Camel Cigarettes
R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company
Attn: Consumer Relations
PO Box 7
Winston Salem, NC
27102
May 13th, 2004
Dear Consumer Relations:
I bought a pack of Camel cigarettes in Chicago a few weeks ago. I purchased the pack in the airport and had one of the cigarettes before getting on the plane. The first cigarette I smoked lit up like any normal cigarette should… with red amber flaming away at the end.
When I arrived home in Winnipeg, and stepped out of the airport exit doors, I lit up another cigarette. I thought nothing of it and fumbled through my pockets for my car keys. Once I found them, I entered my car and immediately noticed something odd reflecting off the mirror. It was an unusual, green glow from my cigarette end. As I am sure you can imagine, it took some time to get over the shock. Not knowing whether to continue smoking it, or to ash it out, I placed it gently into the ashtray, allowing the end to remain lit.
Upon my arrival home, I attempted to show my wife, but the same cigarette would not light up. Frustrated after various attempts, I threw the butt into the garbage can. Then, when I finished unpacking my things and saw my wife off to bed, I went outside to have a smoke on the porch. At no point, had it crossed my mind that another cigarette from the same pack would glow green as well. Once again, I was caught off guard by the next cigarette lighting up to a bright green.
I placed the cigarette on the porch railing (the wife doesn't allow smoking in the house), and ran in to get her. Arriving back, the cigarette was nowhere to be found. My wife dismissed it as "silliness," and went off to make a midnight snack.
Well,needless to say, I soon began checking the rest of the cigarettes in the pack. I pulled out a smoke, and lit it in front of my wife in the kitchen. I was positive that it would again light up to a bright green. Sadly, it did not. The red amber color sat unpleasantly perched on the end of my cigarette. My wife was not pleased (smoking in the house)!
I barely slept that night… all I could think of was the strange green glow. When I closed my eyelids, the green seemed to peer through. It was not an experience I could easily brush off. The next day I again found a cigarette glowing green while I was driving my car. I pulled over swiftly and ran to the first person I saw to show them (at this point I needed verification that I was not going a little loony). By the time I reached the person, the cigarette had extinguished. I lit up another one, but it glowed red.
I have yet to have any eyewitnesses of this event, but I am positive that it is not my mind playing tricks on me. I am almost through the whole pack, and more than 60% have glowed green. My friends have been subject to my failed slapstick attempts of proving these allegations. I have tried taking a picture of one, but like most pictures, the eye of the cigarette turned out red. Recently, I had eye examination -- I thought I was going through a transitory state of color-blindness -- only to find that I have perfect 20/20 vision, and an excellent grasp on color spectrums. Trust me when I say I was near ready to abandon any hope of exacting reason from this phenomenon. I was about to dispose of them by sealing them into a cornerstone pillar of our house, where it could remain encased in concrete, but then something was brought to my attention:
A friend of mine who had recently watched Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory suggested that it might be some sort of rare prize… like the golden ticket to Wonkaland. This brings me to my main motive behind writing this letter. Could you please let me know if I have in fact won a tour, or better yet, a prize from your factory? I doubt that your factory is as visually tenacious as Willy Wonka’s, nevertheless, I would be willing to accept a tour of your facility; if indeed that is the prize (but to be honest, I am hoping for a more original/exotic prize).
I would also like some further information on exactly what was put in the cigarette to cause the green color. I would just prefer to know that it was definitely not marijuana! Believe me when I say the thought crossed my mind, and I was worried about the ill affects. As unlikely as it seems, tobacco companies have been known to break the law. This thought perpetuates my paranoid anxieties, and creates my questioning of the substance.
Please get back to me as soon as possible and address the matter. I am holding on to the last few cigarettes in hopes they will be worth something. They are safely locked away, free of my compulsively smoking fingers. My son thought that the green glowing was some sort of radiation, the kind you read about in the comic books. He smoked one of the cigarettes I carelessly left out in an attempt to gain super powers. It was then I decided they should be kept in a secure, safe place. Heh, kids and their crazy notions!
I look forward to hearing from you. Your response will certainly help me sleep at night and stop my eternal wondering. My inability to exact reason from this situation drives me to write this letter. If I do not hear back from you, I will assume you have not received this letter. Nevertheless, I will resend in hopes of a response!
Yours in continual wonder,
Name Used
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