Smoke Breaks @ Work

[Shadykaricta]

This is a good topic! I do not take smoke breaks and would not because I also wouldn't find it relaxing, but for different reasons.

1)My job and position is semi white collar and one of the companies initiatives is "healthy living." They can't make you stop doing things like smoking but they can do little things like withhold a small bit of your pay (Like 50 a month) as an incentive to quit smoking.

2) Due to my position and the kind of people I work with, me taking even 45 mins (even if it was on my lunch break) to smoke one would eventually get back to my managers and interpreted as me not working hard enough.

3) There is definitely a bias against smokers in my company. Cigarette smokers get watched to see how many times they step out and as I said above I know the 30 -45 mins taken to polish off a cigar would bring a negative stigma.

That being said there are two people I know at my job that do take a cigar break on their lunch times. One works in a different capacity ( A bit more blue collar of a position) and has been at that facility for at least 40 years. The other is at a much higher level and has also been on site for a bit. Also to note the later individual does receive criticism for his cigars due to the lingering odor.

(Please note that I do not look down on any line of work be it White or Blue or no collar. I was raised in an environment which has lead me to fully understand that at the end of the day for various reasons called life, you got to get that money however you can. What you do to get it is something you got to live with and answer for.)

[ggiese]

I side a bit with shady on this... If I were to "escape" to smoke a cigar, it's almost guaranteed that I would be "talked" to. I think my boss would be very tolerant, of course, but certainly I'm not accomplishing anything while I'm out smoking a stogie. Besides - I'd be the lone wolf with all of the cigarette smokers. It really is not the same as being with a group of cigar smokers.

To Will's point - I usually have so many things going on at one time that I could not take my mind off enough to enjoy a cigar at work. I just don't picture that smoking a cigar at work would work in a way that would bring me the relaxation I enjoy.

My wife and I were discussing this, though. She has quite a few co-workers that "enjoy" the extra smoke breaks during the day while she's left to pick up their slack while they're gone. She's often commented that she wants to take up cigarette smoking if for no other reason that to have a few extra breaks in her work day to escape the extra work the cigarette smokers pile on her while they're out. Though - she really does not like hanging with the crowd that normally goes out to smoke...

My old boss tells a story of picking up cigarette smoking only because he realized shortly into his Army career that if you smoked cigarettes you did not have to always stand formation. He found it much more pleasurable to smoke a cigarette than stand around at parade rest. ...though he did comment that it sucked when he was in the back of a covered truck, loaded with the wonderful smells of cigarette smoke on top of body odor and diesel fuel.

Does that answer your question?