mop water and a cigarette butt (a dream)

I was standing in a long line at the post office, and the East Austin Studio Tour was going on (there were paintings hanging and leaning on the walls). I saw M4* in line several people in front of me but he was talking to someone and I didn't want to interrupt to say hello. When I had my chance, he was lighting a cigarette and putting headphones on. At first I was shocked that he would be smoking in the post office; second, that he would be smoking at all, as he had a cancer scare a year ago; and third, he doesn't strike me as the smoking type. I realized that he was putting on the headphones so that he could smoke without having to hear anyone say anything about it. I assumed it had something to do with his post-cancer treatment.

This probably comes from the fact that I was at H.E.B. yesterday and scoffed when I saw a woman grocery shopping with her iPod plugged into her head. Then five minutes later I made a note to myself to do the same through the end of the year because I was humming "Feliz Navidad" as I left the store.

Next, M6 was there and she was smoking too. She was smoking a cool-looking cigarette with a white filter and a filter-colored tobacco part. I looked around the post office and others were smoking as well. I said, "Am I the only one who doesn't smoke anymore?" M6 said, "You're smoking." Sure enough, there was a cigarette in my hand.

I don't know what that part was about. I smoke one or two tiny, hand-rolled cigs a day mostly for the little nicotine high I get (cheap drug). I roll my own so I can make them small, otherwise I would smoke whole cigarettes and not enjoy them very much. I also roll my own so I don't have to think about the litter of the filter. I've seriously considered starting to smoke a pipe. I always think of that as an older guy thing, but S1 pointed out last night that I'm in my mid-40s now (because, according to him, it starts at 44, though, also according to him, it lasts through 47, most likely because that's the age he's coming upon!).

I got to the front of the line, dipped my cigarette in a mop bucket under the counter to put it out and threw it toward the small garbage can back there. It missed, landed in a plop on the floor. The postal worker appeared at that moment from behind me and lifted the counter to go behind and wait on me. I said, "I missed the trash can, I need to pick that up." He said, "You'll have to wipe up the mess, too." I said, "It's just water." He said, "Mop water and a cigarette butt."