Smoking Smarties?

I saw this story about "Smoking Smarties" on the local evening news tonight. Come to find out, the issue has actually been around for quite a while now.



Apparently, kids are crushing up candy Smarties then inhaling the power and blowing out the residue to mimic smoking a cigarette. Parents and doctors are concerned that this act will lead to smoking habits later on and also, the residue inhaled can supposedly be harmful to the throat and lungs (not sure about that one).

Anyway, kids do weird things. How do they come up with this stuff? Although, I will say that pretending to smoke was something I enjoyed doing when I was a kid. Those candy cigarettes were so awesome! Talk about a terrible idea but a kid's wish come true! Candy that looked like cigarettes and even blew out sugar to replicate smoke. Ingenuous!


Candy cigarettes. They look just like the real thing. And...they also look just like chalk.

Seeing the Smarties story made me think of a time when I was probably 6 or 7 years old. I came back from a friend's birthday part with a bagful of party favors. Included with those favors was a box of chalk, or candy cigarettes to an unknowing kid. I can still remember my mom watching me as I opened the box of chalk, pulled out a piece, then her face in shock as I put it in my mouth and blew and blew and blew. But when no smoke came out, her surprise as I chomped down hard on the stick, just like it was candy. I can also still feel the terrible dry and gritty feeling of chalk in my mouth.

Boy, was I stupid. Pretty much like the kids smoking Smarties. Stupid.