Virtue Begins At Home

Daniel told me that in "The Little Mermaid," Ariel smoked a cigar with a sailor and ended up getting sick. I told him that people usually end up getting sick when they smoke. [I didn't mention that eventually most lung-polluters grow accustomed to it, and it's only downhill from there.] I also told him that mermaids don't normally smoke.

Daniel showed that he had Hollywood's number: "Well, just because of movies they make that happen."

Then he told me something very reassuring: "Well when I grow up, I'm never gonna smoke a pipe."

Some people may think that the pipe reference is a kind of technicality, clearing the way for other tobacco products, but I would disagree: Daniel talks about smoking a pipe as a broad category for smoking in general, just as often, in Chinese, people use the term "eat rice" ["chu fan"] as a blanket way of saying "eat" in general.

(February 6, 2011)