Stinking Weed

From Plastic Tub

Stinking Weed (n. sometimes y.) 1. That which is now known as tobacco. 2. Any of a number of Pooban deceptions. 3. A known sacrament for the consistently nervous. 4. Eleventh sign on the O'Donnely Zodiac Placemats. 5. Closest living relative to the common ancestor of the caffienoids; syn. - sot, cut, leaf, poke.

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Usage

"Damn that stinking weed... It was the death of my poor Dewey." -- Katherine Rose, crying, broken down by the defense, and destroying her own case during her lawsuit against the AA.

"My liver for a smoke!" Promethius quivered. "Ye've none left," reeled the organ-grinder. "I'll take those lungs instead." -- "Rynd Dies". NY Times Obits.

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Extrapolation

"Did we invent the stinking weed, or did the stinking weed invent us?" -- Thomas Paine, Letters to Franklin. 1777.

"Ah, but the sot doth impregnate a fertile mind like vapor, & enable a feeble body like so many French negresses." -- Benjamin Franklin, Letters to Paine. 1778.

The stinking weed is indigenous to the New World. During Columbus’ first New World Voyage, Rodrigo de Jerez, a sailor on the Santa Maria, became the first European smoker; he carried the habit back to Spain and was summarily arrested by the Holy Inquisition after frightening a priest by breathing fire.

After this initial scare, the Europeans went ape-shit for the stuff. It quickly escalated in cost, until, pound-for-pound, it was worth much more than gold. Lust for sot and native pootang drove men to the New World, fueling colonization and the development of slavery.

"Pocahontas rubb'd my backe slick with the grease of a beare. Fetchng the dry leaf, she lean'd ov'r to light my pipe." -- Diary of John Rolfe. Jamestown Settlement, Virginia. 1614.

Several centuries rolled by. The fortunes of kingdoms waned and ebbed. Shakespeare died, but England was sitting pretty, raking in Kapital from the Tobacco Import and Export Taxes. The Founding Fathers, egged on by Guvernor Morris, revolted, declaring, "No taxation without representation." A new era dawned...

The O'Donnely Zodiac Placemats