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Tex if you are having humidification issues I HIGHLY suggest checking out
Heartfelt Industries and getting some humidifcation beads. About a pound will take care of 50 quarts of space, much much less for a desktop humidor. Once you humidify the beads they will keep the RH perfectly stable at whichever RH they are conditioned for (60,65,67.5,70 etc.). I use them in all my humis and only have to do maintenance once a month or so. If you are having problems beyond that with varying humidity in the humidor you may want to grab an oust fan, if you toss it in there it circulates the air and pretty much universally solves this problem.
I would agree with you on the current ELs but I would say the Bolivar Gold Medal (not technically an EL but previously a regional release) is a fantastic new cigar. Also, like you said, there are way more scumbag fake habanos dealers than legit dealers on the Internet. I can think of several off the top of my head. So definitely be careful, but there are also some reliable retailers out there..
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funny you mentioned this. i had a humidor i hadn' opened up and seasoned last week that came with an element that has beads in it. it's been the most consistent of my three humidors by far.
i smoked a monte #2 last night, the pyramides. wow. awesome smoke. sometimes its hard to find a stick with such construction that allows an even burn and a big draw, but this was the one. vanilla, slight hints of leather, just an all around favorite-tobacco flavor stick. highly reccomend it even if you have to pay between $15-$20/stick, it's worth it. took me about an hour and 15 minutes to finish, and i was thrilled having only paid less than $15 for mine.
also, yes, to reitterate, the bolivar gold medal is a fantastic stick.
im off to dinner with a cohiba siglo VI. tomorrow i'm going to smoke my genios. envy me [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
-Tex