Some days aren’t about escaping life. They’re about reconnecting with it. The Monday after the Fourth of July weekend felt exactly like that. The celebrations were over. The fireworks had faded into memory, and the crowds had returned to work. I needed something quieter. Something that belonged only to me. …

As you’ve no doubt read, there’s been a terrible earthquake in Venezuela and American do-gooders are out in force trying to help these people. Believe me, I respect these well-meaning people, but I know from experience that most of the effort and expense they go through is of little or …

At 94 degrees in South Florida, most people would call sitting outside a bad idea. I called it therapy. The afternoon sun was blazing, the kind of heat that makes the pavement shimmer and palm fronds move in slow motion. But my backyard had transformed into something else entirely—a private tropical retreat. …

Well, it’s July 4th and I’m out here smoking a cigar that I may have actually made myself! It’s a 5.5 inch Por Larranaga with a 38 ring and I guess they were made right around the Winter of 2000 or 2001. I was at the Altadis factory in La …

Friday nights have always been my favorite kind of reset. The work week is behind me, the chores are done, and for a few precious hours there is nowhere to be, nothing to fix, and nobody demanding my attention. This particular Friday evening was shaping up to be one of …

I think Television is no longer the right word to describe what we watch each night.  Me and LaVonda have been watching a show called The Good Wife. Every night we spend about ten minutes trying to find the damned thing because we can’t remember what service we were watching …

Thursday afternoons have always carried a different pace. The work is mostly done, the weekend is close enough to see on the horizon, and life seems to slow down just enough to appreciate the little things. On this particular late afternoon, I loaded up Saber, my faithful Belgian Malinois, into …

I’m sure everyone was spellbound watching the Spurs vs Knicks Finals. I couldn’t believe how four of the five games were an amazing repeat come behind win for the Knicks. What was even more amazing was that in game four when they were behind by 27 or 29 points in …

There are some cigars that fit a moment so perfectly that you almost wonder if they were blended specifically for it. The Crux Bull & Bear Toro became exactly that cigar for me on a quiet weekday morning in my cigar lounge—which also happens to be my office. The trading day was …

Well, I thought I was finished writing about GANGSTAS for a while, but one story seems to beget another. Since I finished off the GANGSTA piece last week writing about how we sent cigars to a boat in international waters, and to various prisons all over the USA, it reminded …