I Guess You're Not Allowed To Expense Cigs...

Friday, September 5th, 2025. It’s a crisp 61 degrees in Chicago. I get to work at 8:30, pour myself a cup of Stella Blue coffee, and open up the DraftKings Sportsbook app to see what I like for tonight. After scrolling the board, I find something, lock it in, and then head downstairs for my morning cheese stick.

When I get back, Annika walks in. We chat about what we did last night, then drift back to our desks. Just another day in the office. Or so I thought.

That’s when Uncle Chaps walked up to me. Usually, he hits me with his “question of the day.” But this time, there was no question, just a statement, “Expensing cigs is crazy.”

Immediately, I was thrown off. How did Chaps know I had just submitted cigs on my expense report? I asked him, and he showed me Dave’s tweet,

“Hey @nickysmokess the expense report is denied with prejudice.”

Now, I don’t know why he had to tack on “with prejudice.” A simple “denied” would’ve gotten the point across. I barely know what that even means.

From the outside looking in, I get it, expensing cigs is wild. But from inside the house, I thought it would fly. We were already expensing booze, bar tabs, food, you name it. So I figured cigs fell under the same category. I mean, how can Nicky Smokes be Nicky Smokes without smokes?

I’ll admit it… out of those 40 cigs, I probably smoked 30 myself. But they were community cigs. That was my logic when I slid them onto the report.

Dave, of course, has called me a scumbag more times than I can count. He’s said it on Unnamed,  and he’s caught me lying about betting Michigan (I live bet them) so maybe he’s got a point. Or maybe I really am a scumbag and just don’t realize it. Because to me, submitting cigs didn’t feel that crazy. It was part of the house, part of the plot, part of my character.

All I’ll say is this… thank God I pulled the receipt for the condoms I had delivered before hitting “submit” on that expense report.