Details from the December Meeting
Our December meeting has become the highlight of the SHPC club year. Why? Because we get a chance to say thanks to the members who supported the club throughout the entire year. Members can bring friends and family to the meeting, we provide pizza and soda, have a tobacco give away and the increasing popular pipe raffle. Everyone who contributed to the monthly tobacco raffle receives a free tin of tobacco and this year we included a 4th pipe, a lighter and a leather pipe pouch to the raffle items. Raffle tickets were $10 and you could buy a maximum of 3. Congratulations to all of this year's winners:

What's New for SHPC in 2014??

Club Member Appreciation
We think it's important to recognize those members who go out of their way to help make the club more appealing to current and prospective members. This year we started by thanking two members with a $25 gift certificate to an online tobacco shop for their contributions to the club.

For years Neil Morris has taken photos at our club meetings that we used each month in the SHPC Gazette. They not only remind people of the good times that were shared but also help to enhance the look and interest of our website.
Over the past few years Ernie Whitenack has made numerous literary contributions to our newsletter including multi part pipe-centric stories, walks down pipe-smoking's memory lane, tobacco reviews and more. The extra effort from both of these individuals not only makes my job easier but also makes the website more attractive to it's readers and potential new members.

At the December 2014 meeting we hope to present additional awards of thanks and although the categories have not been completely finalized we're thinking about awards for club attendance, new member recruitment, website contributions and maybe even most enthusiastic. The club officers will make these determinations soon and present them at an upcoming club meeting.

Return of the Club Meeting Monthly Theme
Back when we were meeting at the Holiday Inn in Mansfield (we call those the good old days), we used to have a monthly meeting theme that members could participate in. But over the years that practice has sort of fell by the wayside. Recently a couple of requests have been made to revive it so I figured we'd give it a try.

This month's theme: Bring in the first pipe you ever bought or owned and tell us the story of how you got started smoking the pipe. If you don't have your first pipe but still want to participate, just tell us the story of how you first got into pipe smoking.

Ok, so some may call us wimps but I'm sure no one really wants to be stuck on the highway, in the snow, miles and miles from home in the middle of the night. At the same time we don't want to shell out $100-$200 for a hotel room when that money could be better spent on pipes and tobacco. It's sort of a "no brainer."
The Kaywoodie Holiday Event is one of the highlights of our pipe smoking year but it's a long drive and an even longer day. This year the threat of snow worsened as the days grew closer. We had one member back out which seemed to begin a chain reaction with help from additional declining weather reports. I don't really mind driving in the snow but I wasn't doing the driving. I do mind driving at half the speed making a 4 hour drive into 6 to 8 hours whether I'm driving or riding. So much to our dismay we decided to be prudent and stay home this year. Only one of our members toughed it out (I'm sure we'll get an earful at the next meeting) and he also enjoyed a wonderful 6 hour drive home in the slush and snow. The least he could have done was to win the slow smoking contest for us since we all weren't there to beat him :-). Already looking forward to 12/14.

See how Rick Frederics dealt with missing out on this year's Kaywoodie event below.