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Author: cjmkcm Date: 10/06/2004 01:02 PM
No way they are too damp. I have had them in the range of 2 months to about 8 months. Perhaps it is the older ones that are giving me the problems.
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However long you've had them, are you storing them at 70/70? ... used to be, I was very anal about keeping my cigars at 70/70 and I was having to use bamboo skewers to "unplug" cigars all the damn time ... then on vacation (I'd taken both cigars AND skewers with me), I inadvertently let my travel humi fall into the low 60s (RH) ...
What a surprise ... instead of the dry, harsh smoke I expected after learning of my "error", I had a far more rich, smooth, easy-drawing and sharper-buring cigar smoking experience than I'd been having ...
I've come to think this true of most maddies and most Nicaraguans ... some cigars, especially those with lighter wrappers, and most Dominicans seem to thrive better at 70RH ... I now maintain different RH in different humis for different cigars and can't think of the last time I had a draw/burn problem with any cigar, including the significant number of Perdomos that I smoke ...
The Reserve maddie torp I smoked last night, for example, drew perfectly, burned quite sharply even and did not require relighting or touching up a single time.
If you don't want to mess around with different humis at different RHs, follow the suggestion of dry-boxing your cigars for a few days before smoking them ... to paraphrase George Zimmer on the Mens Wearhouse commercials, you're gonna like the way your cigars smoke ... I guarantee it.