Uh, I guess I can see why he kept the chain on the door...
It's not illegal in the US?
Old enough to remember when it wasn't, and when there were ashtrays basically everywhere, and also old enough to have been able to (legally) smoke in bars (while legally drinking as well). I'm in the midwest; one branch of my bank still has the holes from the old ashtrays in the teller counter, and there's at least one long-time restaurant in town that has an ashtray holder above each urinal in their men's restroom.
The feds banned smoking in federal buildings in 1997. Outside of the southeast, pretty much everywhere banned smoking outright at most commercial establishments via state law in the '00's (California was an early adopter in 1995), and even in tobacco country in the southeast, a lot of cities/counties enacted bans, and many states restricted/limited smoking areas in offices and such to designated areas. All healthcare systems at this point tend to be pretty heavy-handed about property-wide smoking bans. BUT, while there are some cities where you could get a ticket for walking down the sidewalk smoking, those are the exception in most of the country. And there are always a few folks willing to look the other way - there was one small town about an hour from me with a small bar whose owner refused to enforce the law, and since the county sheriff was a regular (and a smoker), they were able to get away with it for almost ten years before it finally got the attention of the state police.
Thanks for the chapter!