Day 12 - More Vapemail

My order from High Desert Vapes finally showed up! Picked up the monster flavor and I've been vaping it for the last 3 hours straight. I think I found my perfect all day vape! They even threw in a tiny 3ml freebie called "Organic Raspberry Cream" at 50/50 12mg.

Blurry picture of High Desert Vapemail

This weekend was a pretty good test case for being away from the house while vaping. It was the Magic the Gathering: Gatecrash prerelease weekend. Typically prerelease weekends I would go through an entire carton of cigarettes during the weekend. Theres a lot of waiting, a LOT of talking and a lot of being social between rounds for 15-20 hours each day.

The first problem I ran into was, I forgot to charge my batteries. I barely made it home when the last one went out. Not a huge issue but easily fixable, I just put a charger in my car.

The second problem was much worse. I ran out of eLiquid on Sunday. I thought I filled up 6 cartomizers Saturday night, but only filled two, the other 4 were empty. Combine that with opening one of the full CE5's when switching flavors (DOH!) I nearly ran completely out. Luckily a few other MTG players Vape and I got to pick up some extra eLiquid. If I had been anywhere else I would of been screwed, but luckily I live 5 mins from the venue, so if I had run out it wouldn't of been the end of the world.

I also ran into a leakage problem. With constantly moving my case around and bumping around, some of my Clearomizers leaked out and emptied on their own.

So my lessons this weekend are this:

• Bring a charger, always.
• Bring an eLiquid Bottle, just don't bring clearomizers prefilled.
• If I'm in a highly social situation where I want to change flavors a lot, don't fill them up all the way, they'll leak out.

I also had to field quite a few questions about vaping all weekend. Every type of person from the Super anti-smoking/nicotine jackasses to the interested smokers. Everyone was at least a little interested in what I was doing. Seems vaping is catching and becoming more common knowledge since I first started casually vaping oh so many years ago.

Day 9 - Vapemail!

Normally when my roommate walks into my room while I'm asleep, its time for a fight. However today was a delightful change, she brought in my Vapemail! She was actually nice about it too... she must be up to something.

Vapemail from Mt Baker Vapor (Juice & Adapter) and batteries from Amazon

I have to say, Mt Baker Vapor (reddit's juice vendor of choice) lives up to their reputation. Ordered Tuesday night and it arrived today. Their prices are absurdly low at $4.99/15ml. (thats $0.33/ML) AND they gave me a free 15ml bottle of a random flavor! First thing I did was pop in a random flavor, Vanilla Butternut and fired it up.

Oops. Yeah that flavor is a miss. It tastes exactly like it sounds. Vanilla Butternut, heavy on the butter. Ok so it seems not everything is a hit. I'll let it 'steep' for a few weeks before trying it again, maybe it needs time to settle, we'll see. So I moved on to my freebie flavor, Berry Creamy. It was quite pleasant. I may be ordering more of it. Overall I am very happy

Tonight is going to be a test. I will be out of the house for 15+ hours tonight in a position where I would normally chain smoke. Its the Magic: The Gathering Gatecrash set prerelease night. I will spend the next 15 or so hours playing Magic, talking with friends and playing other games. These weekends are normally incredible and I run through about 5 packs of smokes. This trip will differ from my Cache Creek trip in that, I'm going to need to vape. A lot. Luckily the extra batteries showed up today, that should help a lot. Hopefully I don't run out of battery/juice while I'm out, we shall see.

Again, thank you to Mt Baker Vapor for being so awesome. I WILL use you guys in the future. Hopefully I have for foresight to get some decent flavors =)

Day 7 - One week 'Anniversary' and the my first empty bottle

It's been one week. I'm quite happy. I seem to be breathing easier, my sense of smell is coming back slightly and I've had to field numerous questions about Vaping when I go out. Everything is going great! Here's to another week and many more after that!

On a sad note, I finished off my first 10ml bottle today. It was my first eLiquid purchase back in December when I got the freebie from Vapornine. Now I need to order some more because I love this flavor, its a sweet tobacco that hits strong. May this be the first of many.

First empty 10ml bottle of Carolina Tobacco (24mg)

On a sad note, I looked at my cost spreadsheet and after an ordering spree last night it seems I'm in the hole a total of $169.66! ($210 total, I've saved $40 on cigarette costs thus far). I picked up a bunch of flavors from Mt Baker Vapor at a really good price as well as an 510 to eGo Adapter, a sampler from Alice in Vapeland, and extra batteries from Amazon. I really need to not spend so much money on this, but I REALLY want to try every flavor out there!

Hopefully when I pick up the extra eGo batteries and a few cartomizers this weekend I can put a stop to my wallet bleed. Heres what I've spent so far:

Cost of Vaping after 1 week

Well, heres to another week of vaping!

Day 5 & 6 - Road Trip

Got a call yesterday from my best friend. He was going to pick me up and we were going somewhere for an indeterminate amount of time. Woot! Road trip! Packed up what supplies I had and a few extra juices just in case. We headed out and ended up at Cache Creek (Indian Casino in California).

Chain vaped the entire way up there, and luckily remembered to charge up my battery to full before we parked. My backup stick battery worked perfectly for its intended purpose. One thing this trip taught me was, I'm going to need more batteries. A LOT of batteries for the amount I vape. 

While waiting for a spot to open on the 4-2 no limit tables (which btw I walked away with an extra $100 off.  Not bad for only being able to play 3 hands in 7 hours) I struck up a conversation with the seat caller and asked if I could vape while playing. He said it was up to the players as there was no rules strictly against it and that one table had a couple of vapers the other day. Found out he also vaped and started about 6 months ago and ended up quitting simply because he stopped feeling the need to smoke. Was a pretty good 3 hour long conversation about vaping in general. Yeah, the wait was that long. 

I spent 7 hours at the table and never once felt the need to get up to vape. I think this is the longest time I've ever gone without nicotine in my entire life. It was a strange feeling not having to get up every 30-45 mins to smoke. Of course I did chain vape the entire 3 hour trip up there, so I may of had enough in my system to last that long. Never even needed to ask my opponents if I could vape at the table. 

All in all it was a great trip, and I learned a lot about what I need to take with me for extended trips away from home while vaping full time and what supplies I need to pick up to make my life easier while vaping.

Day 4: Information Information Information

I started the day off in a panic. I forgot to charge my battery. Luckily I remembered a disposable I picked up a long time back had a 510 thread. It had enough charge to last until I got the 18350 charged up. Looked odd, but worked just fine.

Clearomizer on top of a Nebula Express battery.

Last night was an interesting night. I ran across the Youtube channel of cozzan while browsing around reddit. I heard about the pending FDA regulations and/or out right ban of the sale of eCigs and wanted to make my own juice and came across this great podcast show.

VapeLink Mission Statement

The main intent of VapeLink is to provide electronic cigarette users, enthusiasts, and the “vaping curious” relevant and credible information related to the use of electronic cigarettes.

All I have to say is wow. I watched episodes 3 through 8 last night straight (they're about an hour and a half each) and they're packed full of information, vape humor and collective reviews of mods, flavors, and news related to vaping. They air every Monday at 9:30 EST. I've already set my alarm for tomorrow to watch the live show.

While watching I was Googling up the concepts and things they talked about and looked around for more, heres a small selection of sources for new vapers I picked up.

• YouTube - Beginners Guide to E-Cigs and E-Cig Tech - Great resource for people new to Vapes.
• YouTube - GrimmGreen Industries - Reviews with a great presentation
• Distributor - Wizard Labs - Provides PG/Nicotine solutions, high quality. Going to pick up some supplies from here as soon as I get some more money.
• Web Forums - E-Cigarette Forum - And I thought Reddit was full of information. This is the XDA of the eCig world. Massive, tons of reviews, sales from vendors and information. 

I can't seem to get enough information about eCigs.

Day 3: Local options

I seem to of forgotten this weekend is a three day weekend, which means my vape mail I ordered Friday morning won't get here until Wednesday or Thursday next week. Being out of work will do that to you. Time to find some local options for emergency vaping supplies.

Living in San Jose, CA has its benefit. We have an abundance of local stores for almost everything. I had read about a few places that may have liquid and supplies so I made the trips today. First stop was Paramount Imports on Meridian in San Jose. Luckily I hit gold on my first stop.

While their selection was small, they had juice and plenty of it. Mostly chocolate flavors and 0mg nicotine mixes their prices match most online locations and the brand they carry "HV Big Heart Flavors" we're actually cheaper. While they had no big kits (eGo Twists, Novas, etc) they had some good supplies such as clearomizers, cartomizers and a few adapters which I should of picked up as the clearomizer I picked up didn't fit my Mininova. Oops. I also overheard they just ordered more juice, so I'll make the trip next week and see what they have. HV (Hot Vapes) seems to have a decent selection and I'd love to pick them up locally. I also don't mind spending a touch more to support local businesses, especially if they carry a larger selection in the future.

My final bill wasn't too high, being broke limited my purchases for sure. I picked up:

• 1x 12ml HV Big Heart Flavors "Straw Bango Smoothie"
• 1x 6ml HV Big Heart Flavors "RY6"
• 1x Clearomizer, which doesn't fit my MiniNova.

Now its time to figure out how to clean one of these clearomizers and stick in one of the new flavors. I'm dying to try them.

Day 2: NEED MORE JUICE!

Day 2

I woke up this morning and instantly jumped on the Mininova. I think the nicotine levels are a bit low, I'll need to pick up some higher levels soon. I also noticed for the first time how bad that pile of laundry smells in the corner of my room. Yep, need to do laundry. I doubt this is from not smoking, it was pretty bad ;) My roommate came in shortly after I woke up and asked to bum a cigarette. I took 2 out and handed him the rest of the pack. Hopefully that'll be the last time he ever CAN ask for another one. Leech. Put the remaining two in a ziplock just in case.

I jumped into the Reddit forums for eCigs, and started reading. Reading everything I could get my hands on. I've been doing this since I first placed my order last Sunday, but today seemed even more exciting. I wasn't just reading about people who made the jump, I was one of those people.

So the damage to my Juice levels last night weighed in at around 2ml of juice. My short time reading about vapers this tends to be on the high side. I need more juice and soon lest I have to run to 7-11. Sadly its Friday so there may be a good chance I'll have to buy some by Tuesday regardless. I can live with this.

First off I have to say, there are SO MANY CHOICES. Choice overload. What do I like? What don't I like? I HAVE NO IDEA! I never really liked flavored tobacco to begin with and with so many fruity flavors I feel just an overload of flavors. I found a few places with a couple of deals and picked up as many samples as I could. Granted when I made the purchases I didn't know other vendors actually have sets of samplers, so I overpayed quite a bit today.

Heres what I picked up and why:

From Vapor Nine:

• 10ml of 24mg Turkish Blend. I already like the flavor, decided to pick more up. Plus with the Vaporbucks (from my previous purchases) It was pretty much free.
• 10ml of 24mg of Honey. I like honey, it also mixes well with other flavors. 

From High Desert Vapes: (All Liquids 50% off until 1/20)

• 10ml of 24mg Cappuccino - Eh, why not 
• 10ml of 24mg French Vanilla - I love Vanilla. I REALLY love Vanilla.
• 10ml of 24mg Irish Cream - Its like Vanilla, with a 'green' taste.
• 10ml of 24mg Guava - I'm not sure about these fruit flavors, but I enjoy Guava.
• 10ml of 24mg Monster Enegry - Caffinee. My other drug. My delivery method of choice is Monster. Its bound to go bad but at $2.20 for this, I can't complain.
• 10ml of 24mg Pickely Pear - No idea what these things taste like. I'll find out.
• 10ml of 24mg Butterscotch Tobacco - They say its a blend of Carolina Tobacco and Butterscotch. I really like both flavors and love smoking with a Weltcher's Originals under my tounge.

I also picked up a few more Clearomizers. Realizing the need to have more than two since from what I've read, cleaning them is a bit of a pain. I've also noted to pick up some cartomizers as well for flavor testing in the future since they hook into my mod with the adapters I got from the Mininova kit.

Granted I made these orders before further research, I wish I had read about MadVapes sooner, as they seem to be the cheapest I've seen anywhere (at least 50% cheaper than anywhere else so far, outside of direct orders from China). When I get paid I'll be sure to buy a bunch from them.

Its now been 30 hours since I smoked an analogue cigarette, and I've spent a little under $200 on supplies.I thought this was supposed to be cheaper...

Day 1: First Vape Mail

Day 1 - First Vape Mail

*** UPDATE Jan 23, 2013 ***
I was able to identify the exact model number of my mod, it Mini Lavatube v 2.1. It was difficult to figure out exactly what version it was due to the battery cap design and the fact almost every picture on the web is of the chrome version, not the 'finish' version. It seems this specific type is a limited run and wasn't very popular. Based on the prices I've found else where, this was actually a pretty good deal on the mod, I take back what I said about it being expensive.

Packs of Cigarettes have gotten too expensive

Packs of Cigarettes have gotten too expensive. $5.50+ for a basic pack of Camel Wides is just too much. Combined with giving cigarettes out to friends at social gatherings, this shit is just too damned expensive for me to justify on a limited income anymore. I did some rough math the other day and realized I was spending upwards of $2,200 a year on cigarettes. Its time to move on.

First off, I love smoking. I've always enjoyed the smell and taste of cigarettes. I may be in a minority here, but damn it I love it. Ever since I was a kid I always liked the smell of them, well almost all of them, can't stand the smell and taste of Winstons and Chesterfields. So whatever I do must be able to match the flavor, strength and smell of real cigarettes.

I have been aware of E-Cigarettes for quite some time now, longer than most in fact. Never thought it would catch on but the day I saw a small (and pitiful) E-Cigarette at 7-11 was the day I knew this thing finally became mainstream. I've bought many of these 'disposable' ones in the past 3 years for specific purposes. Flying, at-work smoking, long car rides with smokeaphobes, etc. But they never did the trick for very long. After some research I realized why, the nicotine MG level and battery power was just too low.

Last week I decided to take the final plunge, I purchased a Mininova from Vapornine and decided when it got here, it would the last time I smoked an analogue cigarette.