no butts, please.

Today I had to tell on a rabbi who was smoking in our 23rd floor rental office space in midtown west. Smoking. A cigarette. Inside. An office building.

What is this, 1987?

Okay, at this point, most of you might call me hypocrite--I mean, I was a smoker myself for many years, and sometimes I did it indoors when no one was looking--but I'm not. I'm not, because I always smoked in BARS, or HOMES, but not CORPORATE OFFICES. No one wants to smell that crap on the way back from the vending machine. And no one wants to poke their head through the mezuzah-ed threshold of the Orthodox Jewish offices neighboring theirs and tell the rabbi, with his pays and yarmulke and quizzical grin, to stop smoking his freaking Marlboros. But somebody had to do it.

So I told the receptionist.

She knocked on his door and asked him not to smoke. By this time, he probably heard my outrage, because he'd extinguished his cigarette, and hidden his pack and lighter. Smart guy. Even smarter, because when said receptionist asked him not to smoke, he pretended NOT TO SPEAK ENGLISH. Or maybe he doesn't speak English. It doesn't matter. Whatever language you speak, you know you're not to smoke indoors. Those miserable looking people out in front of the office building? They don't CHOOSE to smoke outside in the below-zero windchill, or in today's case, the rain. They are required to leave the building so the rest of us don't get heart disease from your second-hand crap.

And that is my office story for today. god bless new york.