Smoke Free.

In 2003 New York State became a smoke free state.

That`s when i decided to come and live here.

Being a working musician in Athens Greece is like being sentenced
to a life in a smoke chamber.

The pocedure is the same.

You shower, you shave you put on your clean washed clothes for to go to work ,
which in my case was a Blues&Jazz club in the heart of Athens,
or any other Rock club in this ancient city,
and when you come home some hours later you smell
like you have been exposed to a hazardous experiment where
a hundred or more people are smoking (cigarettes)
non stop for as long as they are sitting on their lazy arses,
watching you perform, never engaging in anything else except
smoking and drinking.
Marlboro is the No.1 cigarette of choice
An American Produce the Greeks Love.
Everything else American They hate.
Johnnie Walker walked three thousand miles
for to make Greece his first choice home town.
By the time you come back home your hair and skin smells like a nicotine disposal,
your clothes need to be put directly in the washing machine
and your lungs are filled with cancerous toxins for days.

And the next night is the same.

The torture never stops as Frank Zappa used to sing.

But Greeks are unfamiliar to Frank`s genious.

Give them Bouzouki,Marlboros and Johnnie Walker and they are ready
to kill each other on the road to freedom.

Because, oh Yes they Drive under the influence!

There`s no Law stopping the Greeks .

They invented Democracy and reinvented the word to fit their needs.

I reached a point when i was having an alcoholic drink in the club
i was playing and i was getting so sick i had to go to the emergency room.

Only when i was diagnosed with Pneumonia and did all these tests
i found out that what was leading me to the hospital was called
NICOTINE POISING.

I had never heard of such thing but that was the case.

My desicion to leave this smoking country behind was my only
choice in order to save my lungs,my sanity and my music career.