My sister Catherine has pleaded with me to write about something “positive in the world” this week. Becoming a mother has really made her soft. I told her I would try to write something that wasn’t negative. I’m not sure I can do positive and I doubt anyone wants to read an column about S-Club 7 and puppies.

In the same e-mail she reminded me that I promised to quit smoking after I graduated from college. Since that is less than a month off, I’ve taken to cherishing one less Laramie a day, and observing a moment of silence in which I remember all the good times we’ve had together. A long kiss good-bye if you will.

As I come to terms with the possible end of this relationship, halfway around the world in South Africa’s Bloemfontein Zoo, a chimp named Charlie is being urged by his caretakers to quit smoking as well. The zoo’s spokesperson Daryl Barnes told South African reporters that, “baby chimps pick up habits by mimicking adults and we think he started mimicking smokers at his enclosure which probably led to smokers throwing him cigarettes.”

Reminiscent of me at sixteen, Charlie hides his cigarette whenever he sees staff coming near. The poor chimp already has three rotten teeth due to visitors tossing him cans of soda and zoo patrons are being urged to refrain from providing Charlie both soft drinks and cigarettes.

After sitting for half an hour puzzled by how Charlie managed to light these cigarettes (my friend finally told me that the people were probably throwing cigarettes that were already lit) I started thinking about all the anti-smoking rhetoric thrown in my face daily.

It seems like nowadays people are always complaining about smoke at bars. LAME. Bars are supposed to be smoky. Drink until you don’t notice it, or move to California because you are getting on my nerves.

Although I think it is a good idea to encourage children not to smoke, there is a deeper truth to Truth ads. They’re annoying. I saw a commercial in which a girl named Joanie, whose father died of cancer caused by smoking cigarettes, took a megaphone and went outside a tobacco company’s building to ask them why they sold products that kill their customers.

Although I think it’s very unfortunate that Joanie’s father died of cancer, I also think it is unfortunate that people refuse to look at all who are responsible in this situation. Was Joanie’s father oblivious to the fact that smoking caused cancer? Doubtful.

If Joanie’s father had died from a heart attack caused by eating fatty foods, Joanie would be ridiculed for blaming the company that produces Crisco, but since it is en vogue to hate big tobacco, these “edgy” commercials infiltrate my television.

Also included in Truth ads is discussion of the targeting of minorities and women in tobacco campaigns by advertising more in black and Hispanic neighborhoods and including slogans like “find your voice” and “break free” in women’s magazines, but why blame only tobacco companies when alcohol companies do the same thing?

According to the National Council on Alcohol and Drug Dependency, 105,000 Americans die annually from alcohol-related causes, which could include everything from falls to drunk driving accidents to cirrhosis of the liver. The Truth ad about Joanie’s father included the statistic that 124,000 Americans died of lung cancer caused by cigarettes in the year 2001. The statistics are comparable, yet when somebody dies from an alcohol-related illness or accident, we don’t blame the alcohol companies.

Charlie is possibly the only being in the world who is innocent in all of this, and I hope it doesn’t hurt him too badly when they peel the nicotine patch off his furry little body. I’m sorry my article wasn’t very positive, but I haven’t had a cigarette all weekend and I’m in quite the mood.