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Released every Tuesday, the LOUNGE LIZARDS podcast helps listeners navigate the experience of finding and enjoying premium cigars (both Cuban and non-Cuban) and quality spirits. Episodes are normally around 90 minutes long and feature a variety of different topics including food, travel, life, sports and work.
The podcast features seven members: Rooster, Poobah, Gizmo, Senator, Pagoda, Grinder and Bam Bam.
This is not your typical cigar podcast. We’re a group of friends who love sharing cigars, whiskey and a good laugh.
Join us and become a card-carrying lounge lizard yourself! Email us at hello@loungelizardspod.com to join the conversation and be featured on an upcoming episode!
**Gizmo:** [00:00:00] Welcome to the Lounge Lizards podcast. It's so good to have you here. It's a leisure and lifestyle podcast founded on our love of premium cigars, as well as whiskey, travel, food, work, and whatever else we feel like getting into. My name is Gizmo. Tonight I'm joined by Rooster Poobah, Senator Grinder, and bam bam.
And our plan is to smoke a cigar, drink some rum, talk about life, and of course, have some laughs. So take this as your 86th official invitation to join us and become a card carrying lounge lizard. Plan to meet us here once a week. We are gonna smoke a cubit cigar tonight, share our thoughts on it, and give you our formal lizard rain.
We discussed the aging potential of up and cigars to reach excellence. We revisit a high proof rum pairing from episode six, and we debate whether cigars should be considered an investment, all among a variety of other things for the next 90 minutes. So sit back. Get your favorite drink, light up a cigar, and enjoy as we pair four square rum.
Exceptional cask selection. 2010 with the H up connoisseur. A an aged rib Robusto extra [00:01:00] tonight on the pod from H Up. It's the connoisseur. A, a beautiful cigar out of a beautiful box from Puba. We are loving tonight, boys. Oh yeah. We are loving. Second, with a second time on the podcast. We are lu This is love.
What was the box code? Uh, Poobah. It was Lub 15. 15, July Lu. July 15. So a little bit later than the up and twos we did, which was mm-hmm. One of the best cigars we've ever done in the podcast. And we have a soft spot in our heart for h Upton. Yes. And hopefully tonight will be no exception. Honestly. I'm very
**Bam Bam:** happy we're doing this
**Poobah:** tonight.
Yep. It's a, it's, it's a, it's a 52 by five and a half. The, the factory size is called the
**Gizmo:** Genos. The other famous, uh, Genos is the Cohiba. Which is I think in the Maduro line, correct? Yep.
**Poobah:** Yeah. That's only, only Maduro. Yeah. Yep. That that's correct.
**Gizmo:** Well, lemme tell you something. This is a beautiful cigarette.
It is. Yeah, it is. And it smells incredible. It it does. You know, [00:02:00] Upton really benefits from time, as we've discussed mm-hmm. Ad nauseum on the podcast. Yep. And, uh, I can't wait to smoke it, boys. So let's cut this thing. Yeah. See if we're getting on the cold draw on the wrapper of this beautiful eight year age cigar.
Can't wait.
**Bam Bam:** Very mild
**Gizmo:** on the cold draw. Mm. Really nice though. Yes. So we're gonna go through the entire connoisseur line from H up, starting with the connoisseur. A tonight.
**Bam Bam:** Honestly, something about the Upton line for me, it's, it, it, it's got this air of exclusivity. It's, it's in special markup. It is awesome for me.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. And listen, given our experience, certainly with the cigars we've had, and then the other cigars, you know, we haven't reviewed yet, like the Sir Winston, um, I mean, it's just a phenomenal brand out of Cuba. Yeah, that's awesome. You know, um, to me right in line with Parus as far as a hundred percent, it's, uh, it's
**Poobah:** excellent.
A hundred [00:03:00] percent. Yeah. And when you look at the wrapper, I don't know, tell me how you guys, what you guys are seeing. This is the, the construction looks really good. It does.
**Bam Bam:** Senator, what do you think?
**Gizmo:** Yeah,
**Senator:** I think the construction's, uh, this, it, it's good. The wrappers a little toothy. Yeah, definitely. But, um, yeah, otherwise
**Gizmo:** it's a beautiful cigar.
All right, boys, let's like this thing, the H up men connoisseur a, again, it's a Rab Robusto extra 52 ring gauge by five and a half inches long lu, 15 eight year old cigar tonight, you know, as
**Bam Bam:** we're lighting this, I've only had, so my first Connie A was either from Puba. Or from Rooster and I fell in love with the cigar ever since.
I've never ever had a bad Kanye. I think you all know that. I love the cigar.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. I've had hit or miss boxes. I think they just needed time. Um, I'm really, this is definitely the oldest that I've smoked. [00:04:00] Yeah, definitely. And I buy a lot, so I'm really looking forward to it tonight. You know, anything
**Rooster:** out of 20 14, 20 14, 20 15.
Yep.
**Gizmo:** Excellent. They're great. Yeah. Yeah.
**Poobah:** This is
**Gizmo:** excellent. That is wonderful. In the light.
**Poobah:** This is excellent. There's that twang. I got a twang right off the, I haven't had one of these. So just for context, I haven't had one of these. I smoked the box down, but I hadn't had, I probably haven't smoked cuz I got down to like the last eight, which I've got here tonight.
I probably haven't smoked one in two years. Mm mm You know, that's a while. So it's been a while. I've been kind of saving them.
**Senator:** So you hit the nail on the head. The, the twang mm-hmm. Is like the dominant first note. Yeah. Yeah.
**Poobah:** It's like that got twang, like
**Senator:** Yeah. Salty minerality. Mm-hmm.
**Gizmo:** There's a little bit of a creaminess to it.
I wouldn't say it's super creamy, but it's there. Rounding it out. I, I get [00:05:00] more of a
**Bam Bam:** graham cracker than a creamy on this one. Yeah, I would agree. Yeah. A little dowey
**Gizmo:** maybe.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Yeah. Same. Same. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. This is really nice. You know, I love the, uh, the H up and bands on these. It you, you know, it incorporates, it's a single band.
How's the spelling on that card?
**Poobah:** So it's spelled, um, different ways on the ribbon and it's spelled different ways on the band. On the band, and it's spelled incorrectly. Um, that notwithstanding, this was released in 2013 as. Uh, it's essentially a pseudo L C D A L C D H release without the L C D H band extra band on it.
It, it's, that's the way it was introduced at least. Um, and then over time, what you want to call that is whatever you want to call
**Gizmo:** that, but I feel like all the L CDH is just end up in the regular [00:06:00] production kind of, you know, role anyway. Yeah. Like after time, like,
**Poobah:** like Right. Like the original press release around it in 2013 when it came out, it's like, it's an, it's an exclusive, it's, its distributed essentially on paper to L C D H, DHS in other exclusive anos retailers,
**Gizmo:** you know?
Yeah. I love that the band incorporates it. So like I said, it's a single band, but it incorporates a second layer of the classic H Upton Band, which has connoisseur A on it. But if you take that bottom third off, it's just the classic H up band that you'd find on a Sir Winston or an H uh, you know, an Upton two.
Um, very classic branding. Yep. You find on these cigars old red and white. Mm-hmm. Yeah. This is a really delicious cigar voice. It's excellent.
**Senator:** I'm glad we're doing this because I remember early on, uh, when I met Puba and once Puba took the real deep dive down the rabbit hole of Cuban cigars, this was [00:07:00] easily his favorite cigar for a significant period of time.
Mm-hmm. I mean, I like singularly associate the Kanye with Puba and um, I think he had given me one that I loved. It was really good. And then I had bought a box myself that was relatively young. And what I quickly realized the hard way is that these just really need time. It's a fact. And so it's just a fact.
I haven't had a good Kanye I've enjoyed in years probably since whenever you gave me the first one. So this is a treat. This is what I remember. This is great.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. And, and if you remember, you and I bought boxes, I think in 2020. Yeah, that sounds right. Late 2020. And they were 2019 boxes or 2018 boxes. And you and I both had really.
Mediocre experiences with those boxes. Yeah. Have you
**Bam Bam:** guys had a Connie outta that box yet, since you've aged
**Gizmo:** them? I haven't reached for it in a long time.
**Senator:** I had one maybe last year and it was better, but I still didn't really
**Bam Bam:** love it. I've got a box of 2020s at home. I've had five of them out of that box.
And honestly, I'm a [00:08:00] big, big, big fan of this cigar, and I think you all know that because I talk about it a lot. I do love this thick.
**Poobah:** So, um, yeah, to appreciate what you're saying. Yeah. These need, like, it's a fact. No joke. Need time. I think that these are, at the time that are, is a pretty good time to smoke 'em.
They need time to come into their own. Um, it's a more, as you can see, it's a more tightly packed cigar than, um, maybe some of the other s cigars of, of this similar ring gauge. Yep. But the draw isn't. The draw is good. It's excellent. But this is a sit. Yeah, it's a li it's gonna be a sit, it's gonna be a little bit longer of a smoke.
Um, but which I really like them, you
know,
**Senator:** which honestly is a little surprising. And the only reason I, I kind of expected when I bought a young box that I'd be able to smoke it with just a few years of age on it, because, [00:09:00] This is not a lero heavy cigar. No, it's not strong. I mean, this starts mild and, and probably builds to medium.
And usually it's the case that those need less time. So I'm not sure what it is about it, but at least having this, it's worth the weight.
**Poobah:** It's worth the weight.
**Bam Bam:** Has anyone retroed yet?
**Grinder:** That's what I was just gonna say. The same damn thing. It's amazing, bro. So I'm getting this great, like this great ying and yang because I get the, the graham cracker that you had mentioned.
Yeah. When I don't retro hale, but when I retro hail, I get tons of baking spice. Like a very Oh, that's exactly where I was gonna go. Very
**Bam Bam:** pleasant. Baking all dessert notes on the retro dude. It's
**Poobah:** up and shocking. What the fuck? You know, it's why we pair to run with it tonight, which we'll get
**Gizmo:** to. But yes, I'll add a third leg on what you guys are saying with the retro hail.
The smell with the burn line to me enhances when I draw the cigar. Absolutely. It actually enhances it for me. Agree with you, which we talk about sometimes, but this is one of those that it's really doing
**Senator:** it. Yeah. The aroma at the burn line. It's like a cookie factory. We about some
**Gizmo:** [00:10:00] like, it's amazing actually, it's funny, we're we're right near the former Nabisco factory.
That's right. Which is a big to do right now. They're taking down now. Yeah. So,
**Poobah:** so this is one of just having experience with these, like this is one of those cigars that you're gonna wanna smoke it really, really fast. You can't, you can't. Yeah. The temptation. The temptation. It's the temptation because like the, what you're like, it's a little bit more tightly packed than maybe you'd get like an e tube.
But the draw is great. It's a, it's a, yeah, it's a chill and sig it's a chill and sig it that's, it's a chill and sig, you gotta really chill with it like you want. Cause you're gonna want more of it if you heat it up.
**Gizmo:** Take it easy. Take it easy. So this seriously reminds me, so
**Poobah:** it's really like refined and kind of sophisticated.
This is the Kanye that I love that a couple of the admins on our website love D on our, on our group love. Yeah. Like this is kind of, and this is by the way also just for the record, for the list, [00:11:00] so it's a little bit of a unicorn. This is an h and F box too, which is hunters and f Frank, out hunters and frank out, which has a connection that goes back to Upton to 1844.
I mean, it's like in, in, in insane.
**Gizmo:** So for the listener, hunters and Franco is the exclusive distributor of Haos in the United Kingdom, right? And they serve all of the retailers there. And sometimes when you get a box that's come from one of those retailers, it has a green square sticker on the box that they add after they inspect it, which has a its own serial number on it.
And, uh, that's what PUB is referencing. It's an H and F Lu 15 Box, um, out of the uk.
**Poobah:** That's correct. And, and, and they actually just historically, um, Upton has a relationship with Franco going back to the, you know, the late, uh, the late 19th century. I [00:12:00] mean, it's like, it goes back that far. So you're talking, this was founded in, h Chapman was founded in 1844, and they eventually partnered up with Franco.
And so they had a, that's how far it goes back is, is, is what I'm saying. So, um, and it's, it's one of the most historic. You know, mark is in history. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** Ever,
**Poobah:** ever
**Bam Bam:** has any, has anyone had the connoisseur? B? Cuz I've
**Gizmo:** never had that. We're having that actually, that's gonna be the next in the line. Is that right?
Of Connie's? Yeah, that's lined up. Can I have that? Probably in a couple months. Yeah, we're gonna do all four, but the B is next. And the one and two. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. The Connie, the Connie one is actually the first, uh, in the connoisseur line that was released. It was released I think about 10 years before this point.
Point. Oh really? They've just added more, uh, in the line. And I think the Connie [00:13:00] two now is an actual L CDH release. But, um, we'll do that one at the Yes, it, the last point. It
**Poobah:** has a band on the second band is crazy because it's the same thing. But I mean, it's, it's a, it not the same thing, but I mean, it's a, it's an L C D H, so.
What?
**Grinder:** What's the, why are they spelling it wrong?
**Poobah:** No, well, they're spelling it wrong because they can, I mean, it's just like, it's just like the stubbornness of of it all. Yeah. And we
**Gizmo:** don't care. And I think they just printed, they must have just printed the bands like at one point and just have a surplus of misspelled bands.
What
**Grinder:** a major production. Fuck up.
**Senator:** I just hope they know they've misspelled.
**Grinder:** You should find a complain.
**Gizmo:** Probably not. Probably not. But wow, this is a delicious cigar. It really is. You know what I find, even for its age, I find it to be very, very subtle compared to, you know, in H up in number two, or Sir Winston.
It, you know, it's requiring a slow smoke and it's just not as mfy as some of the others in this world. Well,
**Bam Bam:** but there's a [00:14:00] sophistication in the subtlety of this cigar. A hundred percent. And that cannot be denied. You can't deny the sophistication of that. Totally agree.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. I I get some
**Rooster:** creaminess too.
Absolutely. Creamy and cedar notes. Oh, yeah. On the
**Gizmo:** cigar.
**Bam Bam:** And try retro. You'll get the dessert.
**Gizmo:** Spice all. Yeah. I don't, I don't know how to do that.
**Poobah:** I'll show you. Yeah. Like, like, like for me, this is like, it makes me smile because it's, it's like an exemplification of, of Upton. And you guys know how much I love Upton.
You guys love uping too. Yeah, we do. It's, it's not, it's, but it makes me smile. It makes me happy because I love these kind of flavors. Mm-hmm. And, and it's kind of just, it's delivering that d n a in just a different way.
**Gizmo:** When we all drew straws all those years ago, About which rabbit hole to go down. You drew the H up and straw cuz you have gone headfirst.
No questions asked into H Up. But he was heavy into Connie A [00:15:00] Oh he loves a Connie a Yeah. I mean it was a
**Senator:** running joke obviously for a while. We're like the Coner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But what are you smoking today? The Cartier.
**Poobah:** I like it. Um, and it's giving, it's, you know, it's cool. It's giving off that, you know, when you look at the ash compared to um, some of the other cigars that are younger, it gives that with, it's that it's that kind of black and.
**Gizmo:** It's a darker gray, darker ash, right? Yeah. That says, but it's really holding on Nice. I mean, the construction's fantastic, but look at, look at yours. Ru's got a white
**Poobah:** ash. Oh, he does? Your is a little bit whiter. What's yours look like? Kind of in the middle. Kind of in, and yours is kind of in the middle, but
**Gizmo:** yeah.
So I misspoke. By the way, the Connie B has the second band on it, not the Connie two. That was a misspoke. So we're gonna do them all. Yeah,
**Poobah:** we should do 'em all. We should try 'em cuz those are, those are like, those are good cigars within the h up and line that we should try. This [00:16:00] cigar does need time. Like it's a fact.
It needs time. Like the up and two. It needs time. And the Sir Winston and the Sir Winston needs time. I, it's just the way they're built. But all
**Senator:** of them, I mean, honestly that, that's probably my only knock on the up in line is that the vast majority of them need time. The only
**Gizmo:** ex, the only out
**Senator:** the half Corona, except my patience is not, you
**Bam Bam:** know, very long.
Honestly, the half Corona you can smoke the moment you get that tint. That's the exception. That's right. A hundred percent. Yeah. And they're also very, very,
**Poobah:** they're very good, but not a premium. No, definitely not. Um, I
**Rooster:** think the upend
**Gizmo:** 46 Yeah, the Magnum 46, mag 46, you could smoke them. That's true. That's fairly true.
But
**Poobah:** like it delivers a way different experience. Sure. This,
**Gizmo:** this is more the, this is more in line to me with classic upend dna. Well, than anything in the Magnum line. It's Cuban dna n a. Yeah. Well it's, but I'm, it's also blended right next to some of the other cigars that we've mentioned. I mean, it's certainly, you know, the baking spice things.
Mm-hmm. You know, some of that is absent [00:17:00] or is overpowered by other things in the magnum line, but, To me, this is right, right there with the up and two and the, and the Winston.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. And we are getting a treat tonight. This is an eight year old
**Gizmo:** cigar. Yeah. Right.
**Poobah:** Absolutely. Yeah. And the, you know, with, in tonight we were talking about this, um, I really wanted to pair, as this exemplified the text, I wanted to pair Arum with this.
It works great. Yeah. I wanted the pair classic Cuban. I wanted to pair Arum with this because of just the kind of the, the, the, cuz it's a classic kind of pairing. Yeah. And I think that the dessert flavors of a rum kind of pair up well
**Bam Bam:** with, with the dessert flavor, flavor of, I know eventually we'll get to the spirit, but the, it, it really works.
Fantastic.
**Grinder:** Yeah. So did you ever see, um, you got, of course you've seen it when a blender is, has that collection of, of cigars that he or she is kind of, you know, ingesting. They, they get their, they get kind of into it. They like dive headfirst into the aroma and they, they, they lightly, [00:18:00] they lightly. Draw on it.
And then they have like these bursts, episodic bursts of heavy draws and they just kind of envelope the room. That's what I wanna do when I smoke, when I smoke this cigar, cuz there's so much going on that I, like, every time I'm drawing, I'm getting a new flavored note that I just can't put my hands on.
You know? And it, and, and I, I, I've never had the cigar and the complexity on it is, is, is tremendous.
**Gizmo:** I think with age. I think this is a very, very unique cigar. And, and despite what I said about it, having very dna, similar to a lot of dna, similar to the other up in cigars that we talked about, this very much stands on its own for me.
Yeah, agreed. It's actually
**Rooster:** gotten better after the first
**Gizmo:** half an
**Rooster:** inch or
**Gizmo:** an inch.
**Grinder:** I'm, I'm amazed cuz you're Ash is actually truly white. Right? And then I'm looking at mine and it's really dark. What? Yeah. It's amazing.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. You're the outlier tonight, rooster.
**Gizmo:** So Puba mentioned the [00:19:00] rum. Let's talk about it.
Yeah. So we did this specific four square exceptional cask rum early in our recorded career. I mean, very early. Yeah. It's a single blended rum. Uh, they call it the exceptional cla uh, cask selection. They release it once a year. It's a rum out of Barbados. So the one that we did probably a year and a half ago, very early on, was from 2009.
And this is the 2010 release of that rum. And what's beautiful about it is they add nothing very similar to when we talk about tequilas or, or other spirits that are completely unadulterated. Um, this spirit has nothing added, no sugar, no color, no additives at all. It's a single barrel. Out of Barbados.
Yeah, it,
**Poobah:** it is. And it, it's a, it's a distillery that's run by Richard Seale and he's a fourth [00:20:00] generation, uh, distiller, um, of the RL Seal and Company, um, family. Um, so he has these kind of unique approaches to rum blending and maturation, and he kind of releases these. Uh, batches in, in, you know, these small batches, uh, when they've reached what he feels like is exceptional quality and they're just available for a limited time in these cast selections.
So, um, on these, there's individual numbering on these bottles and, um, they do some unique things. So he's, it's, he, bottom line is, he's a little bit of, I wouldn't say an aristocrat, but it's, it's generational. Um, you know, in Barbados, the, the, the farm that he, um, has the distillery on where they harvest [00:21:00] the sugar cane is a farm that's, that's been in their family for, for multiple generations.
There's, there were starts and stops. Um, in terms of, you know, what they were doing in terms of making rum, it was a sugarcane farm for a long time. Um, and one of the couple of unique thing things, things they do in terms of production, um, there's, they use their, they're, they use a distillers yeast that no one else uses from South Africa.
Um, and they use this two step process, um, where they, they use a temperature controlled. Process used by computer. So they kind of make like old school. They, they mix technology with traditional distilling techniques and then they use these molasses that are imported from Guyana that are added. It's so
**Gizmo:** he does, that's where I get all my molasses is Guana.
Is
**Poobah:** my [00:22:00] Guyana. Yeah. Guyana. No, no, exactly. So Gu, you're now in the pre pronunciation
**Gizmo:** Guyana. I have my assistant handling
**Poobah:** anyway, they blend their rums before and after the aging with all the casks and they age everything in American white, oak, bourbon, whiskey, casks. Um, can
**Gizmo:** I ask a question? Yeah. Hold on one second.
Why are the Americans so good at making. Make good barrels, these barrels. Yeah. Why are we so good at it? We just have a lot
**Grinder:** of, we have the forest, we have a lot of forests. It's a forest,
**Senator:** it's trees. It's just making it though, it's, it's more than that. They're, they're using X bourbon barrels. That's right.
What's most important is that it previously aged bourbon. Right. So let me
**Gizmo:** ask this. Why is bourbon, why are bourbon barrels so crucial to so many distillation aging processes? It's a great question around the world. I don't, great question. It's shocking to me. Yeah. I,
**Grinder:** I, the, the reason why the, the bourbon barrel became, came into exist, and we've talked about this in the past, is that, [00:23:00] you know, there, there was a time, at least in the scotch tradition, where they didn't use American oak, but they, during the wartime, they needed to import, you know, Basically import the, the, the, the wood to, to make that happen because they just didn't have enough forest in Scotland.
Mm-hmm. And it was also time of war. And they used them, their resources for other things. So they be, they began, you know, importing formerly cuz the Americans were just making these things and then dumping them. They were just trashing them and then they, you know, the Scottish are very ingenu, they decided to sell, to buy them up.
I think I'm hypothesizing here. It might just be a, a trend, like a traditional trend that kind of came to fruition from the success that the scotch industry had. That is completely hypothesis, but it's, you know, it, it, you know, begs the
**Senator:** question. Mm-hmm. It's that, but also just in terms of why you would want to impart the flavor from a bourbon barrel.
Mm-hmm. A sherry barrel, all these things, I mean, for dark spirits, the color you're looking for something and [00:24:00] flavor that, like previously aged, a sweet, rich. Spirit. Um, and that's bourbon, that's Sherry and, and other things. And that's why they pursue those. Yeah. And we produce so much bourbon. Yeah. That there's a ton of those to go around.
Mm-hmm. In a way that like, you know, Sherry barrels are so hard to find, like there's not nearly as much Sherry produces bourbon and that's why
**Bam Bam:** they're rare. And those barrels are
**Poobah:** coveted worldwide. That's totally, totally. So, so Richard Seale, um, and his family, um, so they do cast selections aged in a variety of different barrels, Sherry Port, Madeira, and Zinfandel.
Hmm. Uh, casks. Um,
**Gizmo:** and that's, uh, senator's favorite kind of wine. It's Zinfandel. Oh no. Hard cs.
**Poobah:** I hear you. But maybe with a rum. It's good. I don't know. No, no. With a rum
**Gizmo:** it would work.
**Senator:** The wine. Just dump it out.
**Gizmo:** Yeah, dump it out.
**Poobah:** I, I thinkin infantile. But there's no, but, but to your point, there's no color, no sugar, no additives or [00:25:00] filt filtration in these, in these rums.
And I think
**Gizmo:** also that's a, that's a lizard approved process voice. It's a Liz
**Poobah:** Lizard approved process. And also what's really cool too is, is that the family has been making rum since 1820. That's incredible. There've been starts. That's pretty amazing. But that's amazing. Yeah. But the up butman was started in 1844.
So this is how, so I just thought that that's cool. It's a perfect alignment that this is kind of, you know, this is, this is historic. This, they both, these products are from the Caribbean.
**Gizmo:** And they're almost 200
**Poobah:** years old. Yeah. You know, and I just thought, that's incredible thought that was that, that, that's, that's pretty incredible.
Um, and
**Gizmo:** uh, the thing I like
**Senator:** on the four square, I dunno if you get this, especially for maybe guys that don't drink as much rum, but on the finish, do you notice there's this flavor note that is probably very hard to place?
**Bam Bam:** Well, I'm gonna go out on a limb. You're gonna laugh at me, but it's, it's almost like a bubblegum type of a sweetness to me.
It's very, it's a [00:26:00] beautiful, very, very pleasant finish for me.
**Gizmo:** I'm not, I'm not able to call it out, so go for it. But do you notice there's something, there's something there, there that at the very
**Senator:** end, that's that funk. It's a, it's very big. So if you look up like funk in rum, I'm not kidding. Like, I know this sounds ridiculous.
Jamaican rums are big. Any Barbados is, is big with this and Foursquare, it's just on the finish you get like mm-hmm. You taste the sugar cane, like the traditional rum notes. And then on the finish there's just this note that you're never able to place that they just call this funk that from the distilling process that some use like Foursquare, um, like Appleton estate, like certain other distillers.
It just imparts that. You just know it when you taste it. It's like we talk about twang in a Cuban cigar.
**Bam Bam:** Well, I was about go there. That's exactly where I was gonna go.
**Gizmo:** It's just like that. We might need a new t-shirt. Well, with this particular cigar,
**Bam Bam:** Tang funk, the twang that you're getting on this cigar pairs beautifully with that funk that you're mentioning in the spirit.
It's a great, great pairing.
**Senator:** Great pairing. It's like sweet but earthy. Yeah. It's this [00:27:00] weird
**Bam Bam:** complex
**Gizmo:** flavor. Absolutely. So let me ask you a question.
**Poobah:** Yeah. It's really why, like, I was like on the text, I was like, we're like, okay, we're gonna do the connier. And I knew I had this box and I knew that. You know what I mean?
And I'm like, we gotta do Foursquare. We gotta do a rum. We gotta do a really good rum with
**Gizmo:** this because it, I'm glad, I glad we found it, by the way. Cause this is very hard to find. It's hard to find. That's true. All right. So let me ask a question. So for the guys who you know in the room, I think all of us have had a lot of Cuban rum and we did a bunch of them on the podcast
**Senator:** recently.
No. Which by the way, has no funk. Very fun style. I was gonna gonna say it is.
**Gizmo:** It is different. He's right. Right. So now for the listener out there, Who maybe hasn't tried one or the other, or neither of them, or both. How would you kind of compare and contrast what the Cubans are doing with Havana, with Santiago, some of the different rums they put out with a rum, like an artisanal rum like this that also has no additives, you know?
How would you
**Bam Bam:** compare them? Well, you know, I think Senator hit it on the head. That funk [00:28:00] doesn't exist on the Cuban rum, but also, I've never put a chip of ice in any of the Cuban rums that we've ever had. The Santiago? Yeah, the have any of the Havana clubs, no ice needed
**Senator:** ever. So this is a very astute observation.
Like there's a very d big difference in, for some reason, I can't tell you exactly why. Obviously someone made these decisions, but Cuban rum versus really any of the other islands in the Caribbean in the sense that, like Bam said, with Cuban rum, any good Cuban rum, you'll almost never need ice. It's like 40% max.
They don't make over proof rum in Cuba. Um, It's very smooth, very straightforward, I would argue. Um, a lot of the other islands I think, experiment a little bit more. I. They're very happy to make over proof rum. I think the flavor profile can be more complex and so it kind of depends on what you're in the mood for or you know, what suits the occasion.
Yeah. [00:29:00] But it's very distinct, like truly Cuba's an outlier among, it's true all the rest of the Caribbean islands in terms of the flavor profile that you get in Brown Spirit. Now
**Bam Bam:** experience between, between the Santiago and the Havana Club, I get, for me, I get more caramel in the Santi, in the Santiago.
We're in the Havana Club. For me, it's vanilla all day long.
**Poobah:** But this is super
**Bam Bam:** caramel. Oh, dude, it's, this is excellent. And I've had this, now this is like a Carmelo. So here's the thing. I yeah, I've, I've,
**Gizmo:** I haven't had alo in a long time though.
**Bam Bam:** Caramel. Am I wrong? No. Carmelo's a thing. It's a thing. I know.
**Gizmo:** It's a candy bar, right? Yeah, it's a Rolo. The Rollo. Rollo. That's it. That roll by the way, for the listener, the, the rum that we're drinking tonight is 60%, 120 proof rum. So, but guys, so we don, if
**Senator:** we don't make it through the episode,
**Gizmo:** you'll know why,
**Poobah:** but with a little bit of ice, how great is it?
**Bam Bam:** It's fantastic.
Excellent. But it's fantastic. I don't, I don't like it. Oh, even really? You don't like it
**Poobah:** with the,
**Bam Bam:** you gotta turn his mic off now.
**Gizmo:** I know. We have to skip over [00:30:00] him when,
**Grinder:** so coming back, I don't, I don't know what funk is in rum, so I, I can't put my finger on that. I, I don't taste, you know, whatever funk means I don't taste funk.
Um, it's definitely. It's a little over proof for me. Mm. Well, did you put ice in this? There's, I put tons of ice in this, in this thing. So
**Bam Bam:** I've had the, the Foursquare without Ice. It takes a little while for it to settle in, but once it settles in without the ice, It is really, truly, it's an excellent experience, but it's different than the Cuban rums that we've had where right off the bat it's, it's fantastic and smooth.
Oh
**Gizmo:** wow.
**Poobah:** This is a good spirit. Guys. Get the fun. It's
**Bam Bam:** fucking awesome, dude. It's
**Poobah:** awesome. Am I, I crazy or? I think it's phenomenal. I love, I mean, it's really good.
**Gizmo:** I actually, I don't drink this much outside of the pod. I don't drink this much with cigars. I find myself going to this when I just want to have something sweet or a rum, or [00:31:00] especially around the holidays.
I was about to say that. I love, yeah, I love this, this rum around the holidays.
**Grinder:** I think my, my aversion also may stem from my pre, don't call it preconceived. It's, it's, it's just my experience drinking rum. Where I want that smooth, easy drink that is not gonna light my mouth on fire. And I, you know, that's a different experience from what I
**Poobah:** have right now.
I think you gotta put some rocks in it and just,
**Grinder:** I have, I just told you I have so many rocks in, where would you,
**Senator:** but if it's still too strong, obviously not enough, so just add a little more. It's true.
**Grinder:** How many, how many ice cubes did
**Bam Bam:** I put in this thing? Pretty good amount. Yeah. Yeah. You're a lightweight, it's
**Senator:** okay.
You have two options. Either add more ice or He's Right, you're a lightweight. I mean,
**Grinder:** just, I'm a lightweight. Sure. I, I'm happy to admit it. I love you. But that, that doesn't mean I'm wrong, it's just how I experience it. Yeah.
**Gizmo:** I don't think grinder drinks a lot of rum
**Poobah:** or don't, you know, this is a, I I, so for me, I think this rum is like a, I love it.
I mean, I think it's, I think it's [00:32:00] fantastic. The rums
**Gizmo:** I love with this cigar. I love the funk by the way. Yeah. I think that thing that's there at the end, like right at the end of the finish, I find it to be very intriguing and interesting. I agree. I agree. And I think, you know, pairing it with this cigar, which is not.
To me like that Upmanu Sir Winston, which is very, very, it has a lot of oomph. Not in strength, but in flavor. There's just a lot there. Wow. This is a subtle, delicious, wonderfully aged cigar. And I think the rum is pairing wonderfully with it. Yeah. The up and
**Bam Bam:** two has more body. Yeah. Where this has, and they both have baking spice, but this guy on the Retro Hale, because it's eight years old, the, the baking spice is so pronounced because of the age.
It pairs beautifully with the Foursquare.
**Gizmo:** I think this is a perfect pairing. A
**Bam Bam:** absolutely, a hundred percent.
**Gizmo:** This cigar is phenomenal. It is.
**Poobah:** Dude, I, I, I love the cigar, Sonny. Sorry, say that again. I love the ci, I love the cigar rooster. I mean, I love it. [00:33:00] Yeah. It's a spectacular cigar. I love it. I love it for what it is.
I, I, I agree. I love it
**Grinder:** that there's a lot of stuff going on here for me, and, uh, that's kind of what I'm enjoying. I think I mentioned before, I'm, I'm just, there's new. Elements that I'm tasting every time I take a draw.
**Poobah:** There's a, there's a floral element to it that I think, yeah, that I think that, that, I think that the up two doesn't have that gives it a little bit, that differentiates it, so you're getting these baking spices, but you blow it through your nose and you get a little bit of that floral, you get a little bit of that depth.
There's that depth there and, and, and, and that's, that's to me, this, this smoke, this particular box exemplifies what I think this connoisseur is and how it differentiates itself from, let's say the, the, the, the, a similar [00:34:00] smoke from the same time period and same factory as, as, as the two. It just, it's a little more floral.
Mm-hmm.
**Gizmo:** It's a, it's getting better and better. It is. It's getting better and better. It's building as it heats upbuilding. It's building. Yeah. It's building as it heats up, but, but in a really pleasant it really way. And there's no surprises here. It, it's just, it's really just bringing it's
**Bam Bam:** best. It's, it's, you know, it's, we're at the halfway mark for me it's, it's acting and performing and tasting like a quintessential Cuban.
**Poobah:** Yeah. Really. It tastes very Cuban me. Right. And that's why it goes good with the rum. Big time. Big
**Gizmo:** time. So let me ask you guys a question. I think that this is very pertinent, given the fact that we're smoking eight year old cigars tonight. So I, I think that this is gonna be a controversial topic tonight, which is of course why I wanna bring it up.
So, one of the guys on the f o H forum, uh, which I, I love to visit cuz I think it's one of the best places for information on the web about Cuban cigars. Uh, one of the, [00:35:00] one of the folks who post there called Rhino, uh, Posted a topic called Do you view your current aged cigar purchases as an investment?
Mm, and he says, I have a bit of a personal unicorn cigar. I've smoked one of my life, and it remains superlative. Perhaps it was the moment, perhaps the weather, perhaps just that stick, whatever it may be. I recently had an opportunity to purchase a partial cab. I hesitated due to price, but I bought it while I do the occasional trade.
I've never sold. It's just not my thing. I can afford the asking price. But it still seemed like too much, even though it was the going rate. These are just cigars, but something I burn. But this got, this box. Got me thinking. Are folks buying Rares boxes these days, like on Bond Roberts that they enjoy and perhaps also as investments?
Do you buy them just to smoke? Do you buy them to sell? And do you look at your collection as something that is an investment that you'd be willing to sell
**Bam Bam:** on Bond Roberts? I would like to know what cigar he's referring to. That's a good [00:36:00] question. I don't think he named it. Does he mention it? No.
**Gizmo:** Okay. So I, I have conflicting views on this, certainly given the latest increases in ha Bono's price that factors in.
But Rooster, what is, what's your opinion on it? No, I
**Rooster:** don't think cigars are an investment. The cigars are supposed to be smoked. And shared. They're not an investment. You don't buy a box thinking that you're gonna sell it in like five years or 10 years or more. You, you buy a ci you buy a box because you're gonna enjoy them, and you buy boxes that of cigars that you like.
So if you do buy an age box and you don't like it, yeah, you can sell it, you know? But I mean, I, I, I don't buy any boxes as in
**Gizmo:** for investment purpose. If the price goes up, it goes up.
**Rooster:** But that means I'm gonna have to pay that much more if I'm get another box, buy, buy another box. Right. So I'm, I'm glad
**Gizmo:** that I got the box when I did so, so, I, I want, I wanna split this into two categories based on what you just said.
For [00:37:00] me, the way I'm looking at some of my stock that maybe isn't hitting my pallet the way I've wanted it to with time or it's increased in value, 4, 5, 6, 7 x, what I purchased it for. The way I'm looking at it is there's, there's two factors. Some of the stuff that really is, some of the special stock I have the Vegas Robia Classicos aged up and twos aged, sir Winston's aged Eita.
Even my collection of eita that are young, that I'm gonna age, um, those I don't look at as investments, but the massive
**Bam Bam:** collection of loosies that you have.
**Gizmo:** But some of them I am kind of looking at like, wow, okay, what could I do with the dollar value that these things are going for, that they're not talking to me anymore.
What could I buy that is,
**Bam Bam:** now I know which one's not talking to you. And it's a crime.
**Gizmo:** It's a
**Senator:** crime. I have a hard time with this. So, yeah. I mean, do you, um, there's two questions here for [00:38:00] me. Are cigars an investment? I think now the answer is yes. There's something that continues to appreciate and value and therefore should be looked at as an investment.
However, and I say this like I'm gonna draw a lot of parallels to watches. I'm a big watch guy. It's the same thing. However, I personally and Phil, philosophically, if you are in this hobby, if you have a passion for this, I dislike and have a hard time with people flipping cigars for profit. Like you should buy them.
If you want to smoke them, maybe they fall out of favor, sell them to a buy. I just, I will never be able to or have a desire to purchase a box, wait for it to increase fivefold and then try to sell it and turn a profit for some reason. There's something about that that for me, Can compromise this
**Gizmo:** hobby for, I think everybody in the room, lemme just say, I think everybody in the [00:39:00] room agrees with you on that.
Yeah. I think there's an ickiness to purchasing a box for the purpose of flipping it, but hold on. Right. There are
**Bam Bam:** circumstances that change what he just said, like you as an example. I know there's Aveola and a Marco that you're, you can call it out. That's a fund De ados. Yeah. Trinidad. Yeah. So if you have a marker that's accelerated in value, It's not hitting you in a sweet spot, then that could be considered an investment.
Yeah, because the value has increased as you've held it. And you don't want the
**Senator:** cigar anymore. Well, yeah, well that's right. They're all an investment at this point. I mean, this is like so analogous to watches, right? Like there was a period in time where you could buy a Rolex or any fancy brand, and they actually were relatively cheap and they were not appreciating at any aggressive rate.
And so yeah, there was no opportunity to flip this whole like flippers now on the watch market that didn't exist decades ago. Yeah, the same thing in cigars. Like we were buy, you were able to buy Cuban cigars at a relatively cheap price. You were not making four x what you paid. That was not a thing. Yeah.
In Cuban cigars until two years ago, only recently. And similar watches in the last, you know, [00:40:00] 10, 20 years. It's 10 years really. It's like exploded. So it's definitely an investment. I don't think there's any dispute there. I agree. I just have a hard time with that. Doing this for that purpose and what
**Bam Bam:** grind, what, uh, rooster said earlier, I think hits the nail on the head.
It's unfortunate that. The prices of Cuban cigars have gone up so exponentially because I think it's making a lot of people think this way where I do have an investment, let me make some money on it. Yeah. It's unfortunate it shouldn't be that way. I think it just, just in the haos.
**Grinder:** Yeah. Agreed. Agreed. I. I think it's a conversation of what it could be and what it should be.
It could be an investment, especially in these kind of somewhat precarious times where you have these secondary and tertiary markets that are just, you know, there's, there's the cigar in the cigar, uh, consumer base has, I would argue, has grown and there's a lot more entries, there's a lot more people that are, you know, looking for specific cigars and the supply
**Gizmo:** has dwindled
**Grinder:** and the supply has dwindled.
So at this point, yeah, it could be an investment and you could, you know, make [00:41:00] some projections about where, you know, consumption's gonna be, and also inventory is gonna be, and then try to calibrate, Hey, this is a good investment. But I think what we, you know, what we ground ourselves in is enjoying the cigars for what it's worth.
And it's, it is literally, It's, it's, it's plants. It's rolled tobacco leaves. It's rolled plant leaves that comes from the ground. Yeah. And it's, it is meant to be smoked. It's just like wine. It's meant to be drunk. And, uh, I would argue it's, it's a question of Kurt or should, yeah. If I wouldn't hold anything past somebody for having a box of cigars that is in tremendously high demand and Yeah.
You, you could make a, you could turn a profit from it. I would never, I would never mm-hmm. Judge somebody for doing that. You wouldn't begrudge anyone. Yeah. No, not at all. However, I. Cigars should be consumed and enjoyed. And if you're gonna age it, you're, you're aging it so that you could eventually smoke it.
Well,
**Bam Bam:** like the cigar that we're holding right now, that's eight years
**Poobah:** old. Well, this is, this is a, this, this cigar is a 50 or $60 cigar. That's awesome. So let me, let me make a [00:42:00] point. No, I mean, honestly, with this factory code, it's a, it's 50 bucks.
**Bam Bam:** And if you had five boxes of these that are eight years old, I know you are not selling these cigars.
All right.
**Gizmo:** So let, let me draw a line again. Uh, my point is that when I look at my investment, my tower, whatever you wanna call it, in cigars, I'm not looking at everything with dollar size. No. Like romantic. What, what's the da, the, the Donald Duck guy who's obsessed with money, like, I don't, I'm not thinking like that.
Scrooge McDuck. Scrooge McDuck. I'm not Scrooge McDuck. What I'm looking at, I are the cigars that aren't serving me. That very well may be serving other people. There's nothing wrong with them. It just doesn't hit my pallet at a hundred, $120 a stick. Yeah. That cigar to me versus when I purchased it for a fifth of the price several years ago.
That to me, is an opportunity to maybe bring something into my tower to replace that box that is gonna be aligned
**Poobah:** with my pallet. Well, totally. I [00:43:00] think you sh people should manage their collections. It's a, it's kind of a, it's a collecting, it's, it's a collecting hobby. It's like you're collecting things and I think that if there are things that are in your humidor that, you know, maybe don't float your boat, that you thought may, maybe, that they would in the future, and they're, it's not your thing.
I mean, think about it. Not everybody loves ngo Number two. L g c MD number two. I, I, I, yeah. Not, not everybody loves the little Gloria Kabana number two. I mean, like, who, who's that? Yeah. Rob. Rob
**Gizmo:** Isla. Rob Isla. He
**Poobah:** doesn't Right. That cigar. Yeah. He doesn't love that cigar. Wow. I'm just saying there's, it's not like universally every premium cigar that's perceived as a high price cigar that everybody loves.
It's just not everyone has their own taste. You, you take a flyer in a box and maybe there's something in your humid or, I mean, I don't think there's anything wrong with selling it, flipping it. It's not something that I do. I mean, [00:44:00] I'm more into like sharing cigars and having
**Gizmo:** experienced Totally. I think, I think
**Senator:** Senator Point, I just wanna pick up on that.
So like, I have such a hard time with this. I don't judge any, anybody. People can do whatever they want, right? Like everybody has a, if you want to sell something and make a profit off it, go right ahead. Mm-hmm. There's just something like I, I guess the question I would ask, how many people here have actually ever.
Sold and profited off of a box of cigars. Not me. Not me. Right. So I, I have not has, so one or two, yeah, I haven't, and it's not that I can't, like I have the same fundies you have that are worth way more than we bought them for. Same here. I have plenty of things that fall into that category. You know, eight 90 eights that I bought at a great price that are worth much more, uh, so many things.
So many things. But there is something we, and it's the same thing with watches and people are like, oh, are you ever gonna sell? Like, I don't know how to explain it. It's just for me, the moment I sell something that I consider like a passion and a hobby for a [00:45:00] profit, then it become like in, it's just this mental thing.
It becomes like a business. It such a thing. And I don't want it to be that way. And so I intentionally don't, even if a cigars not serving me for some reason, like the only cigar in my life, lifetime. I have ever sold. And I didn't even do it. I gave it to Gizmo and it's
**Bam Bam:** cause of course he did. What else is new man?
No, but listen, what
**Gizmo:** else is new? I'm right there with him and
**Senator:** it's because I, you're J Churchill, it's because I hate this Marcus so much. It was the r and j Churchill. Right? Right. And I finally just said, fuck the rest of these cigars. And GIZ sold them and he sold some himself and we got rid of em. Yeah, right.
But outside. And I felt good doing it because I felt so burned by r and j. It's like I fucking sourced an 2018 box with a Parus factory code. They look beautiful and they couldn't smoke at all.
**Bam Bam:** But there're But there are people that love that
**Senator:** they are, and so great for them, let them buy them and fight with that
**Bam Bam:** cigar.
The utility of the utility of what you're describing, I think makes sense for someone that has a box of cigars that doesn't make sense for them. I [00:46:00] know,
**Senator:** but my, my point is I can't, I just have a hard time doing that regularly or really with any, like, I will probably never sell another, even if I don't like something, I would rather just give it away to someone who does or.
Revisited in a few year. I, there's some philosophical barrier for me where like I have things that are for business purposes that I actively seek a profit in, and this is such a hobby I. And a passion the same way. Watches lifestyle things,
**Gizmo:** lifestyle, let's, let's even double down. It's a
**Senator:** lifestyle. It's this thing of ours is a big part of our life and like, crosses it.
It, it just crosses a line for me that makes it something I don't ever want it to be. That's my,
**Grinder:** I I just want to echo that sentiment that, uh, Senator eloquently kind of laid out is that, you know, uh, the, when you have, when you love something this much, it, it just kind of, it kind of hurts your, it kind of grinds your gears to, to view the other people in the market as like Amazon [00:47:00] resellers.
Like, that's not why we're here. We're not here for to, to, to scour the market and find the right distributor at the right price. We're here to, to find the right distributor at the right price so that we can smoke it and then keep it for ourselves and share it with our friends. And, uh, I think that kind of goes to the, the reason why we're here, the reason why we have the podcast, the reason why we love this so much, and the reason why.
Um, you know, gizmo mentions it as a lifestyles because it is, you know, it's something we all of us essentially do every day. So, and you know, we, we fit it into our, into our daily agenda for a reason. And, uh, you know, to have, you know, all of us are, I think it's indicative of, of of the right reasons to be in the hobby versus the wrong reasons.
Mm-hmm.
**Gizmo:** I agree with you. So the thing I wanna say too is that I, I agree with everything you guys said. So when I'm looking at a box that's not serving me and transacting it in some way, it's really for the purpose of. Acquiring a box to replace it, that does serve me. So if [00:48:00] I'm able to sell a box of Trinidad, fund Dedos, and pull in a box of Cohiba and Ceros or something that really is serving my palette and really serves me as a smoker and serves my enjoyment of the hobby, I'm not a guy buying boxes to flip them.
I'm buying boxes to have them. And if they don't work, I'm happy that maybe there's somebody out there that I can transact with that will appreciate them, or, and I could take that and, and, and purchase something else or someone in the room.
**Bam Bam:** No,
**Grinder:** but, but like I said, I would never begrudge somebody for committing to the capitalist, you know, agenda here, because it's, it's like if there's a market for it and you wanna help somebody else, or that other person has a demand and you have the supply, why not?
Why not make that trade? And I,
**Gizmo:** and to your point, and to both of your points, I, let's merge them. I don't think. What I'm saying or doing, let's say if I do sell a box of fun to Doris, that doesn't work for me, or I don't want. I don't think that I'm [00:49:00] necessarily, uh, offending our lifestyle. No. Or the choices that we make.
I don't think I'm turning it into this capitalist business endeavor by saying, I have a box. I don't wanna smoke. It's worth a lot. Dude. I can do something. It's the
**Poobah:** whole, but it, that's, that's guys, it's the whole way we actually transact with people. A hundred percent. It's true, but it's, it's totally
**Bam Bam:** fine.
There is something to what senators is saying wrong. There's like a purity to buying a cigar, holding onto it. You, you made an effort to buy it. It's this, it's in this thing of hours where we're spending a lot of time with it. There's something to that. Like, I wanna
**Senator:** say, look, everything is the saying makes perfect sense.
It does make sense. No, it does. I, I, you know, I need to be coached to get to a place where a cigar that's not serving me, that I would make three times what I pee. I've coached myself, of course I should sell it. Like of course that is the rational thing to do. But when you said like there's a purity, like I, for whatever reason, I'm just a purist about certain things.
Yeah. And it's hobbies. And for me, hobbies [00:50:00] are not for profit.
**Gizmo:** But there are so many cigar personal, right? He's, there are, but hold on. There are so many cigars that we've enjoyed that we would've not enjoyed. Had these transactions not existed? I
**Poobah:** was suspect. You, you mean like the one we're
**Grinder:** smoking right now?
Fuck. I mean, to pub's point and,
**Poobah:** and to, to your, I I, I could, I could have sold these for fucking, if I put these up on, on our group, forget it. Oh, yeah. Would've he sold in
**Gizmo:** five minutes? He wouldn't. Of course he
**Bam Bam:** wouldn't, wouldn't.
**Gizmo:** I would never do it. He wouldn't do it. But I'm saying I only want to sell stuff that isn't speaking to me.
I'm not looking at my collection of cigars. I love going, wow, there's really cash there. It's just cigars that, that don't work for me, you know? Now here's
**Bam Bam:** a question. The Fundee is a celebrated cigar. It's a luxury item. Why not hold onto them? Because for the, for the, just for the sake of See how they develop.
Yeah. For the sake of time, there are a coveted, coveted mark, a coveted cigar. You think it's what
**Poobah:** everybody does? No, I, I'm holding on to all kinds of shit. I know you are. I know. So is everybody else. Yeah. I
mean,
**Bam Bam:** you [00:51:00] just, but I will take a lizard discount on those funds. I'm also,
**Senator:** I'm also, I'm also do
**Poobah:** think it's happening right now.
You think I'm not holding on, we're not holding onm. I'm gonna say we're holding on right now. This is what it's holding on's
**Senator:** about. I'm gonna say one thing. It's true. True. And now I'm putting the full on like business capitalist hat on senator's
**Bam Bam:** hats on right now. Hats, pipe down. Everybody. The
**Gizmo:** hats on.
He's got his quarter zip.
**Senator:** And what I'm about to say is what I've, if I only knew Rooster years ago, or anyone who's bought watches like I do, so if you're putting the capitalist hat on and you're saying, well, okay, I, these are not serving me so. I would actually make a nice profit right now and I can put that towards something else.
Guess what? And, and especially now, Haos is explicitly trying to make Cuban cigars into a luxury good. And they have succeeded right now. We can't deny that. Especially, no, especially Coban Trinidad, right? We can't deny that they have succeeded right now uhs are that that cigar is gonna be worth if you actually held it, like I'm suggesting big time for another five years gonna be worth even more.
Dude, hold on. He's right. Okay. [00:52:00] Like
**Gizmo:** significantly, he's not wrong potentially, but what I would transact a box of Trinidad fund a doors for and buy a box of Cohiba and Sero, it's like a, it's, but there's, it's
**Senator:** a parallel's buy. My point is, you may be able to buy two boxes of Cohiba.
**Gizmo:** You don't know where the market, the price is not going down.
Senator, everything
**Senator:** you're saying, everything you're saying. Rooster and I have chatted about watches and Rooster had a very nice, uh, uh, roller point. The thing about
**Gizmo:** though is it doesn't disappear once you use it. Once I smoke a cigar, it's gone. Now watch you can hand down to your grand
**Senator:** great-grandchildren.
Everything you're saying is exactly why I thought that cigars would never be in the place they are. And yet here we are. That's true. Yeah. And look at the conversation generating. I agree with you, but somehow here we are. Yeah. So I just can't accept like I, my own logic has not followed where I thought we could never be in this place.
I can't sit here and say, well we've reached the limit. It can't possibly get much
**Gizmo:** worse. It sure as hell can. It will. I think it will. You know
**Rooster:** what? Out of, out of your, that's true. Your tower, everything that you have, how many actual boxes [00:53:00] would you be willing to
**Gizmo:** sell? Probably four mm
**Senator:** five seven. And my simple point to you, giz, is I guarantee you should be in no rush
**Gizmo:** if you, I am in no rush.
So here we go. I didn't prompt it. You, I saw this and I was like, this is an interesting, so my point is,
**Senator:** what you wanna do in any, any product like this, Yes, you wanna hold that as long as humanly possible because it's only going to increase in value. The question is simply how much it's gonna increase in value, but there's no universe in which 10 years from now, those exact fundies we're talking about that now will have 10 extra years of age on them, are gonna go for any less than right now.
I'll be, and so I would just, my advice would be, if that's the route you're gonna go, there's no rush. Hold it. You're gonna actually make more if
**Bam Bam:** you wait. This is kind of like an atonement moment for him. It's, I'll be at your doorstep tomorrow with a bankroll. I'll see you in 10 years. You got it. No, I'll see you tomorrow.
Morning.
**Gizmo:** Morning. My advisor just told me to wait.
**Bam Bam:** Fuck the advisor. [00:54:00]
**Gizmo:** You know his, his door is always unlocked. It's true. It's true. You just, you can always come in. This is true. Just kiss my dog. You're good. That's why I love him. You're good. Yep. So boys, we're coming in the last third here of the H up and connoisseur.
A. It's exceptional. Lu 15. Exceptional. It's exceptional. It really is. I wish I had a thousand of these guys. Me too. I would sell some funded doors to get some more of these. Uh, yeah.
**Grinder:** I, I, I'll buy from a third party, uh, reseller. Oh, go. Just to get some
**Gizmo:** more of these.
**Poobah:** Yeah. You know, you know what I like about it is that it, it, it, it, it is, it's, it builds Right Brown it Yeah.
It's
**Gizmo:** exceptional. Exceptional cigar builds and strength. Yeah, it does. And the pairing
**Senator:** is great. I will say I'm, I'm just really glad we did this in that, I think we've said many times Pub and I have very, very, very similar cigar palettes. Yeah. And. This was the one cigar that I thought you and I would never see eye to eye on because my experience, even with a coner with like four years of age has not been a good one.[00:55:00]
I now get
**Bam Bam:** it. Yeah. Honestly, get it. A lot of you have underrated this coner for a while and
**Gizmo:** but that's because they don't, they don't smoke great young. Well, young. They need that this much age. I, it's not even
**Bam Bam:** that. It's, I was never on the same page with you. I wasn't ever
**Senator:** on the same page. I know, but uh, my problem is, it's not that they're not great young and they're good.
I actually think they're bad young and they just have to you, you can't look at them for at least five, six years. Oh yeah. And that's a long
**Gizmo:** time to wait. Yeah. I'm starting to feel like that with the up men too. We've talked about that. I feel like the up in two needs, four years, five years to really get into a point where they're, I, you know, it's shocking to me that cigar fish in auto named that the cigar, the year's a young cigar.
Yeah. It needs time. It's
**Poobah:** not, but what you guys are saying is not. Hyperbolic. It's fact. It's also the box code. It's it's not, it's not. It's, but it's, but what you're saying though is like, [00:56:00] not to me is, is is fact. This is, this is true. This is true. This, this, this, this cigar, this, this cigar. Young is not the same cigar with age period.
No. Hard stop. Same with the Upton too. It's actually documented, I mean, it's documented that, that these cigars really, they become something very, very, very special. Like we said this before, with for most it becomes very special. Yeah, well, yes. Yeah. Too much. The wins. Winston two, the Sir Winston two rooster.
Hold on. They, they, they, they, something about them. They just need that time. But when they hit that stride, they are, Wonderful.
**Bam Bam:** You know, I have three year old Kanye's, it's, it's truth, three-year-old up in twos, and they are for me, delicious. And I covet those and I keep them. I don't wanna touch them. [00:57:00] For me, the, the threshold for me is three
**Gizmo:** years.
But how do, do you like this? That's me. Do you like this one better? Oh,
**Bam Bam:** of course. This is better than any Kanye I have in my tower right now. There's a lot of complexity
**Poobah:** in this.
**Bam Bam:** Of course. They're good at three, they're exceptional at eight. I mean, it's extraordinary.
**Senator:** Then yet you, you must have lucked out with just a really good box.
I'm gonna share and I have bought ones with four years of age at this
**Bam Bam:** point. No, I'll share. They're not great. Share. I will share the box that I have. I really
**Gizmo:** love them. Share. I had a connier
**Rooster:** just about two days ago and I
**Gizmo:** wasn't thrilled with it. What was the box code? Or the date I threw the box away.
**Rooster:** I have no idea Date.
Okay. But it's not like 2014 or 15. It had to be like 18, maybe 20, 18, 19.
**Gizmo:** Oh, geez. Yeah, it's older than what I have. My nineteens are just not 19. Haven't I haven't reached for them in a while. Wow. I have a box of love fourteens that I haven't touched, so this is making me above
**Poobah:** 14 Kanyes. Yeah, baby. Well,
**Bam Bam:** oh,
**Poobah:** hold on.
I expect we expect the, hold on, hold on.
**Senator:** So hold on time. Now. Time [00:58:00] an accountability. Just brought my
**Gizmo:** last senator account, Senator. God. Now can we have an accountability senator? Bring it, bring it. Accountability hours. Can we have an accountability hour? Yes. I'm gonna ask you. It's that secondary market. I'm gonna ask
**Senator:** you a series of no more than three questions.
**Gizmo:** Fuck this man. No more than three questions. Hold on, hold on. I just need you to answer each one. I need you to pause one second. Grindr, can I retain you as my attorney? No,
**Bam Bam:** no. He's my attorney. I,
**Grinder:** I, I don't know where this is going, so I'm not willing to commit just yet as a client. Take your, yeah, he's gotta reprieve it.
But, uh, but, but let, lemme
**Gizmo:** you're out on the love. 14 county is, no, no, no. Let me
**Grinder:** just steadfast, let's just, let's just hear where this is going and then I'll probably jump in. All right.
**Gizmo:** Okay, go ahead. Talk to my counsel. Go ahead,
**Senator:** Senator. So, I just need to understand three things. Number one, Did you purchase this box of love?
14 Kanye's before or after the 2019 ones that we [00:59:00] hated after. Mm. Why? If you hated them. And we were saying, we don't like Kanye's. Why did you buy them?
**Gizmo:** Because I got a great price and my compadre over here PPA said that they're amazing.
**Senator:** And you've tried? Not a single
**Gizmo:** one. Not a single one.
**Bam Bam:** Wow. That's discipline.
That is amazing Discipline. I
**Gizmo:** haven't touched them. Wow. You know why? Because I wanted them to acclimate to my tower. How long have you had 'em? Yeah, 2014. Six weeks. Six weeks. Oh, you just recently got.
**Senator:** Okay. I thought you got these a while ago. No. Then I'm not concerned if you would've gotten those shortly after we had such a bad experience.
I was worried we had a secret flipper on our hands here. Yeah,
**Gizmo:** you by the way, grinder. I don't need your service. Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Thank God,
**Gizmo:** Puba. That one of those is yours for sure. Maybe two. Bam gets none. What?
**Bam Bam:** That's not fucking fair. I
**Gizmo:** know you love me. [01:00:00] I'll get one boys. This Parrington tonight is fantastic. Mm-hmm. I am really enjoying the cigar and the run. I
can't
**Bam Bam:** wait for the rating
**Poobah:** because, uh, it's gonna be crazy. And that makes me happy because I, I I I think the, uh, I think the cigar has merit.
I think it has merit with a, you know, it
**Bam Bam:** has more than merit. This is a spectacular cigar, pupa. Yeah.
**Poobah:** I, I, I, I believe it is. So,
**Gizmo:** I wish, I'll be honest, I wish it was an inch, inch and a half longer than it is. Because Ed an like, we're just about an hour, like I'm almost done with it. I, I really wish that I can get an hour 45 out of it, you know, where you
**Bam Bam:** get the additional experience.
And Grindr will attest to this. It's if you, I, from beginning of the cigar to where I am now, I've consistently retro hailed. I think if you continue to do that during your smoking experience, it enhances the experience and I think it extends
**Gizmo:** it a little bit. So what do you guys get out of the retro now in the last third versus, I'll let [01:01:00] Grindr like normally drawing it.
Like what's, what's the, what's the
**Grinder:** difference in the two? Well, I, I think when I was first retro hailing, I was getting, you know, those baking spices. Mm-hmm. The retro hill has definitely turned more peppery
**Bam Bam:** for me. It's the, i, I get more espresso. And coffee and the retro, the I get pepper. I haven't gotten any pepper on this.
No rough edges at all.
**Grinder:** No. Let me just, lemme qualify that statement a little bit. I don't get it when I, when on the aroma. I don't get it in my palate. There's no pepper on my palate. I only get it with that, with that retro hail. And I get that with other cigars when I retro ha. Um, and uh, it's not unpleasant.
It's just different. There's still those, those spices there, it's there, there, there's just more black pepper.
**Senator:** A a few things just about the, the flavor notes and kind of the experience all the way through the cigar. I think a lot of us said starts kind of mild. I think in the final third. It's firmly medium.
Um, I think it is a one [01:02:00] act play in that the notes are very consistent throughout and I don't say that as a bad thing. I'm someone who consistently says if I like the flavor notes, I love a one act play. It doesn't have to dramatically shift or change. Um, the only thing I will say, um, In terms of the flavor notes, there's not a significant level of complexity of this cigar.
Like there are certain dessert flavors that you get and you get those all the way through. I'm not getting any unique flavors that are outside of the bounds of the traditional dessert flavors that you would get from Mond. So if there's one knock, it's not an overly complex cigar, but it is excellent, and I'm enjoying every bit of it.
Hmm.
**Gizmo:** Rooster, how about you?
**Rooster:** Yeah, I'm, I'm getting, you know, like initially it was a lot of cedar and creaminess and, uh, baking spices, and that's kind of, it's, it's built as you
**Gizmo:** smoke the cigar.
**Rooster:** Like those flavors have gotten more concentrated till now. So I'm really enjoying
**Poobah:** it. I, I'm enjoying it too. I, I, [01:03:00] I, I, I agree.
I think that, that, that there's a concentration. I like it. I like the fact that it, it builds. There was a gradual build kind of in. The concentration of flavor. Like, it just, it kind of just slowly, very, very gradually builds in a little bit of strength. It builds in a little bit of body towards the end and, uh, in a good way, in like a really, really good way.
So, I like it. I mean, I like the, I, I like the cigar a lot. Um, so for me it's been, it's been, it's been really pleasurable. I think there's a, I think it exemplifies the Outman brand in a really, really positive, positive way. Um, and it's nice. I mean, it's just, I, you know, I like it a lot. Yeah. Yeah.
**Rooster:** [01:04:00] Yeah. Other than the, sir Winston, what is your favorite, uh, Up and cigar.
Well, the two, number two,
**Gizmo:** right? Same. Me too. The two. Yeah. It's amazing up. Uh, the, the Sir Winston's number one for me by far. The two is right behind it. Yeah, I would agree with that. But I think that, I think
**Bam Bam:** the, how do you compare 10 tonight's experience with that eight year old cigar that you're holding right
**Gizmo:** now?
Yeah. I mean, this cigars incredible, but, and we'll go through it in the ratings. I'm curious how this is gonna land. I'm still gonna put this for Winston and the Up two, especially the Love 14, they do edge this out for me. Hmm. I agree. Well, yeah. Yeah.
**Poobah:** They edge it up. They do. But where,
**Gizmo:** you know, but, and that's not a knock.
No, it's not. But you're, it's just we're talk, we're comparing, we're comparing a cigar to something that like the, the up and two from Love 14, the Sir Winston at, at five plus years, let's call it, [01:05:00] I mean, You're talk, you're, you're comparing that cigar to, to God level cigars, to, to banya classico 11 cigars, I mean, God level cigars.
So it, it's a tough comparison for really almost anything else. Yeah.
**Senator:** It, it is. And it isn't though, because the, the reverse of this, if you think about this a different way of those three cigars, which would you pursue young? Whether you're gonna smoke them young or you're gonna hold them and age them, you're probably gonna have the same answer.
**Gizmo:** Absolutely. You're correct. That's true. That's true. A hundred percent true. I mean, I, I know that I've, I've seen some folks that have smoked young, sir Winston's from 21 and 20, and they've performed brilliantly for them. Well, I have, I haven't done that. I had a young, but you in Cuba. In Cuba, you had a phenomenal experience with the Youngs.
They blew me away, sir Winston. It totally
**Bam Bam:** blew me away. Yeah. But this is better tonight.
**Gizmo:** And with that being said, the up and two young. [01:06:00] Is not working for me. No. Compared to something that's four or five years old. I don't think it works for any
**Senator:** of us, but I still take a young up and two over a young Kanye.
I agree with
**Gizmo:** you on that.
**Senator:** Okay. That's what I'm saying, whether you look at it from the age perspective or the young perspective, it's true of the order is the same for me at least then I agree with
**Gizmo:** you. This is true. I agree with you. Oh yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. But we're focusing on tonight and what we're having right now, and this, I can't stop retro haing the cigar.
I just can't. Yeah. It's amazing. And when you have that kind of experience where you're constantly retro hailing, it's, it's, uh, it just enhances the experience,
**Gizmo:** man. All right, boys. Are you guys ready to do the formal liquor rating on the four square exceptional cask single barrel rum from 2010? Yes. Bam.
Bam,
**Bam Bam:** you're up. So I am between a nine and a 10. Um, I will give this a nine. I think you mentioned earlier and a year plus ago when we, when we had the spirit, we talked about how amazing it was during the holidays, the spices that it has, [01:07:00] it really, it's appropriate for any time of the year. It's just, it's a grand, excellent, delicious rum.
Nine.
**Gizmo:** All right for me, grinder, ohoh. Hold on. Lemme say that again. You gotta turn off his mic. Lemme say that again. Uhoh.
**Grinder:** I feel like I'm gonna, you guys are gonna hate me cuz I'm gonna sink tank the, uh, the rating here. What the heck? Uh, I mean, I, I, I enjoy drinking rum. I don't enjoy drinking this kind of rum that has, you know, it, it's, it was a little too much for me.
Now, having said that, it was, you know, you find the deliciousness still there. Um, it's not disavowed and, uh, you know, I wouldn't, I wouldn't totally tank it for that reason. So for me it's a, it's a seven Oh oh
**Bam Bam:** wow. That
**Gizmo:** breaks my heart. Senator,
**Bam Bam:** I need a refill. Okay.
**Gizmo:** Okay.
**Senator:** Uh, for me it's an excellent, excellent rum.
Um, a true high quality Caribbean rum, like in [01:08:00] its truest sense. And I say that because Cuban rum is very much an outlier in a great way, in its own unique way. Um, I give it a nine. I, I genuinely do wish that Foursquare would come out with something lower proof that is a bit less aggressive, and if they could make it as enjoyable.
Where I don't need as, I mean, I put a lot of ice into this. Mm-hmm. More ice, honestly, than I've ever put in any spirit. Um, and that's what precludes it from being a 10 for me. But the, the flavor it imparts, I love the funky finish. Um, and, uh, it worked really well with this cigar. We
**Bam Bam:** gotta coin that phrase.
Funky finish. I like that. So
**Grinder:** many applications.
**Gizmo:** Oh yeah. All right. So for me, this is a no-brainer from the first sip to right now to when I have it at the holidays. It's a 10. Nice. I mean, very nice. It's to me, no question. Uh, we've had, what, what was the rum? We did the Santiago 20. Yeah, it's right there with that.
Yeah. This [01:09:00] is, this is a rum, but hold on.
**Bam Bam:** You don't need
**Gizmo:** ice with that. But this is a rum that I can go to my store and buy. I enjoy it. Yeah. So much. I, I covet this bottle of rum and home. It's fucking delicious. It's delicious. I wish I had a hundred of them. Yeah. It's a 10 for me. Yeah. This absolutely suits my palate.
I love this rum. Often, often. How often do you drink this? Awesome. Quite a bit. Nice. When Well, don't send you the pictures.
**Grinder:** I mean, he never, he's pining in his lounge at home. He never brings us into
**Gizmo:** the lounge. Listen, of course I don't, cuz I have like three bottles of it. Only Puba.
**Poobah:** Um, I love Foursquare.
It's a 10, I think it's the best. It's bar it, it exemplifies Barbados rum. They're the, they are the premier distiller of Barbados rum. Uh, that's, and period, it's four generations. They're doing it in a way that's more unique than anybody else does it. They take care. They only do [01:10:00] it in small batches. It's a fantastic spirit.
It's, it's a fantastic spirit. Spirit done in a way, um, with a lot of care. It's a craft
**Gizmo:** spirit with no, no additives.
**Poobah:** No. Right. And, and, and, and like, that's why you can't get the same bottle. Yep. Uh, they only do whatever it is, 30,000 cases at a time. So for me,
**Gizmo:** It's a 10. So bam. I wanna point out, yeah, by the way that I think I've broken the Senator UBA alignment, now Puba and I are aligned.
I see that. You see that Uhoh, you see that? Oh yeah. I think senator's out, senator's on the ass. Senator might out. He's on the
**Senator:** ass. I think you missed the boat. He like we're talking about cigars for line. Yeah. Well, no, the next rating.
**Gizmo:** Yeah. I
**Poobah:** mean, well, we'll see how that goes. Well, is it a little high proof?
Like, do I need all Listen, don't defend Senator. I hear you. But, but, but [01:11:00] for me, this exemplifies, um, I love that.
**Bam Bam:** It's something that's really, really good. I love that it's higher proof with a little bit of ice. It's an excellent experience.
**Gizmo:** Listen, just senators out, let's just enjoy that for
**Bam Bam:** a moment. All
**Grinder:** right.
Two tens, two nines, and a
**Senator:** seven gizmo a plus for effort.
**Gizmo:** The former Wick Rating Boys on the four Square Exceptional Cask single barrel rum. It was a 9.0. Excellent. That's
**Bam Bam:** 90. That's an
**Gizmo:** excellent score. Excellent score. Should be higher, but grinder. So be it. Comp, the composite score.
**Senator:** Nevertheless,
**Grinder:** you know, you didn't turn up.
It's a
**Bam Bam:** great score. It's cause you know that happened. Honestly, you didn't turn off his mic. I should
**Gizmo:** have. Yeah. Yeah. I really should have. No,
**Senator:** no. His rating was very useful for this.
**Gizmo:** Oh. You, you're, are you saying it nine is a fair score? Are you saying it hedged, ppa, and my, yes.
**Senator:** Listen, yes.
**Grinder:** Wow. It's a, it's a, it's a great rum as, as the composite lizard score, you know, demonstrates it.
I, it always, always does. I never, I, I, I don't want to ever drink this again. What, so like, I mean, and, but doesn't like rum.
**Senator:** That's, that's not something I pulled for, but he does drink rum occasionally. [01:12:00] So like, the point is, but what, when I do, it's never gonna be this one. It's not like that. That's my
**Gizmo:** point.
So it's PPA and me versus Grinder and Senator. Bam. Are you taking notes? What do you mean versus, oh, I'm, I'm not,
**Bam Bam:** I'm all
**Senator:** right. I, I have a new, I have a new proposal. Clearly, gizmo needs to work in the news media. He's, he's all about dividing the lizard tonight,
**Grinder:** by the way, the propaganda device. By the way, can I, can I also let the lizard record reflect the fact that I didn't like this the first fucking time I had it?
That's true. So like, what was his rating? Can you
**Bam Bam:** look that? We didn't have a rating? Didn't do one. We didn't Oh, that's
**Gizmo:** right. We never it Did you try Santiago 20? I think that he did
**Senator:** not. He would love that He did not try it. He would love that. He would love that. Absolute, because that's the true 10.
Absolutely loves that. Yeah. Yeah. It's a true 10. Wow.
**Gizmo:** That's an 11. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. All right. Onto the cigar boys. Okay. Let's give the formal lizard rating to the H Up men connoisseur a. Rooster, you're up.
**Rooster:** Yeah. So for me, this, this is a, it's a nine because I'm gonna, I think the, if if the same box box code
**Gizmo:** for a Sir Winston
**Rooster:** came up, [01:13:00] or the Lu 14 up in two, that would be a 10.
So this is, I mean, I would like to give it a little bit higher than a nine, but it's, it's a nine for
**Gizmo:** me. Okay. Puba? Yeah, it's a nine for me. Nine for me as well. Um, 10 is up two or Sir Winston. Same as, as Rooster. Absolutely a nine Senator.
**Senator:** As I said, you missed the boat gizmo. It's a nine for me. Uba and I are perfectly aligned
**Gizmo:** yet again.
Listen, I enjoyed my moment grinder. It's, it's also a nine for me. Okay. Bam. Bam. Taking our last straw here. Don't burn your
**Grinder:** fingers. Yeah, you, you're gonna get burned there.
**Bam Bam:** But I, I don't know how you're giving, I,
**Poobah:** I, you gotta give it a 10 cuz you're given like, I'm disappointed like Dominican,
**Bam Bam:** then Sarah.
Honestly, I'm a little disappointed. I'm gonna, you know, I haven't had many cigars that I've retro hailed from beginning to end, so I have to give this a 10 for what it is tonight. The experience tonight, the way it's smoked, it was an incredible cigar. It [01:14:00] is
**Gizmo:** 10. All right, so the formal lizard rating doesn't lie, boys.
It's a 9.2. Fuck me. That's a great
**Bam Bam:** score.
**Poobah:** There you go.
**Gizmo:** There you go. That's a great score for this cigar. I mean, I love 15. It's, I think a 92 is perfect. Well deserved. You know, you compare that to the up and two. I mean, what was that, a 97, 98? I mean, it's perfectly in line of how it performed tonight.
Totally, totally.
**Poobah:** I can't stop, I can't stop smoking an arm. It's, it's, it's, well, I thought it was, was cool to have the exploration to, to, to kind of like, I'm not saying that this was a polarizing smoke, but it's like a smoke that I've always liked it, it
**Senator:** was before this.
**Poobah:** Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Like, I'll be
**Senator:** honest, I actively, among this
**Bam Bam:** group, I hated it. Yeah. Before this, so. Yeah. But he's right. So, you know, this whole months and months have gone by and I've, I've always loved this cigar and I've never had any negative thoughts about it. You, you guys all know that. I've talked about it from time to time.
I kind of got piped down. That's fine. [01:15:00] It's, it's got much more merit than I
**Gizmo:** think Senator was texting me the other day like, let's get rid of these boxes. How much can we get for, I,
**Senator:** I certainly was not so, but, but, but I, I try wanted to, but I think the point of, but that's even my point. The fact that they're still sitting in my tower and I hate them.
I just can, can't bring myself to sell them. I want to hear what
**Bam Bam:** Pupa
**Poobah:** has to say. Well, no, no, no. Go. I, I think that, that one of the reasons why I wanted to bring these forward were, was because I wanted to bring them forward so the group could kind of experience the same experience that I had, which was a positive one with, with, with the cigar.
So, so yes, it, it's a fact. It's a, it's, it, it's not hyperbolic to say that up, that up, up twos. The coner, the larger ring gauge upends just need more time. It's not even debatable. It's, it's, it's documented like online. It's [01:16:00] documented by people. Like, this is a fact, we've experienced it ourselves. They need more time.
But with time, if you're willing to invest that time and buy some boxes and put 'em away, do it. Yep. I, I, I, I mean, and I don't think there's anything wrong with just saying
**Bam Bam:** what it is, dude, nothing wrong with that. In fact, that's why this is a 10 for me because it's age and it's right where it needs to be.
It's, it's an exceptional, perfect cigar
**Grinder:** because of the age. I, I think the conversation that we had around the discussion of resellers and aging is perfect for the cigar because for me, when, when I get a box of cigars and I know that I have to age them, I, I just won't, I don't want to, I don't wanna buy a new box of cigars and then have it sit.
So that is, is frustrating to me. However, It's, it's, it's just a product of the Cuban market. Yeah. Because everyone knows that some of these Cuban cigars are better aged. And that's why we have resellers. That's why, that's why we are consuming [01:17:00] this, these cigars and buying them from the, from the resellers.
Right. Because we know, and this is just because, you know, Cuba displaced that aging process. And you know, the, a lot of the Nua, Nicaraguans, uh, manufacturers, they have that aging process as part of their production process. Right. Because Cuba does this, and we have these cigars that that's why there's this market.
Right. Because you know, the consumers, they have to actually age them. It's a little frustrating to me when I, when I get at that cigar and I can't, and I can't immediately smoke it. However, enjoying this tonight to echo bam, bam sentiment. This moment, this his fucking phenomenal cigar. Yeah. And you can't, you can't debate that.
Yes, it is fact.
**Poobah:** Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And, and, and you can't duplicate it. You see, that's the thing. Yeah. Like you can't, so, okay, it takes x amount of time for this cigar to become what it is, but go try and duplicate it. Yeah. Yeah. Go try and like, it's not happening. No. Like go [01:18:00] try and duplicate that experience.
It's why Cuban tobacco is so special. It's why you chase it. It's why Rob Isla says it's like hitting a drive like that. Perfect. Drive down the fairway like, You chase it, you chase it. So this is part of that, this cigars part of that, you know, dovetails into that narrative. That's it. I, I, I, I mean, love it, hate it, love it, love it, love it, love it.
Whatever it is. I mean, it's just the way it is.
**Bam Bam:** But everything, he's, everything he's, he's talking
**Poobah:** about like, like, like, like, it's kind of like, like you either you, you either want to chase it, you don't want to chase it. What I'm, what I would argue is, Try. Yeah.
**Bam Bam:** Yeah. Everything he's talking about takes everything that we're talking about, this thing of ours to a much higher level.
And it, it's akin to the, that 80th that we had, that senator was aging in his tower, it's own 80th. How old were those? Four years plus? No more than that. Than more than [01:19:00] that. A total nine years. So that's an exceptional experience that most of us won't ever experience again. Yeah. And when you're rating a cigar, I, I'm gonna go back to that at that moment right now, as you're smoking it, it's, it's gotta be an exceptional rating,
**Grinder:** I have to tell you.
Bam. I really appreciate the, uh, continuous illusions to the Costa Nostra here.
**Bam Bam:** But
**Gizmo:** it's, it's like, it's like a little mafia. It's, it's kinda, yeah. Thank you. That, yeah. Yeah. When we turn off these mics, we're gonna have a whole ritual, dude. Absolutely. All right, boys, A fantastic night. A 9.0 for the four square ex exceptional cask single barrel rum, and a 9.2 for the H up connoisseur.
A from Lu, 15 Up, H Up and factory, an excellent night. We'll see y'all next week. Keep smoking. Hope you enjoyed this episode. Thanks for joining us. You can find our merch store and ratings archive at our brand new website, lounge lizards pod.com. That's [01:20:00] lounge lizards p o d.com. Don't forget to leave us a rating and subscribe on your favorite podcast platform.
If you have any comments, questions, if you wanna reach out, say hello, tell us what you're smoking, email us hello@loungelizardspod.com. You can also find us on Instagram at Lounge Lizards Pod. We really appreciate your time and we'll uh, we'll see you next week.