Benson & Hedges 100s Lights Menthol

In the continuum of cigarette consumption by age, you start with Marlboro Mediums at, say, 13, make your way to Kool Milds around the time you start driving, hit the Parliament Menthol Lights at 19, and onward to Dunhill Blues in college.

Given this trajectory, assuming your lungs still function and your bones haven't become overly brittle, you should be on Benson & Hedges in your 50s. (I'm not sure what to do about the intervening years, as that was the time of my life spent beggaring any cigarette I could get in the bowels of Mule Creek State Prison.) Smooth, slim, smart, and sophisticated, Benson & Hedges are the cigarette equivalent of George Plimpton.

The Menthol Light 100s are a tad chemical-tasting, and strangely slippery, but they're a nice smoke with a bit of panache. It's hard not to think of yourself as society's darling while enjoying one.

Which is a far cry from how I felt at Mule Creek, stuffed headfirst into an unspeakable pit urinal while various denigrates hammered my ass with incredible force. So you can see why, when I reach for a smoke nowadays, I appreciate something that gives me even a false sense of human dignity.

Review by Eduardo Penís