I like pipes and pipe tobacco, but can you see a 35yo with a pipe hanging out his mouth? I'll post a pic of me at home ...lol

Alright, I pulled out the 2 CAO cigars, and the la gloria, and for grins I tossed in a Rocky Patel 1990 reserve.. My local cigar shop doesn't know much about em.. so hopefully it doesn't suck..

Any paticular order to smoking these weakest to strongest? The Rocky Patel looks medium in color.

I would definatly like to see your igloo humidor, also do you keep the celo on or off? seems mixed school
Lastly I went to all the troubly of prepping my humidors, but the one with my nice cigars has a digital hygrometer in it, and I can't get humidy above 65-67% I am using distilled water and that cheesey florist sponge stuff stuck to the top of my humidor.. thinking I should by some of those gel packs..

attius wrote:Alright, I pulled out the 2 CAO cigars, and the la gloria, and for grins I tossed in a Rocky Patel 1990 reserve.. My local cigar shop doesn't know much about em.. so hopefully it doesn't suck..

Any paticular order to smoking these weakest to strongest? The Rocky Patel looks medium in color.

I would definatly like to see your igloo humidor, also do you keep the celo on or off? seems mixed school
Lastly I went to all the troubly of prepping my humidors, but the one with my nice cigars has a digital hygrometer in it, and I can't get humidy above 65-67% I am using distilled water and that cheesey florist sponge stuff stuck to the top of my humidor.. thinking I should by some of those gel packs..

The rocky patels aren't bad - for some reason though they never really hit me as a cigar I remember when I think "I'm in need of more cigars".

Since you're looking for contrasts, I'd suggest going with the lighter CAO, then maybe to the Brazilia, then the La Gloria / RP. The most contrast you're going to get is in going from a light to a full (dark) cigar.

Celophane doesn't really matter to me that much. I usually just leave it on. Exceptions would be if I think the cigar is a bit dry, I'll pull off the celo and put it in the humidor since it will absorb moisture faster without the wrapper. The nice thing about the wrappers is that they do help to protect the cigars if there's something that happens where you get a leaky or overmoistened humidifying element.

If you're humidor is fairly new, it's not a surprise that you're having trouble getting to 70% humidity. It takes awhile for the wood to absorb enough moisture to reach the level where it's not drawing down your overall humidity. You can try taking a clean sponge and some distilled water to wipe down the inside of the humidor. That will help get the wood full of moisture quicker than waiting for humidified air to do it.

The gel packs usually work better than the florist stuff. And you can avoid adding propylene glycol to balance out the humidity. For my igloo, I actually bought those museum grade silica crystals that they use for humidifying artifacts and shit. I keep a pound of them in a stocking and every once in awhile (when it drops to 65% or so) I put a bit of distilled water in the bottom of a bowl and sop it up with the crystals. They keep it at 70% constant without a problem. And no propylene glycol. You can buy them here: Silica Beads.

I spent about a week treating the inside the both the humidors with distilled water, and bought a new sponge that I cut in half, boiled, and then used 1 half to wipe down the walls each day, the other was left on a little platform soaked in distlled water.. lol was really moist at first just can't seem to keep it.. seems like I need to retreat the humidor.. I can see now why it is such a balancing act..

attius wrote:I spent about a week treating the inside the both the humidors with distilled water, and bought a new sponge that I cut in half, boiled, and then used 1 half to wipe down the walls each day, the other was left on a little platform soaked in distlled water.. lol was really moist at first just can't seem to keep it.. seems like I need to retreat the humidor.. I can see now why it is such a balancing act..

It's usually not that bad - once you get it set it typically doesn't move much unless you neglect to keep feeding the humidifier about once a month or so (depending on season and humidity of the house). You did more than enough to humidify the box. I would bet that a better humidifying element would do the job. Some of those cheapo foam humidifiers have too much propylene glycol in them from the manufacturer, so it actually sucks moisture out of the box until it hits its proper relative humidity (sometimes 60-65%). That's one of the big reasons I switched to the silica crystals. Never a doubt that they're properly balanced.

Does you humidor lid fit snugly? When mine was dry, the lid would lift without any resistance. Once it absorbed some water the lid was a snug fit and wasn't exactly difficult to open but it did resist if you just tried to open it lazily.

My lid is not super snug for sure, I have 2 different humidors, and neither of them seem air tightish.. the nicer one does seem to be a tiny bit tighter then the basic one from thompson ciger I got free..
Will work on this when I get home

I don't smoke but an investor I know bought a crap load of cigars he plans to unload in a few weeks because of the new taxes...

http://ryorevolution.com/ryo-schip-table.html

Thanks for the heads up I don't think the .40 is gonna matter to me.. I did smoke 4 cigars that weekend, I took the 2 CAO, the la gloria, and a rocky patel.. Wife thought the patel stank the least lol..

I definately noticed a difference too while driking OJ and smoking them, the nice lady that brings drinks while playing craps kept me we stocked.. I have smoked a couple since... I keep waiting for my pallet to start to notice large differences in the cigars.. not so far.. I have to say all of them have been nice though, burn well, no crap short leafs, nice easy draws.. Hoping the weather changes some more,, my daughter going to get a lot of walks to the park while I smoke lol!