The latest blog to hit the Let's Talk Cigars blog portal is from Cigar Tailor. You'll find his blog at http://letstalkcigars.com/cigartailor/ and you should start seeing posts from him show in the aggregate feed on the front page of Let's Talk Cigars website.

Remember, if you'd like to get your very own cigar oriented blog, please send a note to admin at lets talk cigars dot com (deleting the white space and replacing the words at and dot with their symbols).

This short, just under 3 minute, documentary from Bert Shapiro of Pheasant's Eye Productions, has won numerous awards for this fun piece. Awards from the likes of Zoie, Rochetster, NYExpo and Algonquin film festivals honored this festive piece that shows the handiwork of "Tabaqueros" working in a storefront in New York City as they whip out hand rolled cigars set to a festive beat.

In the SubText contact page and have been able to use it to send out massive quantities of spam impersonating users that don't exist in this domain.

If you are here because you received such a missive, please accept our apologies. We have removed this feature from the site and have contacted the software manufacturer to get this issue corrected.

If you are regular visitor to this site, please understand that we've had to take this feature offline for the time being.

Well, day one of 2006 RTDA show went well. The flight out (Chad, Ron and I flew out on 4CD) went quite well despite the reduced visibility due to not only moisture in the air but a high amount of smoke in the air from the big brush fire burning north and west of Palm Springs.

More about this can be found here: http://letstalkcigars.com/mjg/archive/2006/07/17/RTDA_Show_2006__Day_1.aspx

The Washington Post reported on May 18, 2006, that 40 states are looking to limit the 'little cigar' marketing effort. States lobbying the Trade Department's Alcohol and Tobacco Trade and Tax bureau to make this change include Maryland and Iowa.

States are claiming that they are nothing more than cigarettes in a brown wrapper and are an attempt to not only evade taxes but also to attract younger smokers with their lower cost and propensity to be flavored.

The feds say the agency intends to rewrite the rules to draw a "bright line" between cigarettes and little cigars but his is not coming anytime soon. Cigar industry groups are also looking for clarification so that they not get smeared by the "tar" of association with those attempting to bypass cigarette laws and taxes.

Norman F. Sharp, president of the Cigar Association of America,  is quoted as saying "Little cigars are not cigarettes and, over the long term, they have never been substitutable for cigarettes," he told New Jersey legislators at a hearing this month. "They represent the cigar industry's attempt to give satisfaction to cigar smokers, not an attempt to attract cigarette smokers."

or at least into a cigar box cigar. The guys over at Make magazine have a number of articles about creating a Cigar Box Guitar. 

• Here's a link to a recent 3 string guitar project: [http://makezine.com/04/cigarbox/]
• Here's a link to a photo of the finished project: [photo link]
• Here's a link to a Google search against all such projects on the Make website: [too long to print but link works]