Two Cigarette Holder Asides

Neither of the little tidbits with which I am about to present you truly belong with our running tally of cigarette holders. But they are worth mentioning if only as examples of the kindness that people have shown to the "blog." First, Jim Whorton (who, as it's about time to point out again, is actually the humane comic novelist James Whorton, Jr.) claims that I have been overlooking a cigarette holder hidden (like the letter in the Poe story) in plain sight: on the back page of that issue of the Oxford American I keep going on and on about! There is a full-page photo of William Styron there, and Whorton contends that Mr. Styron is availing himself of a cigarette holder. After careful examination I do admit that I see a holder, but I believe that the object being held is a cigarillo, at least it looks that way to me. In similar cases, the sighting has been disqualified. My ex-boss Lisa sent me a terrific record cover that shows Phyllis Diller with a cigarette holder. Lisa had not read my earlier explanation of why women with cigarette holders have been arbitrarily banned from our count. Lisa and I conferred and did agree that Ms. Diller deserved some kind of special dispensation, hence this mention, and the accompanying illustration.