Smoking Pot

[727Sky]

Author Alex Berenson joins 'Fox & Friends' to discuss Massachusetts' push to recriminalize marijuana amid rising daily use and data linking high-potency THC to youth psychiatric emergencies' mergencies.

[Ninurta]

I can't see recrimializing it, but that's just me - I don't believe in micro-regulating consenting adults if they aren't hurting someone else. I don't even agree with criminalization of meth and cocaine, really. Not even heroin. The criminalization has created a booming black market that is where the cartels thrive, and it drives prices way up, which is also the source of a lot of crime associated with drugs - the crime where folks are robbing other folks to get the money for their next fix. If the prices weren't so high, the ancillary crimes surrounding it would drop, and the cartels would go broke.

With that said, this weed they have out there now is not your grandpa's weed. When someone says "this shit is KILLER!" they might not be that far off. When I was younger, weed was harmless. You'd smoke a bit, get high, and go on your merry way. About the worst you could expect from it would be to get thrown into an uncontrollable laughing jag, laughing at shit that wasn't all that funny to begin with.The weed they have now, after years and years of selective breeding to get more bang for the buck - so they can charge more bucks, of course - has elevated the THC levels beyond ridiculous. What used to be at around 2% to 4% THC is now CLAIMED to be 15, 20, 30, or even 40% or more THC... which I think is probably marketing bullshit for anything over about 18% to 20% THC.

Another little clue - as THC content goes up, there is less room for things like CBD in it, so you get more bang and less cure. CBD tends to moderate the effects of THC to manageable levels, as well as other good stuff for you, like pain relief, psych help (it's been used to good effect for PTSD, for example), and crap like that. You need about equal parts THC to CBD, even in "Stoner" weed for a good buzz.

I'll tell ta a little personal story. When I was younger, I smoked weed. That's the weed I got used to, the weed we had back then, that 2-4% THC weed. Then I just stopped one day, and swore off of it, and got on with life. I swore off of it for about 40 years or so, maybe a bit more. Then, a few years ago, I'd retired, had nowhere to have to be and all day to get there, nothing else to do, so I thought I'd give it a try again.

That right there was a mistake.

I got hold of some, which was claimed to be 40% THC weed, and going by the way weed used to be, I smoked it like I used to do. Damn near killed me - literally. I was not only tore up from the floor up, my heart started racing and wouldn't stop. It got up to 183 or 184 beats per minute, which is technically tachycardia, before we called the Rescue Squad, since I was clearly going to keep going until my damn heart blew up.

And all this while I was stoned to the bone. It took the Rescue Squad 45 minutes or more to get here, and all that time my heart was trying to beat it's way out of my chest and run away from my body. I was so wrecked on that shit that if I HAD died, I'd have never known it.

Once I got that sorted out, and got my heart rate back under control - and came down offa that high - I pretty much swore off of it again. If that's what weed has become, I'll find something else to do. Don't need it. If I wanted to die, I'd jut drink some damned bleach or something. Don't need no weed that promises a high and then kills ya in the middle of it. Liquor is much better to sit around and commune with.

It was after that incident that I developed atrial fibrillation, and I've often wondered if that weed experience didn't precipitate it. I'll never know for sure, but I'll always be suspicious. Don't need no more of that - the next one might be the BIG one!

It also wrecked my relationship with liquor, if it's what caused the A-FIB. The medicine they have me on for life now for that don't mix well with liquor. Apparently, the metoprolol lowers blood pressure as a side effect, and liquor intensifies that lowering, potentially to dangerous levels. Now, don't get me wrong, I haven't clear quit drinking, but I've had to really, REALLY cut back on it. That alone might've killed me already if it wasn't for the fact that I'm no stranger to low blood pressure - my BP was 80 over 70 for most of my life, sometimes as low as 70 over 50, so I can manage it pretty well. Just makes ya  a little tired some times, and you learn not to stand up too fast, else you run a risk of seeing little black spots swimming circles around your head and sitting your ass right back down, fast..

So, anyhow, this weed they have nowadays ain't no joke, and it was positively criminal for them to do that to what was once a useful plant.

Bastards.

My advice to weed smokers is to try to find "heirloom" or "landrace" varieties, and get seed for them if you can manage it, to grow your own heirloom weed. It's better, and it's safer, and it cuts out the cartel middle-men... and any potential "additives" they may have laced your weed with. I never got wrecked on it like that in the old days. Be warned - those varieties are hard to find, and seed for them is even harder to find. Might be a lost cause. Everyone these days appears to be crazy after the high-test weed, and they've all forgotten the old adage from the days of my youth that "speed kills".

"Crazy" may be the operative word in that last sentence - this modern crap has a high potential to drive one bat-shit crazy, just as the story reported. Weed wasn't like that back in the day when it had sane levels of THC like the Good Lord intended it to have before these breeders tried to horn in on the God act.

Anything that has "gorilla" or "blueberry" or "diesel" or "rhino" or any of that other crazy shit they put in weed names these days is better passed on, in my opinion, unless you are just TRYING to wreck your whole world. If that's the case, then go for it, with my blessings. No judgement here. You do you, and let me do me.

.

[babushka]

I have much the same complaint about the weed not being what it used to be. It's way too potent, covered in crystals. Pretty sure they dope the dope. Spray crap on it. I always buy the cheap stuff and check the flowers doesn't look suspect.

[Ninurta]

I have much the same complaint about the weed not being what it used to be. It's way too potent, covered in crystals. Pretty sure they dope the dope. Spray crap on it. I always buy the cheap stuff and check the flowers doesn't look suspect.

There have been reports of weed getting dusted with fentanyl here in the US, much like some of it used to get dusted with PCP back in the day, both methods trying to amp it up. The PCP dusting is what made me lay off the weed originally, and the threat of fentanyl dusting doesn't make me feel any warmer or fuzzier about it.

I reckon the cartels have found themselves with too much fentanyl on their hands since it's harder to get it across the border now, so they've got to do SOMETHING with all that overstock!

But seriously - if I didn't grow it myself, I wouldn't fool with it. Now the fact is, I DO grow some, but I don't even smoke what I grow myself, since the seed came from some of that high-test weed. Folks tell me mine is pretty mild, more like old school weed, but I don't think I'll chance it, all the same. I don't fancy another bout of waiting for my heart to explode. 

I just grow it for the ornamental value - I think it's a pretty plant - and I save the stems to eventually try to get the fiber out of to maybe make some string. I just give the flowers away. Not enough yield off 4 plants to bother going into business over it. But shit, at a 4 plant per growing season maximum, it'll be years and years before I realistically have enough fiber to make a pair of shoe strings, so that's probably just a waste.

It's something to do. it keeps me off the streets and out of trouble, although since the Feds have started screwing with the rules again, this past growing season might be the last I grow. To much headache trying to navigate their murky and confusing rule book.

The state rule book is just as confusing - you can grow up to 4 plants here for any purpose, but you can't buy it anywhere but a dispensary, and you can't buy the seeds at all to grow it from, anywhere. You have to hope you luck up and find a bag seed to pop into the ground. You can't sell it, but you can give away as much as folks can stand to carry off... except that they are limited to possession of an ounce in public... and the state is pretty murky on how much you can posses in private... other than the 4 plant maximum while it is growing. So you can grow it, but you can't get the seeds to grow it from, and you can give away as much as you can stand to give, but not more than an ounce per person if they have to pass through "public" to get it to their house. The laws are all over the damned place, both state and federal, and they are subject to change on short notice, or no notice at all.

It's a headache trying to navigate the often contradictory red tape. The law should say simply "Get some seed. Drop it in the ground. The end."

So, in that case, I might have to start hitting the streets and finding some trouble again, since the government may get upset with my dinky 4 plants a growing season that keeps me at home on the farm... and if I'm going to get in trouble either way, I'd rather it be for something BIG and serious! Something that counts for something, y'know? You know what they say - go big or go home!

.

[babushka]

There have been reports of weed getting dusted with fentanyl here in the US, much like some of it used to get dusted with PCP back in the day, both methods trying to amp it up. The PCP dusting is what made me lay off the weed originally, and the threat of fentanyl dusting doesn't make me feel any warmer or fuzzier about it.

The state rule book is just as confusing - you can grow up to 4 plants here for any purpose, but you can't buy it anywhere but a dispensary, and you can't buy the seeds at all to grow it from, anywhere. You have to hope you luck up and find a bag seed to pop into the ground. You can't sell it, but you can give away as much as folks can stand to carry off... except that they are limited to possession of an ounce in public... and the state is pretty murky on how much you can posses in private... other than the 4 plant maximum while it is growing. So you can grow it, but you can't get the seeds to grow it from, and you can give away as much as you can stand to give, but not more than an ounce per person if they have to pass through "public" to get it to their house. The laws are all over the damned place, both state and federal, and they are subject to change on short notice, or no notice at all.

It's a headache trying to navigate the often contradictory red tape. The law should say simply "Get some seed. Drop it in the ground. The end."


.

Yup and we got the same rules over here. 4 plants per person. Illegal to sell but you can buy at dispensaries. Climate is crap though, have trouble curing, last time I tried to grow my own the flowers got all moldy and I threw it away after a week

[rickymouse]

I can't see recrimializing it, but that's just me - I don't believe in micro-regulating consenting adults if they aren't hurting someone else. I don't even agree with criminalization of meth and cocaine, really. Not even heroin. The criminalization has created a booming black market that is where the cartels thrive, and it drives prices way up, which is also the source of a lot of crime associated with drugs - the crime where folks are robbing other folks to get the money for their next fix. If the prices weren't so high, the ancillary crimes surrounding it would drop, and the cartels would go broke.

With that said, this weed they have out there now is not your grandpa's weed. When someone says "this shit is KILLER!" they might not be that far off. When I was younger, weed was harmless. You'd smoke a bit, get high, and go on your merry way. About the worst you could expect from it would be to get thrown into an uncontrollable laughing jag, laughing at shit that wasn't all that funny to begin with.The weed they have now, after years and years of selective breeding to get more bang for the buck - so they can charge more bucks, of course - has elevated the THC levels beyond ridiculous. What used to be at around 2% to 4% THC is now CLAIMED to be 15, 20, 30, or even 40% or more THC... which I think is probably marketing bullshit for anything over about 18% to 20% THC.

Another little clue - as THC content goes up, there is less room for things like CBD in it, so you get more bang and less cure. CBD tends to moderate the effects of THC to manageable levels, as well as other good stuff for you, like pain relief, psych help (it's been used to good effect for PTSD, for example), and crap like that. You need about equal parts THC to CBD, even in "Stoner" weed for a good buzz.

I'll tell ta a little personal story. When I was younger, I smoked weed. That's the weed I got used to, the weed we had back then, that 2-4% THC weed. Then I just stopped one day, and swore off of it, and got on with life. I swore off of it for about 40 years or so, maybe a bit more. Then, a few years ago, I'd retired, had nowhere to have to be and all day to get there, nothing else to do, so I thought I'd give it a try again.

That right there was a mistake.

I got hold of some, which was claimed to be 40% THC weed, and going by the way weed used to be, I smoked it like I used to do. Damn near killed me - literally. I was not only tore up from the floor up, my heart started racing and wouldn't stop. It got up to 183 or 184 beats per minute, which is technically tachycardia, before we called the Rescue Squad, since I was clearly going to keep going until my damn heart blew up.

And all this while I was stoned to the bone. It took the Rescue Squad 45 minutes or more to get here, and all that time my heart was trying to beat it's way out of my chest and run away from my body. I was so wrecked on that shit that if I HAD died, I'd have never known it.

Once I got that sorted out, and got my heart rate back under control - and came down offa that high - I pretty much swore off of it again. If that's what weed has become, I'll find something else to do. Don't need it. If I wanted to die, I'd jut drink some damned bleach or something. Don't need no weed that promises a high and then kills ya in the middle of it. Liquor is much better to sit around and commune with.

It was after that incident that I developed atrial fibrillation, and I've often wondered if that weed experience didn't precipitate it. I'll never know for sure, but I'll always be suspicious. Don't need no more of that - the next one might be the BIG one!

It also wrecked my relationship with liquor, if it's what caused the A-FIB. The medicine they have me on for life now for that don't mix well with liquor. Apparently, the metoprolol lowers blood pressure as a side effect, and liquor intensifies that lowering, potentially to dangerous levels. Now, don't get me wrong, I haven't clear quit drinking, but I've had to really, REALLY cut back on it. That alone might've killed me already if it wasn't for the fact that I'm no stranger to low blood pressure - my BP was 80 over 70 for most of my life, sometimes as low as 70 over 50, so I can manage it pretty well. Just makes ya  a little tired some times, and you learn not to stand up too fast, else you run a risk of seeing little black spots swimming circles around your head and sitting your ass right back down, fast..

So, anyhow, this weed they have nowadays ain't no joke, and it was positively criminal for them to do that to what was once a useful plant.

Bastards.

My advice to weed smokers is to try to find "heirloom" or "landrace" varieties, and get seed for them if you can manage it, to grow your own heirloom weed. It's better, and it's safer, and it cuts out the cartel middle-men... and any potential "additives" they may have laced your weed with. I never got wrecked on it like that in the old days. Be warned - those varieties are hard to find, and seed for them is even harder to find. Might be a lost cause. Everyone these days appears to be crazy after the high-test weed, and they've all forgotten the old adage from the days of my youth that "speed kills".

"Crazy" may be the operative word in that last sentence - this modern crap has a high potential to drive one bat-shit crazy, just as the story reported. Weed wasn't like that back in the day when it had sane levels of THC like the Good Lord intended it to have before these breeders tried to horn in on the God act.

Anything that has "gorilla" or "blueberry" or "diesel" or "rhino" or any of that other crazy shit they put in weed names these days is better passed on, in my opinion, unless you are just TRYING to wreck your whole world. If that's the case, then go for it, with my blessings. No judgement here. You do you, and let me do me.

.

I think they should limit the strength to like it was back in the seventies myself.  You are right, but raising the THC so high, it takes away much of the medicinal CBD chemistry.  It is not a medicine anymore, it is a drug to get high.  We now have legal pot here in Michigan, and the price actually went down to around a hundred bucks an ounce from being around two hundred plus when it was illegal.  The state gobbles some of that money they charge here, so they don't seem to be concerned that the highly potent strains are causing mental issues. 

I liked the nice smell and flavor that it had back in the seventies.  Now it smells like crap, I gave up smoking three decades ago because the taste was not pleasing like it used to be, and occasionally did get some from a friend who sold it over twenty years ago....and did not even smoke most of it because it was too strong and did not taste like it should.  Now that it is legal, I though about growing some mild tasty stuff, but you can't seem to find the seeds anymore for that.  If I would have known this was going to happen, back in the seventies I would have saved the seeds of the best tasting stuff...mild in strength...and grow it now that it is legal. 

I can't understand why anyone likes the crap they sell today.  It gets a person real stoned, it wouldn't be fun anymore.  There used to be fun parties with a hundred young people at them, drinking and passing joints around back in the early seventies.  Then the stronger pots came around and it divided the culture.  I was welcome at both of the two different cultures that formed....and I saw society splitting apart even in the pot culture at that time.  But I could not bring someone from the regular cheap pot culture with me to the high quality parties...that was taboo.  That split the class apart.  Back then there were the hard drug users class too, and they did have their own culture group.  The tickers, and the hashers, and of course those who liked crystal and those who liked downers.  Most of the LSD crew fit well into the other groups, most of them were mellow trippers.  Heroin was not very popular in the party culture in our area back then....now I know quite a few older people who have kids and grandkids that got messed up on Heroin.  That drug is really problematic.  so are the meths and fentanyls.  The upper class back long ago did a lot of Cocaine...but with the cost, not many could afford it locally, kids of the businessmen and kids of judges could afford that stuff, and of course later on some lawyers indulged in that...but the working class rarely used that drug.around here, the barrel parties out in the woods mostly had beer and cheap pot that barely gave you a buzz.

Of course I was just an observer, I did nothing illegal and fun. I never got dragged into the police station and questioned because I was at a party with a friend that ODed by the Tri-county detectives with all the police in the area in attendance....which I knew most of those cops from partying with over the years. I just mentioned that don't any of the cops here get high and drunk or own fully automatic weapons or do anything illegal...with all the cops in the room I knew well looking down...maybe twenty of the twenty five watching...they just sent me on my way and said stay out of trouble.  I told the detective questioning me I never squeal on anyone, if they want someone to talk, they can find someone else.  I actually gained respect from the cops in the room that day...they knew I could be trusted.  I even gained respect from the overzealous cop that was questioning me.  Nothing happened, the friend of mine got busted for Tick in his blood, he did sell some harder drugs, after three years in prison he reformed and became a LPN working for a hospice group going out to visit people who were disabled and old with disabilities.  He did that for twenty years...he actually straightened out pretty well, getting his training and crudentials while in prison....having a prior knowledge of drugs gave him some insight into side effects of medicines on people I suppose.  He never became an RN though, I suppose he did not want to be involved in dispensing meds anymore.

[gortex]

Perhaps they should recriminalize alcohol too , the damage that drug does and the trouble it causes for hospital staff and law enforcement must deserve equal treatment to a drug that doesn't kill its user or cause them to want to smash people in the face.

I gave up alcohol.

[Kenzo1]

Perhaps they should recriminalize alcohol too , the damage that drug does and the trouble it causes for hospital staff and law enforcement must deserve equal treatment to a drug that doesn't kill its user or cause them to want to smash people in the face.

I gave up alcohol.

Nice gortex        to give up alcohol .

[Michigan Swamp Buck]

Take my word for it, "Poking smot causes drain bamage".

[Ninurta]

Yup and we got the same rules over here. 4 plants per person. Illegal to sell but you can buy at dispensaries. Climate is crap though, have trouble curing, last time I tried to grow my own the flowers got all moldy and I threw it away after a week

I reckon I wasn't too clear - here it's 4 plants per household, rather than 4 per person. So if, for example, you have a 4 person household, you can't extrapolate that to grow 16 plants.

But that's just this state. Other states allow 6 or so plants per household, and one I think goes up to 12 plants. Like I said, the laws are all over the place about it, no standardization. So you have to really, REALLY know the laws in your area here, both state and federal - which are also different, often at odds and contradictory. It's a mess.

Humidity can be a killer for curing it. High humidity is where the mold gets to grow. Here, outdoors, humidity varies drastically I don't know what the low is - probably around 30% - but the highs often get to 100%. Indoors, in the summer it usually hovers around 70%, which is high enough to let the mold grow, but in the fall it drops to around 60%, and in the winter, 44-45%. Drying should be around 60-65% humidity, and once dried, curing should be around the same, but inside sealed glass jars which you have to "burp" - every couple of days for the first week, twice a week for the second week, then down to once a week for a couple of weeks, and then don to once every two weeks for a couple of weeks,and then it's done.

"Burping" the jars just involved opening them for 5 minutes or so to allow for air exchange.

When it's done, you just seal it up and forget about burping it, an store the jars in a dark, cool place.

The key is to dry it in a climate-controlled place where the humidity is only around 60% to prevent the molding. creative use of heating and air conditioning can control the humidity, but you got to keep an stye on it to keep it constant for the week to two weeks that you're drying it. Not always as easy as it sounds. Once you've got it jarred up for curing, it's a bit easier.

This year, out of 4 entire plants, I got a grand total of about 84 grams which cured down to about 42 grams. Hardly worth the effort for someone looking to make a financial killing, which luckily I'm not. To be fair, one of those plants was a male, so doesn't count for buds. I keep a male around to create seeds. Like I said, they're hard to get otherwise. A pretty high proportion of that 42 gram cured weight was seeds. But, if I produce my own seeds, I don't have to fool with the outside markets, buying enough bud that I won't smoke just to get enough seeds for 4 dinky little plants.

I shook down and mashed out the seeds, and gave the buds away. Got about 1500 or 1600 seeds off the 4 plants, so I ought to have enough for my 4 plants next year if I even decide to grow any again, with a bunch left over I can give over to the other "farmers" around here. Have to give those away, too, because again you can't sell them here. On line, they go for about 5-15 dollars PER SEED, so if I could sell them, I could finance my next year's entire garden handily.

I think seed production would be where the real money is for growers. For example, off of these 4 plants, only 3 of them females, I got around 250 dollars worth of buds at local market values, but around 15,000 (between 7,500 and 22,500) dollars worth of seeds at those same market values. I don't mind just giving that stuff away, though. You can build up a lot of good will that can be drawn on later by just giving crap away that cost you nothing or next to nothing to get in the first place..

.

[Ninurta]

Perhaps they should recriminalize alcohol too , the damage that drug does and the trouble it causes for hospital staff and law enforcement must deserve equal treatment to a drug that doesn't kill its user or cause them to want to smash people in the face.

I gave up alcohol.

They tried that here about  century ago, but it didn't go well. What it did was the same as the criminalization of drugs - created a whole new criminal underworld class, and caused it to grow, and grow, and grow. That's how the Mafia made it big in the US... off the back of Prohibition. I do believe that Prohibition was the only Constitutional amendment that required another Constitutional amendment to fix it.

By then, however, the Mafia had moved in to other endeavors - diversified their business interests, so to speak. We see the same thing happening currently in the drug cartels - got their start and made their bones in drug smuggling, but are now diversifying their business interests into human trafficking as well as drug smuggling.

No telling where it will end if they don't nip it now, assuming it's not already too late.

That's the thing about trying to tell other folks how to run their own lives - it creates an instant criminal class, and once they've broken one law, they don't mind diversifying into breaking a crap ton of other laws, because they already breached the gates, After that, it's all over but the cryin'.

For example, they should have stopped at making murder and assault illegal, rather than trying to micromanage HOW folks commit murder and assault. Just let the base crime be illegal, and don't worry over the details of why and how that individual got sent to the gallows. The micromanaging causes entirely new criminal classes, and creates new business opportunities for the criminal classes - gun runners and folks selling butcher knives out of their trunks are just offshoots of the basic "thou shalt not kill" laws. Then, once those weapons runners have broken one law, even though they've never directly killed anyone, they don't mind diversifying their businesses to break more and more laws, and that eventually leads to even more killings to protect their own business interests.

Paradoxically, perhaps, over-legislation leads to lawlessness on more massive scales.

.

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[Michigan Swamp Buck]

Mold can grow on the drying plant, but as long as you keep circulating the air, even if it isn't hot and dry, the mold won't grow. I dry in the garden shed with a small fan and heat lamps to speed up drying. Cigar people use humidors and say a little mold isn't a big deal, but the mold on pot can infect your lungs when you smoke it. 

In October, just around harvest time, esp. if it is humid or rainy, the mold will destroy the buds in a matter of a few days. This is called bud rot, and the moment you see the smallest spot on a bud, you need to trim the whole bud to save that plant and the others around it. It is really fast and will ruin your harvest if you aren't paying attention. I'm not that concerned with growing it, though. Other than some fertilizer occasionally, I tend my pot plants like they were weeds. I only look at them when they get four or five feet tall and can be sexed, and then again close to harvest time.

Also, the law here allows 12 plants per household, or 12 per person if only one person is growing. The bigger operations require a license and other crap, of course.