Not only is vaping 90% better for your health than smoking - it also turns shameful addiction into sheer, flavourful pleasure

This time last year, I was convinced that any e-cigarette user who vaped anything other than tobacco-flavoured juice from anything other than a device that looked like a cigarette (i.e. a cigalike) was a pretentious ponce. During the past week I've used my JACVapour ego/pen style vaporiser and my chunky Aspire Nautilus box mod to switch between rich, dark custardy flavours from Vapemate and delightfully sweet fruit mixtures such as Bat Juice, Vamp Toes, Blackjack and Pinkman (the best of the lot) from Vampire Vape. I have become a flavour-chaser to such an extent that there are days when I forget that I'm actually pumping nicotine into my system every time I press the button that activates the coil which turns the liquid into vapour (I'm on an 18ml nicotine mixture, which is 2ml below the maximum allowed under EU rules).

If you offered me a cigarette or a cigar, I would have no problem in resisting the urge - mainly because the urge isn't there any more (or, rather, it's being satisfied by other means). As for the tobacco-flavoured e-juice I was happily vaping last year, the very thought of it makes me queasy. I found an old bottle of what purported to be Golden Virginia in my stash a few months ago, and - being a waste-not-want-not sort of chap - took a few puffs... and almost barfed.

My conversion to New Man Hipsterdom is now almost complete.  Although the silly hat, shades and a vaporiser shaped like a pipe just aren't going to happen, I'm about to order a DIY kit, which will enable me to create my own e-liquid at home, by mixing the four constituent elements - propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, nicotine and flavour concentrate - in the comfort of my own study. This will have three benefits: first, I can experiment in order to find the perfect mixture of throat hit, vapour production and flavour; second, unless I've got my sums wrong, it halves the cost of e-liquid; and, third, I can produce it in any quantity I want and store it in bottles five times the size allowed by the ridiculous new EU Tobacco Products Directive.

I suspect that mixing my own e-liquid will be my final step. I've tried what's called direct-to-lung, sub-ohm vaping - there's no resistance when you inhale, so you draw the vapour straight into your lungs, and, because the process involves a lot of heat, it results in huge, billowing clouds of vape, and I just don't see the point, as I don't want our living room to look and smell like a vape shop. I haven't tried "dripping", where you drip e-liquid directly onto the wick and then take a few puffs so packed with flavour it almost blows your sinuses out: I've seen people doing it on YouTube, and it looks like something you'd do in a crack house. Vaping, like smoking, should be an activity that can be enjoyed while doing other things, rather than an activity in its own right.

I don't feel any great need to start producing my own e-liquid - I was always useless at Chemistry experiments in school - but I assume some bunch of ignorant, anhedonic, busybody left-wing health Nazis will eventually try to tax it out of existence, having at first tried but failed failed to ban the practice altogether, so I want to have the means at hand to keep doing it in samizdat.

I'm just reaching the end of my bottle of Strawberry & Kiwi (rather disappointing) so I must check whether my Rhubarb & Custard - which I've been "steeping" for several weeks to allow the flavour to emerge fully - is ready. If it isn't, I'll treat myself to the dark liquorice tones offered by the sublime Blackjack.