Sweets healthier than drinking, smoking
by Bryan Bland, reporter

    Am I the only one to notice just how little sense drinking and smoking makes? Everywhere I go nowadays, I see people smoking. In rain, ice and sleet they will still be outside puffing, albeit in fewer numbers.

   I can’t get to the dentist’s office without passing at least three billboards advertising liquor stores. I would be hard-pressed to name 10 people who don’t drink.

   I look at this, and I can’t help but wonder something. Why? Why is there pressure to drink and smoke? What is the point of drinking and smoking? Outside of peer pressure, what reason is there to ever drink and smoke? If alcohol tasted good and if cigarettes had a spring-fresh aroma that freshened your breath, maybe I could understand.

   The problem is, alcohol tastes something like I might expect gasoline to, and cigarette smoke ranks somewhere just below burning industrial waste in odor, and certainly does nothing to improve the breath.

   This tells me that alcohol and cigarettes are acquired tastes. Now that makes no sense at all. Why should you have to acquire a taste for something that’s not good for you?

   Cake isn’t necessarily good for you, but you don’t have to cough up your lungs a few times until you get used to it. Cake, as far as I know, has never been linked to multiple types of cancer.

   If you can’t handle candy, you gain a few pounds. With alcohol you may wake up the next morning with a hangover, a dark gap in your memory of the previous night and possibly an unwelcome bed buddy.

   I’ve never heard of an auto wreck caused by a driver with a sugar buzz or heard of a husband becoming abusive after getting hooked on pastries.

   If you overdo it on sweets for long enough, you might become diabetic.

   However, as long as you brush your teeth regularly, your teeth won’t be dyed yellow, your lungs will never be blackened and your liver won’t give up on you.

   I may never understand drinking and smoking, but so be it.

   Let them eat cake; that’s what I’ll probably do.