Update.

Well, the next day I smoked that cigarette.

I knew I would fail if I tried to quit without some artificial starting point, so since it was only a couple of days until my birthday, I decided to keep smoking until bedtime the night before then, and start all over.

That was three days ago, and so far so good.

Some of my triggers are wierd. I've already discussed boredom and pissed-offedness and the fact that my hands and mouth seem to have their own residual memory of smoking, and they don't want to quit yet. I have others that are stranger.

One is other people talking about my quitting smoking. It doesn't particularly matter what they're saying about it; whether they're congratulating me or telling me I'll never succeed at it, the very fact that they are talking about it at all triggers the "I HAVE to have a cigarette now" subroutine in my brain.

I think it's rooted somewhere in the notion that the decision to quit smoking is a private one (he notes as he tells the entire blogosphere about it), and other people shouldn't be talking about it. So maybe I'm punishing them (I have no idea why punishing others and smoking cigarettes are interwoven in my brain) or at least NOT rewarding them for talking about it.

Another trigger is realizing that in the past X amount of time it hasn't been that difficult not smoking. I'll be going along just fine and the thought "You know, this not smoking thing has been pretty easy this time" will pop into my head, and then WHAM! I will either want a cigarette right then or will want one the very next time things don't go the way they ought to go.

I guess the lesson that one teaches is that, for the rest of my life, I can never let my guard down. And no matter what, I am not capable of having Just One.

It's 8:20 now. Sadly enough, tonight that means it's Time-A-Go-Seepy.

[1-26-09 Update: Another trigger is being unable to go anywhere, which will be the case starting in a few hours and lasting several days with the oncoming Ice Storm.]