The Helper

By 5:15 PM tomorrow night, it'll be a full two weeks for me without cigarettes.

I'm fine. The cravings hit a peak last week, into the weekend, before basically going away almost completely. Most of the time now I don't even think about it. And even being around people at work who are still smoking doesn't bother me.

It's exceedingly weird.

No, really. It's really strange that I don't have the urge to get up in the morning, go out on the porch, smoke two or three cigarettes, and then actually start my day. That doesn't happen anymore. I get up, make some coffee, check my phone, sit on the couch and vape for a while (sometimes I won't even touch the vape until I've been up for 40 minutes or so) and then go get dressed for work.

When I'm at home on the weekends my sleep schedule is so messed up anyhow that I'm never sure when I'm going to bed or getting up, so obviously it's a bit different. Still, there are very few times where I ever just absolutely crave a cigarette anymore. The vapes have taken care of that.

I mentioned before that I've pretty much settled on my rotation of vape juices that I cycle through, with the exception of some limited edition flavors or promotional ones (meaning, flavors I get for free or have gotten in promotional deals, flavors I've only purchased because of free shipping on an order with other stuff, etc), and I think keeping a regular rotation helps a lot. Changing it up too much or having a new flavor every week messes with me, and I've found that while I'll like to vape a tankful of a flavor to try it, I get really tired of it after that -- if I've ordered a big bottle of it, it'll just sit there until I want it again or until I give it away. I've spent entirely too much money on vape shit in the past several months only out of sheer curiosity, and as part of the goal is to stop spending as much money on this stuff, I really need to scale it back.

So, I have my stable of pretty regular flavors. Every once in a while I'll rotate one out and rotate another one in -- for example, for a month or so I really liked Fruit Hoops (read: Froot Loops cereal flavor), but got burnt out on it. I rotated it out and replaced it with something else, just to keep it interesting. I like routine, but too much routine makes it all boring, and if it's boring I'm likely to go back to cigarettes just out of habit. Part of what's keeping me off them is the excitement of new things, new parts, mods and flavors -- the hobby aspect of it all. And there are indeed ways to do that cheaply that doesn't involve me spending $50-100 a week on new things, as I never spent that much on cigarettes (thank fuck). Having ordered two more backup tanks this weekend, and waiting for two more and two boxes of coils to arrive, I think I'm pretty much done for the next several months when it comes to hardware -- I even gave one of my mods to a friend at work when he broke his and broke his tank. He gave me a $10 bill, two 12-packs of soda, and a bottle of juice in trade and still got the better deal, but I don't care because I like helping people. I like being the helper.

The wife and family are still very proud of me, by the way. I'm glad they are. The positive feedback helps out a lot. My wife is extremely happy I'm no longer smoking. Of course, not having to stop at the gas station every 3-4 days for more cigarettes is nice too, and not having to spend money on them out of pocket is great as well (though that savings is, again, pretty much negated by all of the vape stuff I get). I need to fill the truck up with gas this week, and it'll be the first time I've done so without going inside for cigarettes. It's bizarre.

The truck is still going strong, by the way. No issues with it yet, though I do still need to get new tires and get it tuned up (oil change, spark plug checks, etc). Chevrolets are workhorses -- I know that from the years of owning the Monte Carlo. As long as it's in one piece, it'll run -- and nothing's started falling off of it yet. When the relatives come into town over the summer (whenever that will be), I can't wait to show them that it's still going and still running strong...ahem, provided that it doesn't blow up on me now that I've said that. I'll renew the registration and plates in July, around the time they'll be here.

The wife and I have to renew our lease here in the next week as well. I say "in the next week" because, well, it runs out at the end of the month, and while we let the complex know our intentions to renew (we had to do so by the 1st of this month), they have to schedule a time to have us come up and sign the paperwork. They have not yet done that, so in the morning I will be calling the office to tell them "hey, we need to do this, when's the best day/time for you, 'cause we both work weird hours and will probably have to do it on our lunch break" or something like that. It takes about fifteen minutes at the most, but it's still a relative pain in the ass.

It's a payday Friday this coming week, so I have bills that are coming due that will have to be paid in addition to our rent -- as does the wife. Still, as we go deep into the spring, it appears that most crises are settling down and we're able to get out from under a lot of the stuff we've been paying on for a while now, with the exception of our taxes. I don't know if I've mentioned it here in recent weeks (and right now, frankly, I'm too lazy to care/check if I have) but we owed a shitload of money in taxes this year...all because on my own W4s with our company, they had me marked down for two federal exemptions for no reason. That's not something that can be changed retroactively, and we didn't figure it out until we got our taxes ready this spring. I cannot tell you how absolutely batshit pissed I was, especially as getting a decent-sized refund would've let us pay down some credit cards and would've paid for the aforementioned new tires on my truck. The taxes are paid, thanks to having high-limit credit cards with 0% interest for eighteen months, but we're both very angry. I went in and changed my W4 to zero exemptions shortly after we found out what had happened, as if I didn't we would probably owe again for 2016. Fuck it, let 'em take out all the taxes they want now so when this time rolls back around next year, we don't have to worry about it.

The weeks pass by quickly, and the weekends even faster. Soon, we will be coming up on our second wedding anniversary at the end of May, and both myself and the wife have requested the day off of work so that we can get an extended weekend. We do not have any plans, at least not yet -- the parents asked us last night if we were going anywhere or doing anything. We had to laugh at that to a certain extent, as it's so rare for us to ever go anywhere or do anything we don't have to or that isn't required by law. Shit, there are at least five large boxes and ten giveaway clothing bags for Goodwill (or a similar charity) which have been sitting here in the spare room with me since we moved into this apartment in 2014. The wife's wedding dress is in the exact same spot she left it when she took it off on our wedding night.

I've already purchased and gifted the wife's anniversary present to her -- I bought her the high-end expensive replica of Hermione Granger's wand. I had asked previously and she claimed Hermione was her favorite character in the entire Harry Potter series, so okay. I have several favorite characters, most of whom die quickly (some offscreen, even -- what a tragedy). However, the wand that called out to me was the wand of Narcissa Malfoy, Draco's mother.

I ordered that wand for myself, and during play-fighting with the wife and her wand, it broke in half. Very quickly. Fuck. I ended up getting Snape's wand, so both of us have wands now. The object is to take photos with them for our anniversary. Because we're nerds like that.

The broken wand? Added to the pile of clutter.

"We're cleaning on Saturday," the wife told me matter-of-factly when she came into the spare room a few moments ago on her way to bed.

To be fair, the house is a mess -- it needs a good vacuuming and steam-cleaning of the carpets, a good dusting, a good scrubdown of the bathroom and kitchen, including the floors -- etc etc. I have Mondays off, so a good chunk of the day every Monday is me doing upkeep on the house as much as I can reasonably do based on time and energy levels -- reorganizing the kitchen, doing all the laundry and putting it away, washing the bedsheets, cleaning the cat box and sweeping out the cat room, etc. That's hard to do if I'm not feeling well or if I sleep late, however. And some Mondays I don't even have the energy to mess with a lot at all -- or I want to decompress and play video games and listen to podcasts and let the entire world just go away for a bit. Because, of course, I have those weeks too.

Will keep you posted on any happenings, of course. However, now's the time for me to go to bed as I've been up way too late as it is.

The Last of the Cigarettes, Part II

At 5:15 PM tonight (central time), I will have gone a full seven days without a cigarette.

It's hard sometimes; this weekend was especially difficult as the craving for cigarettes was almost too much to bear at times. I'm not sure if I can describe why, really, aside from the fact that on weekends, when I'm off work, I have the time and ability to smoke if I want to, when during the normal week I do not. During the work week, I'd have to get up from my desk, go downstairs, go outside, smoke, come inside, wash my hands, go back to work. Or, conversely, I could only go outside on my deck and smoke when I was at home, could only do it in my own private time and I would have to meter out that time for it -- only when I had the time or energy to do it, and only when it wasn't interrupting something else (like shower time, sleep time, etc).

Up until this week, I didn't realize how much of my actual day was taken up by me being outside with a cigarette in my hand or on my lips. It's a fair chunk of time, I realized, that I was basically locking myself outside to take part in this nasty habit. I don't have to worry about that with vaping, as I do that indoors anywhere I want, anytime, unless I'm at work or in a public place (like a store or restaurant). Sadly, we're not allowed to vape at our desks in the office. If we could, I'd get so much more work accomplished as I'd only have to get up to go to the bathroom or grab another cup of coffee from the break room.

In the mornings now, I make my coffee at home and sit in the living room with the cats, who usually look at me funny, with my vape mod in my hand. I vape as much as is necessary, then I get up, go get dressed, and go to work.

As for health or energy effects, I really notice no differences.

I don't notice any difference in my ability to breathe, or any real difference in my allergies. The wife says I don't cough nearly as much now, but I remind her that my cough wasn't so much from smoking, but from my allergies, and that I still cough occasionally on vape (especially if I take too large a hit or have the watts turned up too high on one of my mods).

I don't have any more or less energy. I don't sleep any better or worse. My libido is the same. My bowels are regular. I don't feel dehydrated or over-hydrated. For all intents and purposes, everything's pretty much the same.

Except my ability to smell -- which has definitely come back quite a bit, even in a week's time. I have noticed that. Smokers basically have an incredibly dulled sense of smell and taste. My taste is normal, but my sense of smell has indeed increased now that I'm off the cigarettes -- which is good, at least.

People have told me the first week is and will be the hardest of all, and while I understand that, the vast majority of the time I've felt...well, normal. I have had cravings from time to time, but vaping for a bit does tend to lessen or eliminate those. Sometimes the cravings are quite bad, quite strong, to the point where I pace back and forth and want to pull my hair out. But they do, eventually, go away. Keeping busy helps -- finding something to occupy my mind, even if it's playing a game on my phone for a few minutes or reading a news article -- will make it ease off somewhat.

"I can't promise I'll never smoke again," I told the wife. "I can't say that I'll never go to the store and pick up a pack of smokes when and if I want them."

I am correct in saying this; I can make no absolute promises that I'm not sure I can keep. In the short run -- I've only been a non-smoker for a week -- I can deal with it, stay off the cigarettes, compartmentalize and vape a lot more to make up for it, but in the long run? I don't know, I can't promise anything. I can only take it day by day, one week at a time. As the days go on, the cravings do get worse -- I won't lie. It's either going to come to the point where I can push through them and ignore them long enough to where they go away, or I can't.

On some level, I think I'm going into a psychological or physiological panic mode. I have smoked for so long that when I stop, even with vaping, everything inside me panics at full throttle. I hear those little voices inside my head (not schizophrenic ones, but more like the devil on my shoulder) telling me things like how long can you do this? or do you even know who you are without cigarettes? do you like that person? are you even the SAME person? And I honestly don't know how to answer those questions.

I know the answer to the last one, at least, if I don't have some sort of nicotine replacement to get me off the cigarettes, and the answer is an absolute no, I am not the same person.

I know the answer because the last time I had to quit smoking it was not because I wanted to, but because I had zero money to do so. I had just moved to Kansas, the ex had just entered grad school and I was jobless and unable to even get the local sub shop to hire me, much less able to get a job anywhere else, and I had $3 in my bank account when a pack of cigarettes at the time was about $4. My mind was foggy. I couldn't sleep well. I was having cold sweats off and on, and was almost constantly constipated. I was a terrible, evil person to be around at any time for any reason, and was very close to having an absolute psychotic break. When I finally was able to get a pack of cigarettes again after a few weeks, once the ex got her first paychecks and we could afford to go to the grocery store again, I smoked through three of them in rapid succession and cannot describe or put into words the sense of euphoria and bliss I felt, and all was well again -- I was, once more, myself, in the span of ten minutes or so. It was an immediate night and day difference.

That's the hold cigarettes have on me. I'm sure if you are or have ever been an addict for anything, you understand what I'm taking about.

I've been a smoker for all of my adult life, and this is the first time I've ever quit willingly and made the choice to do so. I mean, the vapes absolutely are the only things helping me to do it, yes, but that only goes so far -- the rest is willpower. The rest is me wanting to be done. And the funny thing about willpower is that I have a bunch of it when I have my vape in front of me and accessible, but have absolutely none of it when I don't or when the vape doesn't seem to be working the way it needs to.

For as much as I do not care what people think of me in most situations, however, the same does not hold true when I'm trying to stay off the cigarettes. I have purposely not mentioned anything on my personal Facebook page about me quitting, nor will I make a big deal about it to anyone but close friends and family (namely, the wife and her parents, and very few others). This is because, in the case that I do fail, with the more people who know the more I will be judged and the more I'll have to admit to my shortcomings. I'm a Slytherin; we don't like admitting our shortcomings. Ever. And I do not take criticism of any sort well -- I never have. I don't want anyone to have expectations of me that I fail to live up to. I don't want people to look at me down their noses and think (or say) "oh, so he's not perfect, he is fallible." My choices, as well as my abilities or inabilities to complete my goals, are mine and mine alone -- I refuse to be judged poorly for them by anyone.

I will, of course, keep everyone updated on what happens and how I feel.

The Last of the Cigarettes

I mentioned a few posts back in my blog that I am vaping now. I am, as they say, one of those vaper people.

I am okay with being identified this way.

I smoked cigarettes for over fifteen years. I am sure, over that time, that they contributed to a decline in overall general health for me. I was a pack a day smoker, or more, for all of that time -- sometimes, in college, it was two packs a day.

As an early birthday present in December, the wife said she would be more than happy to help me quit by switching over to vaping/vape devices. She told me to pick out a kit, pick out any accessories I would need, and she would get it for me -- order it online right then and there -- as she wanted me to get something I wanted and to be happy.

Mind you, I'd tried vaping before, about three years prior -- I'd had an electronic cigarette, one of the little tobacco-flavored ones, which was fine -- but it was not a cigarette. I used it off and on, and then used some of the disposable ones (which would run out of charge/flavor juice inside too quickly and go dead), before getting a little eGo battery starter kit with some high-nicotine (18mg) "Turkish Tobacco" juice. I liked it, but it made me cough and hurt my throat. I went down to 9mg nicotine a short while later, got a fruity-flavored juice in a new tank, and it did the same thing -- plus the tank leaked everywhere no matter what I did. I gave up on it and went back to cigarettes full-time as it had made me somewhat frustrated.

In the interim between that time and four months ago when I dove back in, the vaping market -- no, the vaping culture -- exploded. Different companies began producing different juices, setups (known as "mods") and tanks -- all of which was foreign to me. I saw friends and co-workers carrying around large mechanical mods made of stainless steel and/or copper, mods that looked like lightsabers or sonic screwdrivers. I saw them taking deep breaths from their devices and watched them exhale full-on clouds from their lungs, enough to fill rooms and fog up car interiors or windows. I was fascinated, if only in a morbid-curiosity sort of way -- if these people could get off the cigarettes with these electronic things, why couldn't I?

So I consulted with these friends and coworkers for advice -- what's the best juice? what's the best "bang for the buck" when it comes to mods? how much nicotine should I use? what is your favorite tank and/or setup, and why? I pooled as much information together as I could about all sorts of things I had previously no clue about. I asked for suggestions, for websites to purchase materials from, for reviews, for every bit of input I could get.

Finally, after a few weeks, I just let the wife pick out a mod kit for me after giving her some basic requirements of what I thought I would need. She picked an Eleaf 60w iStick, a good basic device that wasn't too weak and wasn't too powerful, and was a good base starter kit. She also made sure I had two rechargeable batteries (the mod only needed one, so I'd have a spare), a wall charger for said batteries, and a battery case. Once it all arrived, I went to one of the local vape shops here in town and purchased a bottle of The Milkman, a favorite flavor of one of my coworkers, and went to town on it. Proverbially, of course.

I liked it. I liked it a lot. But, at the time, it was simply a novelty more than anything else -- a "hey guys, look at me, being one of the cool kids now" and, I definitely want to stress, it was not a cigarette. It helped, and helped a lot, but it was definitely not a cigarette.

Still, I was able to cut back on my smoking by a decent amount. I vaped through the first bottle of The Milkman pretty quickly, and immediately ordered two more bottles from VaporDNA, who shipped them out quickly and painlessly. I acquired a few more bottles of different flavors from my friends, and found Vape Wild, the site I now use for all of my juice purchases, to sell great juices in large quantities for unbelievable prices. I began ordering sample packs and larger bottles of single flavors almost in bulk, spending $35-50 every two weeks or so on all of the juices I wanted to taste and to try.

And then, shortly after Christmas, the worst thing ever happened to a new vaper: my mod stopped working. I switched out tanks to my backup tank, still nothing. I switched coils in both tanks, fiddled with the connectors, even used stabilizer O-rings to make sure everything was connected properly -- still nothing. The mod would fire intermittently and give me a breath of vapor, and then it would either fry the coil or would stop working completely, giving me "atomizer short" errors.

I was beyond frustrated. I felt like I had wasted so much time, effort, and money on not only the mod itself, but all of the juices, tanks, and accessories I had purchased. It was also the beginning of January, and it was cold outside -- and while I could vape in the house, I could not smoke in the house. While I was already smoking a lot less than before, I was still smoking -- trying to wean myself off with the vape more than anything else.

After a day or so of frustration, I took stock of everything I had. I'd spent about $200 on juices and another $50 on tanks (not to mention extra coils for the tanks as well) and I wasn't about to give up now. I'd just gotten an increase on my credit card limit for one of my best cards, and now was as good a time as any to use it. With the mindset of if this gets me off the cigarettes, it will save me money as well as probably my life in the long run, I bit the bullet and logged on to purchase not one, but two more new mods -- I wasn't going to go without having a "backup" again. Those mods were the Smok Micro One 80w and the Eleaf iStick 40w, the latter being the smaller and slightly less powerful version of the mod that had died on me. Both had internal batteries that charged via USB as well, so I didn't have to worry about carrying spare batteries or making sure I had one charged and ready to go at all times.

Fast forward to today, and I use both mods on a daily basis -- sometimes it's hard to choose which one I want to take to work with me, or which one I want to carry when I go out to run errands and/or do shopping or dinner with the parents.

My collection grew, as well -- as much as it was a means to an end, it became a full-on hobby, a minor obsession. Right now I have three full time mods I switch between (the third being a red Kangertech KBOX 120, which I'm using right now), a backup 40w iStick that is still sealed in its box, a Kangertech KBOX Mini 60w Platinum which I also keep as a second backup, and today I ordered a Smok Stick One Plus kit simply because it bills itself as a "smart" mechanical mod. Right now I have close to ten different tanks -- several multiples, some small, some large, and two more still coming to me in the mail even now -- all with enough extra coils to last me for months on end. And, not to be outdone, I have probably fifty bottles of juice hanging on the wall in the living room in a spice rack specifically purchased and mounted to keep the juice in.

The wife, of course, finds all of this quaint and exceedingly amusing. She'll watch me order a bunch of juice only to see me give half of it away to friends over the course of the weeks/months following (I've now found my 5-7 go-to flavors, and buy it in bulk -- but I do go for the "special" or "limited edition" juices from time to time, depending on what they are).

For the record, my go-to juices are Circus Bear (strawberry/banana custard), Wrecking Ball (banana cream), Fruit Hoops (like a similarly-named cereal), Strawberries & Cream (no flavor explanation necessary here), Murica (bomb pop), Bombshell Batter (blueberry/lemon pound cake), Butterbeer (butterscotch cream soda) and Smurf Cake (blueberry cake-pie).

There are others, of course, but those are my staples. I like the coffee and nutty/toffee juices too, as well as a few menthol flavors, but not all the time and only in small amounts.

The wife will listen to me talk about different juices or mods or tanks or what-have-you for hours on end at times, all with a wry smile on her face -- she doesn't care that she doesn't know about everything I'm talking about (though I'm sure she's learned a lot), but she is happy to see me have a passion of sorts that I am vocal about, and is very proud of me that I've almost quit smoking. I've even helped several people at work get on the vaping train, including one Director and his wife, to help them get away from smoking. It's like I'm a pusher -- only the first taste is free, etc. In the short few months I've been really "into it," I've become a bit of an expert -- I've even joined a few groups on Facebook which I am fairly active in, all to help people out and give them advice. I've studied, I've done research, and it has, indeed, become a passion of mine.

That being said, however, is not the point of this post.

The point of this post is that I have not, unfortunately, been able to completely quit smoking.

As I mentioned above, vaping is many things, and it is very fun, therapeutic, and something I very much enjoy -- enjoy more than many other things in my life, in fact -- but it is not a cigarette. 

For those of you who are current or former smokers, you know what I'm talking about. Whether you smoked five cigarettes a day or fifty, it is not a habit that can easily be broken no matter what you try to do to replace it or wean off of it. It is a dirty habit, a shameful one, and an (increasingly so) expensive one. I take no pride in the fact that I smoke, especially not when I'm still smoking after many months of being one of the biggest vaping advocates I know. I feel like a traitor, or at the very least, a hypocrite.

But it is hard. It is very hard to just quit, to switch from one habit to another, all with the goal of being done with everything completely at some point. Because, honestly, that is the goal here -- for all of the time and money I've put into the vaping thing, the overall goal is to be able to quit that as well after some time. I don't want to turn one habit into another, at least not forever.

That being said, I have gone from being a pack a day smoker down to four packs a week, then to two. Presently, I have five singular cigarettes left, and I want them to be the last cigarettes I ever purchase.

It's time; I want to be done with them. The goal was originally to be done with smoking completely by the beginning of summer, when it would be nice enough to sit out on the porch every morning before work and not freeze, drink a cup of coffee and hold my mod and not need a cigarette instead. But that goal got pushed up as I began to smoke less and less, and as I purchased more vapor accessories, flavors of juices, mods, and tanks. I've gone whole hog on the vaping thing at this point, and it's really something I enjoy -- I no longer have a true physical or psychological need for the cigarettes, it's just a habit. And it's a habit that finally, I can say I want to be completely rid of. The latest catalyst is the two aforementioned tanks that are on their way to me now via international mail -- they're tanks I've been looking forward to owning and using for months (the Smok TFV4), which I already know I'll love as I have the miniature version already.

Many friends have told me that the only way to stop smoking is to stop allowing myself to smoke -- I vape now, so just quit buying them. Quit buying the cigarettes, remove yourself from situations where you'd want to smoke, and make the resolve to be done.

That's really all it is at this point -- being steely in my resolve. I can't tell you how many times I've fantasized about waking up in the morning and not needing a cigarette, or have wanted go out somewhere and not have to check all of my pockets for my pack and my lighter beforehand. Smoking in my house in Kansas turned the walls of that place from white to brown; I can't imagine how much better my lungs will feel once they don't have to deal with that anymore.

Is it going to be hard, is it going to be rough going for those first few days or weeks? You bet. The juice I vape is 3mg nicotine; it's very low. Higher nicotine levels than that burn my throat or make me cough like crazy (especially in all of these new, high-tech sub-ohm vaping devices), but that's good -- it means that I've already done more than half the work for myself. Vaping that low means I've already cut myself off from a lot of nicotine.

I've gotten good support from my friends, the wife (of course) and the wife's family; my own parents seem sort of ambivalent or aloof about my goals here, though that's probably due to them not knowing a whole lot about anything I'm talking about when I mention vaping to them (they've mostly ignored it). As contact with my parents has become more and more sporadic since I got married, oh well. There's not a whole lot of talking or chatting between us anymore as I am usually so swamped with work and there's always something else to do around the house.

So that's where my life is at right now. Hopefully, in my next post I will be able to tell you how many days/weeks I've gone cigarette-free.

#slytherinpride

I am a Slytherin. I am a proud Slytherin. I absolutely embody many traits of Slytherins (though I embody several traits of the other houses as well).

I'm sure this surprises some of you, and for others, you are probably thinking "yeah, that's about right." When Pottermore got its makeover, it was roughly around the time the wife and I purchased the Blu-rays of all eight Harry Potter movies -- none of which I'd seen in years (and several which I'd never seen all the way through from beginning to end), and I took the sorting hat test.

I thought for years that I would be, as one of my friends likes to call herself as well, a "textbook Ravenclaw." I have many House Ravenclaw traits, including the quest for knowledge and the dedication/desire to be the smartest and the best.

But I have arrogance, I have ego, I have a desire for power and control of all things possible. I am always trying to climb the proverbial ladder, in almost all situations. I am not evil (which many of you can attest to), but I do have an evil side, yes, a mean streak that will occasionally come out. I have little patience or understanding for incompetence or failure, and even less patience for incompetence or failure in someone I know to be competent and successful. I am not in blatant disregard of the rules -- in fact, I tend to follow the rules as much as I can, and expect others to do the same -- yet I can and will absolutely bend said rules as much as possible if in doing so I can gain an upper hand in any given situation, and cover my tracks behind me.

These aren't just things I've noticed in passing -- many of these personality traits are core parts of my personality, my soul, that make me who I am.

From the Pottermore Wiki page:

Slytherins are associated with cunning, ambition and a tendency to look after their own. Their Pottermore welcome letter describes Slytherin as the "coolest and edgiest house in the school." which most Slytherins can confirm. Slytherin has produced its share of Dark witches and wizards, but unlike the other houses, members are not afraid to admit it as one of the Slytherin traits is ambition and greatness. Its students are often feared by the other houses, but most Slytherins are actually very kind (unless you happen to get on their bad side for some reason). 

Many view Slytherin as an evil house. According to the welcome letter, this is not necessarily true. It is true that some Slytherins have achieved greatness through evil deeds, but there are just as many if not more who have done great, non-evil things to achieve greatness. 

Slytherins are always striving to be the best, something they have in common with Ravenclaws. However, Slytherins will never leave their own to be the best. 

And, from the official Harry Potter Wiki:

Slytherins tend to be ambitious, shrewd, cunning, strong leaders, and achievement-oriented. They also have highly developed senses of self-preservation.^[7] This means that Slytherins tend to hesitate before acting, so as to weigh all possible outcomes before deciding exactly what should be done.

Well then.

I knew almost as soon as I began the sorting hat test that it would place me into Slytherin -- the test isn't perfect by any means, but it is the one sanctioned by Rowling herself, so it's the one everyone should and does trust.

For the record, as I'm sure you're curious -- my wife is a Hufflepuff, as is her mother, one of her sisters, and several of our close friends. The sister and brother-in-law who gave us my truck are both Gryffindors. I know very few Ravenclaws -- true Ravenclaws, anyway -- and even fewer Slytherins. It sort of makes me the odd man out in our combined family as well, as I am the only Slytherin I know of in both my family as well as the wife's.

Well, let me take that back -- I'm fairly certain that if my mother took the test, she'd be a Slytherin. As well as at least one, if not both, of my brothers. I'm much less certain about either of them.

When I found out I was Slytherin, I went "whole hog" with it, as they say. I got us banners for the wall in our bedroom -- Slytherin on my side of the bed, Hufflepuff on the wife's. I own no fewer than three Slytherin shirts (with three more on the way to me in the mail now) and a Slytherin coffee mug. My Facebook is covered in Slytherin things, and my profile message on our work IM program is #slytherinpride, with my avatar photo the Slytherin crest.

The wife finds it all very amusing and nerdy, especially for a guy who's never read any of the books (well, I read about half of the first one about ten years ago). I have, however, seen the movies. I am disappointed with the way most Slytherins are portrayed and have had long discussions about this with my wife -- most of them are portrayed as one-dimensional characters, at least in the films. It's all "hey, we're Slytherins, let's be dicks because this story needs villains!" And I'm all like "no, just because the biggest dick in the wizarding world just happens to be the heir to Salazar Slytherin and he kills a whole bunch of people doesn't mean that all of us are fuckholes."



In my research to learn more about Slytherin House, I came across an interesting little quiz; these seventeen questions were written from the perspective of a Gryffindor as questions Gryffindors have for Slytherins. They came from this article, which was posted some time ago on Buzzfeed. As a Slytherin, I feel it is my duty to answer them.

1. How does it feel to be a part of the most loathed house at Hogwarts?

Oh, I don't know, how does it feel to be in a house full of cocky little pricks who think they're better than everyone else just because Harry Potter was one of you?

2. Do you ever secretly wish you were a Gryffindor?

Do you ever secretly wish Merlin was a Gryffindor? I bet you do. 

3. Are you proud of the reputation your house has in the school?

Wouldn't you be?

4. Do you honestly believe the teachings of Salazar Slytherin? The whole pureblood thing?

No. Truthfully, I couldn't care less about it.

5. Could someone tell Millicent Bulstrode to stop spreading cat hairs everywhere?

Ugh, again with the cat hair. Stop whining.

6. Does it bother you that, like, 99 percent of the world believes Gryffindor is the best house?

I can't help that people are stupid. Plus, it keeps the attention off of us.

7. Although not all Slytherins are terrible, do you ever feel weird knowing that your crest was named after one of the most hated creatures of all time?

What, the snake? There's nothing wrong with snakes. They eat rats, keep the pest population down, scare whiners...

8. Does it make you feel weird that Malfoy, your Quidditch seeker, had to buy his way on to the team?

Malfoy is a sniveling little snot who doesn't deserve to be a Slytherin anyhow, so I don't believe this question warrants a response.

9. On a scale from one to 10, how mad were you all when Dumbledore awarded Gryffindor the House Cup after the whole Philosopher’s Stone thing?

Do you mean on a scale of one to fucking horseshit? I think that's what you meant, right?

10. Do you feel a little weird knowing that some of your parents are Death Eaters?!

Meh, we all have our own goals and passions. Who are you to judge? Besides, while I don't approve of the Death Eaters' actions, you have to admit that the Dark Mark is badass.

11. Could one of you notify Blaise Zabini to drop by the Gryffindor common room one day? He’s cute.

Oh yeah, like he'd associate with any of you little pricks.

12. Does it suck that your common room is located in the dungeons?

You mean "under the Black Lake"? Because that's where the common room is, and let me tell you, that's pretty fucking awesome.

13. Are you guys ever astonished by how dim Crabbe and Goyle are?

I'm sure the other houses have some idiots in them too, you know.

14. Harry was definitely the winner of the duel between him and Malfoy in year two, right?

Who cares?

15. Do you all ever make friends with people in other Hogwarts houses?

Of course, but that's because I don't have prejudices against people just because a hat told them what part of the building they're going to sleep in for seven years.

16. Is it annoying that the most popular person who ever lived is a Gryffindor?

Popularity is vain and fleeting.

17. And finally, if you could be sorted again, would you ask the Sorting Hat to be a Gryffindor?

Psh, no.