I had ordered a selection of Lane when CI had a sale... BCA was nice but too light (converted cigar smoker) and HGL was too too robust in vitamin N. I blended them 50/50 and feel I have stumbled I the perfect thing for my tastes...
@ghostsofpompeii love to see other people mixing their own blends and sharing them.
@motie2 he sure can but the bigger question is do you blend your own? If so tell us about them. We all love to read others adventures and I for one would never pick on grammar or punctuation....lol.....just look at mine!
I am still trying to think what I might want to blend for me new Irish Aromatic Blend, haven't made any blends at all for a little while, need to go buy some tobacco to make blends. Anyone have a go to place where you can get tobacco to blend it yourself? If so please share so the rest of us can get some.
If I don't mention your name don't feel bad, I sometimes have to go back and look again because I don't see all the comments all the time, I just did see Cerozero' comment after I made my this post and then right before I decided to mention that I saw two more comments another from ghostsofpompeii and then Oneofsevens comments, not sure why but some posts are grey in color where most are black, maybe you guys have your color setting off or maybe you just want to be different but that and they get bumped around or on another section (page) in this comment that I miss some of them. Trust me I want to read everyone's comments and I would like to reply to them all but that would take forever and then we would all be reading a lot. Anyway I do read them all and I like everyone's comments about what they like to blend, they are very interesting and some look really good, if I was rich I would try every single one of these home blends!! Now back to the other part....I am all for mixing other blends to tweak a special blend but lets talk about making our own blend from scratch, anyone have some? Where do you get the tobacco to do this? I used to see a section in one of my books where you could pick a few tobacco's and they would mix it and ship it to you, I want to get bags of all these tobacco's and do it myself at home.....anyone have a clue where to get these tobacco's?? My next step is going to do a search online or go to my not so local smoke shop but I am sure they will not want to sell me what I want or need and if they do I am sure the price will be higher than if I found it somewhere else.
Had the lab coat on again last night but this time my inspiration was one of nostalgia for the 50s' and those neighborhood hamburger joints once populated by teenage girls in poodle skirts and bobby socks and guys in blue jeans, white T-shirt, and leather jacket, sporting greased back hair. Places like 'Al's Diner' on "Happy Days". The local hang-out, complete with juke box blasting out popular tunes from Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper while kids chowed down on steady diet of burgers and fries, followed by a root beer float. And that creamy sassafras flavor of a classic root beer float is what I was striving to capture in my next experiment.
Once again the base tobacco blend I used was my 20 year old can of Velvet. It's the one blend I seldom if ever smoke so I don't mind wasting it for experimental purposes. Though I'm starting to believe the shortcomings of this OTC Burly blend may be a major stumbling block in achieving my goals for perfecting flavorful aromatic blends. If I want to get serious about continuing this experiment in creating my own blends I think it's time to get some straight blending Cavendish which is better suited for flavor casing.
Once again I pulled out several bottles of Watkins flavor concentrates from my wife's baking supplies in the cupboard. As well as a few I added in preparation for this experiment ... mainly Root Beer Concentrate. I also had a bottle of Birch Flavored Concentrate I bought years ago at a Fall Pioneer Days Festival where a guy dressed in period garb was making and selling what he claimed to be authentic Birch Beer. (instructions on the bottle says add 1 part Birch Concentrate and 5 parts soda water ... not quite sure where the original pioneers got soda water from but he had a great sales pitch, looked the part, and managed to get me to open my wallet and buy a bottle). And since Birch Concentrate has a similar flavor profile as both root beer and sassafras it seemed like something worth adding to the concoction. In the end I added about 6 capfuls of Root Beer Concentrate, 6 capfuls of Birch Concentrate, 3 capfuls of Vanilla Concentrate, 3 capfuls of Imitation Caramel Flavoring, and a tablespoon of pure honey just to make this goopy concoction even more sticky. To try and sop up some of the excess moisture I added a pinch of Captain Black Dark, Captain Black Round Blend, and what little was left of my Up All Night "Gone Fishing" (barely enough to mention). But it seemed to help.
This really was a sloppy blend to hand mix. In trying to make it more potent and flavorful I over-did the concentrates. I'm sure an actual blender would have been rolling on the floor laughing if he saw the amounts of liquids I poured into the witches brew. But after some mixing and tamping it with a paper towel to absorb some of the excess moisture I was eventually happy with the consistency. To aide in the drying process I placed it under a desk lamp for a few hours to help dry the tobacco.
Now for the results. Just like my 'Dreamsicle' blend the pouch note is wonderful. And although the room note is quite pleasant there is only a hint of the actual root beer aroma to be detected. It's there ... but nothing like the scent in the pouch. And as for the taste it's quite flavorful and sweet, but a bit of a wash-out in terms of capturing the Root Beer Float flavor I was hoping to achieve. Like the room note ... a trace amount of the sassafras flavor can be detected in the retro-hale, but as for the taste of root beer on my tongue it's nearly imperceptible. Guess I'll need to suck on a root beer barrel while smoking if I want to experience what I was hoping to achieve. I'm going to give it another week or two before revisiting it to see if it improves with age. Since it was such a moist blend I probably should have given it a bit more drying time before smoking it.
@ghostsofpompeii maybe let is soak for a day or two in a sealed jar or bag before you dry it up and to dry it don't pat it down the first day out of the jar, let it dry into the cuts of leaf, also maybe cut back on the Vanilla (2 caps), Caramel (1 cap) and Honey (teaspoon or less) they tend to over power other flavors and aromas. Sounds good though, you might want to do what I am trying to do and that is get them base line and flavored tobaccos in bulk that way you know what is going into your blends. With them cans of mixed tobacco you don't know what percent of blends are in them and that might mess you up down the road. Keep that Lab coat on though, sounds like your having fun and have some good ideas. Hope you keep a log of all you mix even the bad ones. This is what this Post was made for, I would love to see more people doing these things, you people do know this isn't just for Aromatic blends you can add your non-Aromatic mix on this post as well.
I can picture ghostsofpompeii now, in his white lab coat standing in his wife's kitchen, stealing her flavors, making a mess all over while staring onto a bag of tobacco and goop with his pipe hanging halfway out of his mouth......lol If you have glasses they would be hanging on the end of your nose and you would be rubbing your chin with one hand with either a can of tobacco or flavor mix in the other....LMAO Sorry but would make a good picture! Photographer coming out of me, used to love doing photography.
@Wolf41035 You must have a hidden camera in my house. The only thing you missed were the sticky chunks of tobacco sticking to my beard as I rubbed my chin.
I'm not done with this blend yet. My plans are to take out enough for a bowl, add a pinch of Perique, mix it together before packing my pipe, and then light up. I'm really curious what the addition of Perique will do beside make a lot richer white smoke.
I have been on a big OTC tobacco spree as of late. I have narrowed my favorite OTC blends to be Carter hall (typical i know) and Velvet. Both burley blends, but different in some simple ways. One day i had half a pouch of velvet and half a pouch of carter hall. Considering i just bought a can of both, i decided to mix the two together. I know the blend is nothing fancy, but i tell you what, its the coolest smoke i have ever had. The thing that surprised me is that i didnt think i could get a cooler smoke then the two individually, but i was wrong. I get a very cool sweetness, no nonsense burley taste. I believe the sweetness is coming from the carter hall, but it almost is enhanced a little.
@ghostsofpompeii I have been a paranormal investigator since the early 2000's maybe I am getting psychic....who knows? LOL It would make a good picture though!
@thefarmingcodger I hear you, and you just never know what mix will do what and so on. That is how I started, I mixed a little bit of a couple tobacco blends I had left over and made enough for a couple bowls, the problem is I did it and did not pay attention to how much of each I mixed, the darn mix was GREAT but I could never get it the same again, that is why I always write down what I mix now. Crazy how things happen.
@Wolf41035 As a paranormal investigator can you explain to me why on TV Ghost Hunting shows they do all their investigating in pitch blackness with the lights turned off. Even when investigating a place where witnesses claim to have seen an apparition in great detail (right down to the period garb he or she might be wearing) walking down a stairway in clear view under normal lighting conditions? I'm a firm believer in the existence of ghosts and the paranormal ... but I can't understand why an investigator would opt to stumble around in darkness, using expensive night vision equipment that limits your vision to a tunnel vision perceptive when it's just as easy to turn on the lights and get an unobstructed 360 degree view of everything going on around you. This is what makes it so hard to take a majority of those TV shows serious, making even a believer like myself all the more skeptical. Noises in the dark could be much easier explained if the light is on and you can see exactly what just occurred. The suggestion of a perceived shadow in pitch darkness is a hard sell for the home viewer, and easily dismissed as a trick of the eye - or pure B.S. from a TV Ghost Hunter. But actually getting a clear glimpse that same apparition walking down the stairway as described by witnesses - now that would make even the most jaded skeptic take note.
@ghostsofpompeii and @PappyJoe TV Shows are a joke, most of them are faking their stuff because of ratings, I hate watching them shows but to answer your question, IR and FS (Full Spectrum) Camera's can pick up things that you usually can't see so some teams do it to pick up something extra, also when you do see stuff during the day you usually see it out of the corner of your eye even though you think you see it head on, knowing that some think a normal camera will not pick up images, I know differently, I set up camera's and record during the daylight and at night, I use IR camera's Full Spectrum camera's and even low light camera's after dark and normal camera's with lights on and during the day. I am very thorough when I investigate, I have well over $4,600 worth of equipment and make my own stuff as well. Our team is National, International and PAST Family Network certified, we have been doing this since the early 2000's and I have had the ability to see things since the 1980's. I am Part Native American Indian and have been told I have strong abilities and I am also a Dream Walker which means when I sleep I can walk in the past or future at times. It is scary and wouldn't wish it on anyone! I love the Paranormal not just Ghost hunting, I wish I was healthy enough to keep doing it but at the moment I am looking for people to step up and take over running and doing most of the investigating. I founded Kentucky P.A.S.T. (Paranormal Active Scientific Teams) in 2008 or 2009, can't remember but anyway I have been running the team for a long time and we have TONS of evidence and have helped hundreds if not thousands of people. We have people call us from homes and businesses saying they can't sleep, work or anything without being scared so we go in and find out what is actually going on, if it is haunted or something natural or man made causing the problem, if it is man made we either fix it or let them know what it is and have them get someone to fix it for them, if it is natural we explain it and leave it up to them to decide what to do, if it is a spirit or something Paranormal I can cleanse the place for them (sometimes it is a family member) if they want it gone. We never charge for any services, we keep everything private if they don't want anyone to see or hear about their issues, we respect our clients that is why we have so much evidence that other people will never get to see. I have only dealt with evil twice in the years I have been doing this, evil is rare so teams that say the are seeing demons all the time or say they have had to do exorcisms are full of crap or don't know what they are doing, teams that charge are fake and teams that have a lot of exciting investigations are full of crap as well, 7 out of 10 investigations are nothing and you sit all night talking because nothing is going on. (Don't get me wrong, some teams ONLY go to active sites, that is different) Some teams only go to paid or known active sites, they are teams that only like the thrill of investigating, you will seldom see them teams helping people and if they do some of them mess it up and the people end up not trusting other teams to help them. I have a few known active sites I take my team but it is for training purposes only, I show them how to use equipment, how to communicate with spirits and what to ask and what to do around them, it is not for a thrill or thrill seekers, it is to train my team so when we go to investigate a home or business they know what they are doing. SO I hope this helped and hope I didn't get so far of track you got bored, but as you can see Paranormal is one of my passions and I am going to hate to cut back and not do as much as I used to.
@ghostsofpompeii I was offered the chance to do a TV show more than once but refused to do it because they want excitement on their shows for every episode. I told them I didn't want to fake anything or act out for every little bump in the night. lol
Follow-up on my Root Beer Float tobacco blend experiment.
Well after letting it set for a week or so I went back to it three days ago and added about double the root beer concentrate I originally used as well as an additional three capfuls of caramel flavoring, and boy was it saturated and sticky mess. I added a bit of Carter Hall to help sop up the additional moisture then let it set for a day and a half in the sealed Tupperware container - shaking it up throughout the day.. Today I opened it up and it smelled outstanding, but was still a little to moist to smoke so poured it into a Mason Jar (to keep it from blowing all over the room) and went at it with a hair dryer - transforming myself from mad scientist Henry Frankenstein to hair stylist Vidal Sassoon. Once I was satisfied with the consistency I packed the tobacco into a small 4 oz. Mason Jar where it will sit for the next few weeks. I took some of the remaining blend and packed an old Dr. Grabow ... even though it was still quite moist. I was actually afraid it might be too moist to light ... but it took the match and after the first char light it stayed lit throughout the smoke. I think I did relight somewhere near the bottom of the bowl but not because it went completely out.
Now the results: As I stated before the pouch note was outstanding - as was the room note. I had my wife walk into the garage to get a sniff and she was not only pleasantly surprised but immediately detected the scent of root beer. And the taste was almost as good as the pouch note. It taste exactly as it smelled. During the retro hale that sassafras/root beer flavor was front and center like sucking on a root beer barrel. Then that creamy hit of caramel followed and wham ... Root Beer Float! It burned down to a nice white ash, and believe it or not there was no pipe gurgle - nor was the bowl a goopy mess.
It was a roaring success. Unfortunately I can't truly call it a success because with all the changes I made during the process I doubt if I can reproduce it exactly. I was constantly adding a bit more of this and a little more of that without taking any real notes because I assumed it was going to be a whopping failure from the get-go. But now that I've discovered how much I like it I'll have to go back to the earlier part of this discussion to see what I started with ... factor in the additional flavoring and tobacco blends I tossed in to sponge up the excess moisture and see what develops. This may prove to be a one-off blend so I better make that little 4 oz. jar last me a long time.
This post interests me greatly. I have been toying with several 'blends" recently, and I am having a ball. I have been keeping a list and assigning my own ratings to them as I expect to be experimenting quite a bit. My game plans is to for the most part initially to mix my blends 50/50 to get a idea of the taste. Once I have tested several, I can revisit them and perhaps tweak the percentages of the tobacco components. So far I am extremely happy with my latest, smoked today, Carter Hall and McClelland 403 Darkest Chocolate. I always thought I could detect a cocoa note in the CH, and these two blended very nicely. Even at 50/50 the chocolate note was not extremely evident. I have also tried with Lane products such as BCA and Dark Red 50/50, and BCA and 1-Q. They are obviously less of a change particularly the first blend. I expect to try some of the caramel blends, and some of my "nut" blends with CH or PA. Now I know this is not true blending per se, however it is fun and I am coming up with some pretty pleasant "variations on a theme" so to speak.
I would love to hear about any other members and their trials and tribulations regarding such amateur blending. I thinks a list of sorts and maybe some "ratings" or comments would be of interest to a lot of participants. This is a fun hobby, or obsession, or whatever this strange trip is.
@pwkarch Since you're currently experimenting you should try something we discussed on a different post which I called 'stacking blends' Whereby you layer the bowl with three different blends like Neapolitan icecream. You can try three different fruit blends - or any combination of vanilla, chocolate or what-ever strikes your fancy. I did several combinations like putting a bottom layer of Sutliff Chocolate Mousse, a second layer of a Black Cherry Blend, and a top layer of Vanilla Custard. Ending up tasting like a chocolate covered cherry. Another blend combined a bottom layer of Carper Hall, middle layer of Chocolate Mousse, and a top layer of Coconut Almond. Ended up tasting like an Almond Joy. If you have a nice variety of aromatic blends the sky is the limit. I've made concoctions that tasted like everything from a Smores to a York Peppermint Paddy Mint. When you have the right combination can lead to a pretty interesting smoke. You'll start with one dominant flavor upon the light-up, then the second kicks in, and then the first two mesh into a new flavor, then the third becomes prominent before all three combine to make an altogether different flavor.
@pwkarch if you like this thread you would like our Aromatic only thread, both are good threads and both are full of information about aromatics. @ghostsofpompeii I must have missed that comment but sounds like a couple good mixtures, I have layered a few times, the first time was by mistake, I was loading my pipe and lost concentration and went to another bag half way through loading my pipe, the second time I was running low of one tobacco so I added another to finish off my pipe and after that I was so intrigued that I mixed a couple together just to be doing it nut I have never mixed more than two, might have to try three or maybe four on my extra large bowl. lol
When mixing blends or stacking blends what should be the limit on how many of each you should mix? Personally I think when mixing blends you mix what you want to get the best results. As for Stacking Blends, I guess 3-4 should be the limit to actually get the full effect of the stack, anything more I would think there wouldn't be enough to really get good results, also the bottom stack should be the thickest because if not you won't get much of it smoked due to moisture and such. Maybe use four so you can get the best three on top and the fourth on the bottom is more of a buffer or stopping point due to moisture and heat.... Bigger the bowl the more you can get in there but I still wouldn't pack more than 4 blends and 3 for the flavor and fourth on bottom for buffer.
Been stacking blends to change the bowl halfway through a smoke, last night I stacked Orlik Mellow under CAO Eileen's Dream, it was a good stack but think I can do one better for the Eileen's Dream......
I found a VERY good combination today while playing around with mixing blends. This one was quite by accident. I had to run a quick errand, and I had a desire to smoke some Carter Hall in my 'pickumup truck". So I put a little on my "mixing dish" which had just a little of the Sutliffe Vanilla Custard from a bowl fill yesterday.. I meant to keep the CH separated from the small amount of Vanilla Custard, and at the last second basically thought "oh what the hell" and mixed the two. My guess in retrospect is the VC MIGHT have been 10 to 15% as much as the CH. The resultant smoke gets a solid 10/10 in my book.
As soon as I put the pipe in my mouth, I could taste the VC tobacco even through the larger CH portion. As soon as I added fire I was greeted with one of the most rewarding smoke in a very long time. I had that mellow cocoa / sweet burley flavor from the Carter Hall, with a wonderful vanilla note from that tiny amount of the VC. It was a pleasure to smoke that bowl, and I actually waited about 10 minutes on my arrival home before going into the house because I did not want to give it up.
I will next play around with the ingredient percentages to see how the taste and aroma changes. But, as of right now I am staying with this recipe.
I just want to share this with everyone. If anyone tries this please let me know what you think.
Recently I tried blending HH Old Dark Fired Kentucky (RR) with 5110 - Dark English Full. It ended being a really enjoyable smoke. The 5110 added a bit more sweetness and smokiness to the ODFKRR which I really liked. A little more ODFKRR and it was a bit more earthy and rich in flavor. Nice blend overall.
Comments
@motie2 he sure can but the bigger question is do you blend your own? If so tell us about them. We all love to read others adventures and I for one would never pick on grammar or punctuation....lol.....just look at mine!
I am still trying to think what I might want to blend for me new Irish Aromatic Blend, haven't made any blends at all for a little while, need to go buy some tobacco to make blends.
Anyone have a go to place where you can get tobacco to blend it yourself?
If so please share so the rest of us can get some.
Anyway I do read them all and I like everyone's comments about what they like to blend, they are very interesting and some look really good, if I was rich I would try every single one of these home blends!!
Now back to the other part....I am all for mixing other blends to tweak a special blend but lets talk about making our own blend from scratch, anyone have some? Where do you get the tobacco to do this? I used to see a section in one of my books where you could pick a few tobacco's and they would mix it and ship it to you, I want to get bags of all these tobacco's and do it myself at home.....anyone have a clue where to get these tobacco's??
My next step is going to do a search online or go to my not so local smoke shop but I am sure they will not want to sell me what I want or need and if they do I am sure the price will be higher than if I found it somewhere else.
Had the lab coat on again last night but this time my inspiration was one of nostalgia for the 50s' and those neighborhood hamburger joints once populated by teenage girls in poodle skirts and bobby socks and guys in blue jeans, white T-shirt, and leather jacket, sporting greased back hair. Places like 'Al's Diner' on "Happy Days". The local hang-out, complete with juke box blasting out popular tunes from Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper while kids chowed down on steady diet of burgers and fries, followed by a root beer float. And that creamy sassafras flavor of a classic root beer float is what I was striving to capture in my next experiment.
Once again the base tobacco blend I used was my 20 year old can of Velvet. It's the one blend I seldom if ever smoke so I don't mind wasting it for experimental purposes. Though I'm starting to believe the shortcomings of this OTC Burly blend may be a major stumbling block in achieving my goals for perfecting flavorful aromatic blends. If I want to get serious about continuing this experiment in creating my own blends I think it's time to get some straight blending Cavendish which is better suited for flavor casing.
Once again I pulled out several bottles of Watkins flavor concentrates from my wife's baking supplies in the cupboard. As well as a few I added in preparation for this experiment ... mainly Root Beer Concentrate. I also had a bottle of Birch Flavored Concentrate I bought years ago at a Fall Pioneer Days Festival where a guy dressed in period garb was making and selling what he claimed to be authentic Birch Beer. (instructions on the bottle says add 1 part Birch Concentrate and 5 parts soda water ... not quite sure where the original pioneers got soda water from but he had a great sales pitch, looked the part, and managed to get me to open my wallet and buy a bottle). And since Birch Concentrate has a similar flavor profile as both root beer and sassafras it seemed like something worth adding to the concoction. In the end I added about 6 capfuls of Root Beer Concentrate, 6 capfuls of Birch Concentrate, 3 capfuls of Vanilla Concentrate, 3 capfuls of Imitation Caramel Flavoring, and a tablespoon of pure honey just to make this goopy concoction even more sticky. To try and sop up some of the excess moisture I added a pinch of Captain Black Dark, Captain Black Round Blend, and what little was left of my Up All Night "Gone Fishing" (barely enough to mention). But it seemed to help.
This really was a sloppy blend to hand mix. In trying to make it more potent and flavorful I over-did the concentrates. I'm sure an actual blender would have been rolling on the floor laughing if he saw the amounts of liquids I poured into the witches brew. But after some mixing and tamping it with a paper towel to absorb some of the excess moisture I was eventually happy with the consistency. To aide in the drying process I placed it under a desk lamp for a few hours to help dry the tobacco.
Now for the results. Just like my 'Dreamsicle' blend the pouch note is wonderful. And although the room note is quite pleasant there is only a hint of the actual root beer aroma to be detected. It's there ... but nothing like the scent in the pouch. And as for the taste it's quite flavorful and sweet, but a bit of a wash-out in terms of capturing the Root Beer Float flavor I was hoping to achieve. Like the room note ... a trace amount of the sassafras flavor can be detected in the retro-hale, but as for the taste of root beer on my tongue it's nearly imperceptible. Guess I'll need to suck on a root beer barrel while smoking if I want to experience what I was hoping to achieve. I'm going to give it another week or two before revisiting it to see if it improves with age. Since it was such a moist blend I probably should have given it a bit more drying time before smoking it.
Sounds good though, you might want to do what I am trying to do and that is get them base line and flavored tobaccos in bulk that way you know what is going into your blends. With them cans of mixed tobacco you don't know what percent of blends are in them and that might mess you up down the road. Keep that Lab coat on though, sounds like your having fun and have some good ideas. Hope you keep a log of all you mix even the bad ones.
This is what this Post was made for, I would love to see more people doing these things, you people do know this isn't just for Aromatic blends you can add your non-Aromatic mix on this post as well.
I can picture ghostsofpompeii now, in his white lab coat standing in his wife's kitchen, stealing her flavors, making a mess all over while staring onto a bag of tobacco and goop with his pipe hanging halfway out of his mouth......lol If you have glasses they would be hanging on the end of your nose and you would be rubbing your chin with one hand with either a can of tobacco or flavor mix in the other....LMAO Sorry but would make a good picture! Photographer coming out of me, used to love doing photography.
@Wolf41035 You must have a hidden camera in my house. The only thing you missed were the sticky chunks of tobacco sticking to my beard as I rubbed my chin.
I'm not done with this blend yet. My plans are to take out enough for a bowl, add a pinch of Perique, mix it together before packing my pipe, and then light up. I'm really curious what the addition of Perique will do beside make a lot richer white smoke.
@thefarmingcodger I hear you, and you just never know what mix will do what and so on. That is how I started, I mixed a little bit of a couple tobacco blends I had left over and made enough for a couple bowls, the problem is I did it and did not pay attention to how much of each I mixed, the darn mix was GREAT but I could never get it the same again, that is why I always write down what I mix now. Crazy how things happen.
Our team is National, International and PAST Family Network certified, we have been doing this since the early 2000's and I have had the ability to see things since the 1980's. I am Part Native American Indian and have been told I have strong abilities and I am also a Dream Walker which means when I sleep I can walk in the past or future at times. It is scary and wouldn't wish it on anyone! I love the Paranormal not just Ghost hunting, I wish I was healthy enough to keep doing it but at the moment I am looking for people to step up and take over running and doing most of the investigating. I founded Kentucky P.A.S.T. (Paranormal Active Scientific Teams) in 2008 or 2009, can't remember but anyway I have been running the team for a long time and we have TONS of evidence and have helped hundreds if not thousands of people. We have people call us from homes and businesses saying they can't sleep, work or anything without being scared so we go in and find out what is actually going on, if it is haunted or something natural or man made causing the problem, if it is man made we either fix it or let them know what it is and have them get someone to fix it for them, if it is natural we explain it and leave it up to them to decide what to do, if it is a spirit or something Paranormal I can cleanse the place for them (sometimes it is a family member) if they want it gone.
We never charge for any services, we keep everything private if they don't want anyone to see or hear about their issues, we respect our clients that is why we have so much evidence that other people will never get to see.
I have only dealt with evil twice in the years I have been doing this, evil is rare so teams that say the are seeing demons all the time or say they have had to do exorcisms are full of crap or don't know what they are doing, teams that charge are fake and teams that have a lot of exciting investigations are full of crap as well, 7 out of 10 investigations are nothing and you sit all night talking because nothing is going on. (Don't get me wrong, some teams ONLY go to active sites, that is different) Some teams only go to paid or known active sites, they are teams that only like the thrill of investigating, you will seldom see them teams helping people and if they do some of them mess it up and the people end up not trusting other teams to help them.
I have a few known active sites I take my team but it is for training purposes only, I show them how to use equipment, how to communicate with spirits and what to ask and what to do around them, it is not for a thrill or thrill seekers, it is to train my team so when we go to investigate a home or business they know what they are doing.
SO I hope this helped and hope I didn't get so far of track you got bored, but as you can see Paranormal is one of my passions and I am going to hate to cut back and not do as much as I used to.
Follow-up on my Root Beer Float tobacco blend experiment.
Well after letting it set for a week or so I went back to it three days ago and added about double the root beer concentrate I originally used as well as an additional three capfuls of caramel flavoring, and boy was it saturated and sticky mess. I added a bit of Carter Hall to help sop up the additional moisture then let it set for a day and a half in the sealed Tupperware container - shaking it up throughout the day.. Today I opened it up and it smelled outstanding, but was still a little to moist to smoke so poured it into a Mason Jar (to keep it from blowing all over the room) and went at it with a hair dryer - transforming myself from mad scientist Henry Frankenstein to hair stylist Vidal Sassoon. Once I was satisfied with the consistency I packed the tobacco into a small 4 oz. Mason Jar where it will sit for the next few weeks. I took some of the remaining blend and packed an old Dr. Grabow ... even though it was still quite moist. I was actually afraid it might be too moist to light ... but it took the match and after the first char light it stayed lit throughout the smoke. I think I did relight somewhere near the bottom of the bowl but not because it went completely out.
Now the results: As I stated before the pouch note was outstanding - as was the room note. I had my wife walk into the garage to get a sniff and she was not only pleasantly surprised but immediately detected the scent of root beer. And the taste was almost as good as the pouch note. It taste exactly as it smelled. During the retro hale that sassafras/root beer flavor was front and center like sucking on a root beer barrel. Then that creamy hit of caramel followed and wham ... Root Beer Float! It burned down to a nice white ash, and believe it or not there was no pipe gurgle - nor was the bowl a goopy mess.
It was a roaring success. Unfortunately I can't truly call it a success because with all the changes I made during the process I doubt if I can reproduce it exactly. I was constantly adding a bit more of this and a little more of that without taking any real notes because I assumed it was going to be a whopping failure from the get-go. But now that I've discovered how much I like it I'll have to go back to the earlier part of this discussion to see what I started with ... factor in the additional flavoring and tobacco blends I tossed in to sponge up the excess moisture and see what develops. This may prove to be a one-off blend so I better make that little 4 oz. jar last me a long time.
Wow that sounds great, hope you can remember what you did or at least enough to get it close!
@ghostsofpompeii I must have missed that comment but sounds like a couple good mixtures, I have layered a few times, the first time was by mistake, I was loading my pipe and lost concentration and went to another bag half way through loading my pipe, the second time I was running low of one tobacco so I added another to finish off my pipe and after that I was so intrigued that I mixed a couple together just to be doing it nut I have never mixed more than two, might have to try three or maybe four on my extra large bowl. lol
Personally I think when mixing blends you mix what you want to get the best results.
As for Stacking Blends, I guess 3-4 should be the limit to actually get the full effect of the stack, anything more I would think there wouldn't be enough to really get good results, also the bottom stack should be the thickest because if not you won't get much of it smoked due to moisture and such.
Maybe use four so you can get the best three on top and the fourth on the bottom is more of a buffer or stopping point due to moisture and heat....
Bigger the bowl the more you can get in there but I still wouldn't pack more than 4 blends and 3 for the flavor and fourth on bottom for buffer.
So many combos you can do and a lot of them make for a better smoking pleasure.