The Christian’s motive is, I believe, mischaracterized. The atheist overlooks another possibility to the Christian’s beliefs and actions—namely, that the Christian just honestly believes that the gospel of Christ and his promise of an afterlife is true as naturally as he believes that gravity works. The evidence of Christ, like the evidence of gravity, is apparent to the Christian, so to believe any other way is simply impossible if he is to remain honest. Fear, therefore, plays no role in the Christian’s belief, but fear and respect for God comes into play after the Christian knows God and better understands why God is to be feared.

In fact, I think it is much easier to not believe. I can only use myself to exemplify this, but as a human I don’t believe my perceptions are that far off from most. Being a Christian is hard. I don’t mean hard in a “living in poverty with ringworms and being hungry every day” sort of way—don’t misunderstand me. We’re talking about what Christians and atheists whose day-to-day necessities are taken for granted, which is the state of most people in the developed world who have the luxury of thinking about whether to be Christian or atheist. So within that context, and presented with the daily troubles and frustrations of a first-world life, I sometimes envy the atheist because being a Christian is hard.

The reason it is hard is because it demands so much. It demands; 1) Faith in an invisible God whom I only know through a Book; 2) The sacrifice of my own will and desires to God so that I can desire what God desires; 3) Perfection. “Be perfect like my Father in heaven is perfect” said Jesus, and that is, obviously, an impossible request. So yeah, being a Christian is hard, and part of me envies the atheist whose only god is himself.

If I woke up every morning knowing that I had the freedom to indulge myself in any sort of thing I wanted without guilt (for as an atheist, the only guilt one would have is that which comes from breaking the atheist’s own personal morals or rules) I think I’d rather like it. Because even though I am a Christian, I am still a man—that frightful animal—and I have all the desires, passions and rebellion of a man. Being a Christian and denying my own desires while serving the will of God is not a natural state for me. I, like all humans, love rebellion. I want to fight against the Man, Machine, Authority and whatever else have you. I want to do my own thing, eat what I want, say what I want, believe what I want. Being a Christian does not suddenly grant me with the super-human power of being meek, submissive, humble and one who delights in daily trying to master my own thoughts. On the contrary, being a Christian and trying to be perfect (while failing daily) gives me a keener sense of how evil I really am, just like how a smoker doesn’t know how addicted he is until he tries to stop smoking. Being a Christian is hard because it is unnatural.

And yet, as I go on through life, presented with innumerable temptations and daily choices, choosing wrong at times, failing at times and every now and then, doing something partway right, I have discovered that I can’t help being a Christian because I just flat-out believe it. I have, somehow, even though I never sought to, already achieved number one in our previous list—Faith in an invisible God whom I only know through a Book. How did I get there? Was it the way I was raised? No. I was raised well, but I have few pleasant experiences with Christianity during my childhood. In fact, the Christians I knew at my church and school during childhood disgusted me. I have a natural aversion to “fakery” and this was all I saw as a child, aside from the Christians in my own family. The natural, expected path for me to have taken on becoming an adult was to rebel, blame Christianity and the Church for all the troubles of the world and become my own god, as so many who have been raised in Christian homes have done. I didn’t, however, and the only reason I can think of is that God wouldn’t let me.

This concept isn’t that strange. Like Paul, Lewis and countless Christians before me, I am compelled towards Christ often against my own will—dragged to Christ kicking and screaming, as Lewis once put it. My animal self does not want to be one. I have, by all appearances (and God will forgive me for being presumptuous) been elected in a very Romans 9 sort of way, against my own will, and compelled to chose Life. My soul clings to Christ while my body clings to the earth—being a Christian is bloitting hard.

So up till now, you probably have the impression that I think being an atheist, with myself as my own god, is a much better life. Ultimately, no, I don’t. Yes, if you live your life doing what you want to do then life is much easier; none of that bothersome repenting business. However, that doesn’t make it better. If God is not in the picture, then you are ultimately responsible for your own life. This isn’t as nice as it sounds. I’ll use an extreme form of sexual depravity as an example, so forgive me ahead of time, but I think it is the best way to push my point (and it is also something I think this culture is obsessed with. Sex has become, for some reason, the greatest desire and ultimate goal of humanity, as proven by the types of advertisements that best appeal to people of both sexes. I’m still trying to figure out why).

If, as a Christian, I do not go to the crazy sex orgy because I love God, I know it is wrong and I want to do his will (and supposing I am into that sort of thing) then I will be bummed and frustrated at missing it. Ultimately though, because my faith—my principles—have kept me from the crazy sex orgy, I will feel relieved and satisfied for sticking with them through my human animal desires. I would only find shame by indulging them. If, however, I am an atheist who likes that sort of thing, but I do not go to the crazy sex orgy because I wasn’t invited, I’m not attractive and no one wants me…. well then who have I to blame? My shame, then, would come by not being able to indulge. Being a virgin because you have a principled faith is far better than being a virgin because you just can’t get some.

Just because you now have the personal moral freedom to do something that you couldn’t if you were a Christian, doesn’t mean you’ll actually be able to, which will lead to frustration and depression if you have only yourself to blame. I just used the word “freedom”, but really, the things which we have been discussing (“sin”, I suppose) is really more like slavery than freedom. And here is where the real tragedy comes in—yes, as a Christian I am urged to sacrifice my own will and desires to Christ. The Bible often describes this as being a servant or slave to Christ. It makes no apology for this language. However, even if I am in a state of rebellion, am an atheist and embrace myself as my own god, I’m still a slave, only this time to my animal self. The man who has anger issues and can’t help but explode in a bout of anger, who can’t stop watching pornography, who can’t stop committing adultery, who can’t stop eating, drinking, and smoking whatever he wants—on and on. Is the atheist who indulges his own passions less of a slave than the Christian who sacrifices those passions to God? No matter who we are or what we believe, we are all slaves to something. There is always something we wish we didn’t desire. Have you ever been in love with someone and wish that you weren’t? Have you ever wished that you didn’t like chocolate so much? Or that you didn’t envy your sister, co-worker or whatever?

As much as we want to, we can’t control our lives. We may pretend to be our own god, but we never can be.

This is why I think being a Christian is best. From the very beginning, Christians know that they are flawed and imperfect, who don’t have ultimate control or freedom over their own lives. They don’t have to (but often do) discover this the hard way, through experience. Yes, the Christian life is harder, in some ways, than the atheist life, for the satisfaction of our desires is often out of sight, but it is a better life.

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This slightly rectangular shaped cigar is great to hold in hand and mouth. The novelty of its box-pressed shape is nice, and the wrapper is silky too. It has a dark, oily look and a somewhat leathery feel.

It has a medium draw that seemed to get a bit slower as I smoked it. Towards the beginning it smoked very smoothly, but towards the end I had to keep relighting it and puffing it a few times to get it going again.

The burn is fantastic. It is slightly wavy but the ash burns straight and very white. The ash hangs around for about an inch before falling, and it gives no warning like leaning before falling, which can be precarious.

The taste and smell is faint, but you can really sense a sort of… “farm” thing going on. Like wet hay and animals. It isn’t bad. It sounds bad, I know, but it was somewhat pleasant, actually. It wasn’t very strong and I only got this sensation in whiffs.

It’s nice and cheap, and for the price I would judge it to be spectacular—a nice every day cigar.

Classy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

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