Smoke Only Local, Organic Pot

and only from a farmer you know and trust. (4.00 / 8)

preferably one who understands the medicinal uses of each strain they grow.

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by: zic @ Sat Apr 04, 2009 at 22:47:46 PM UTC

We tried... (4.00 / 8)

back in high school in NJ, to grow our own weed, which would have (unwittingly) been local and organic by default.  But we failed, which probably should have been expected from us.  Heh.  Hydro was far more complicated than it sounded, obviously...

Yes - legalize the stuff already, long past due.  Just stay away from the inevitable Monsanto GM weed, though...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Sat Apr 04, 2009 at 23:26:00 PM UTC

so complicated (4.00 / 7)

gosh, we just grew it out in the south 40.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 00:51:56 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Now they confiscate your land. (4.00 / 7)

so people grow it on someone else's back 40.

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by: zic @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 01:50:23 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

true that (4.00 / 3)

kind of a tacky thing to do, put someone else at risk like that. Better to build a nifty little louvered compartment into some dead space in the wall.

There's always the national forests and parks, but then you get side effects like legalizing carrying guns in the parks so the tourists can play cowboy with the drug growers...sigh. My, all this would be a lot simpler if we'd just legalize it.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:59:58 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I hear the new Roundup Ready (4.00 / 6)

stuff is good, though!

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by: Farmboy @ Sat Apr 04, 2009 at 23:30:37 PM UTC

As a lifelong non-toker (4.00 / 7)

I can't help but agree. Legalize the stuff already. We tried prohibition twice already. Once it failed (alcohol) and and now it's in a long slow fail (marijuana). Personally I don't much care if someone lights up a doobie as long as they don't do it when they're driving and otherwise obey any local laws about where and when you can consume tobacco and alcohol.

I have succumbed to the Twitter craze. @Omir55

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by: Omir the Storyteller @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 00:30:04 AM UTC

funny thing. They did a study in England a few years ago (4.00 / 6)

and found that teenage boys had fewer accidents when toking because they drove slower.

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by: zic @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 01:49:32 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

you know (4.00 / 6)

every potsmoker I know tells me they are better drivers while stoned, and I never believed them!

"I can understand someone from Iowa promoting corn and soy, but we are not feeding the world, we are feeding animals and soft drink companies." - Jim Goodman

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by: Jill Richardson @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 04:27:15 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

It's been a while (4.00 / 1)

I gave up the booze and drugs around the same time 20 years ago - it was ruining my life.

I can tell you, in brutal honesty, the biggest difference between driving drunk, driving stoned, and driving sober is in the expectation of capability.

As a drunk, I thought I was more capable than I should have thought I was.

When stoned, I thought I was less capable than I actually was.

Sober, well - that's the new norm, so call it "baseline".

So, drunk me would drive wildly, too fast, too cocky, with slowed reaction time - an accident waiting to happen. I've had a few; sometimes it was me, sometimes it was the other guy, but drunk is the best and most effective path to an accident there is.

Driving stoned was altogether different. Gone is the cock-surity of liquid fortified courage. Replace that with a dash of paranoia and a much more careful demeanor. Stoned, I would drive much slower - at the speed limit lest I attract the attention of the cops. The most dangerous driving while stoned is left hand on the wheel, right hand digging through the grocery bag trying to find the box of Devil Dogs under the eggs.

Sober - well, no accidents in the last 20 years - but a dozen speeding tickets. What does that tell you?

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by: Patriot4Peace @ Tue Apr 07, 2009 at 14:19:25 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

it's misleading to argue (4.00 / 8)

that marijuana doesn't ever have any negative side effects. Heavy use trashes people's short term memories, you can have to get seriously into taking notes if your life is at all complicated and what you need to do isn't right in front of you all the time.

And it has some strange effects on anger management, I've noted - i.e., it may be great for chilling out wife-beaters, but it can screw people up who are more avoidant; i.e. you don't really ever learn to deal with your anger, you just smoke it away. Thus, you don't ever confront what you're angry about, and the anger doesn't really go away, you tend to turn it in more. That can be a real dead end.

But compared to alcohol? Are you kidding? These are just minor inconveniences compared to what alcohol can do to people. You can DRIVE stoned on pot without impairment, other than perhaps driving around in circles a lot because you keep forgetting where you are. Don't try this with alcohol, kids. Marijuana also doesn't screw up your heart or your liver.

And I do drink, but I don't smoke. The politics of it got to be too much for me, but if it were legal, I wouldn't be able to resist growing it. Probably smoke it too. So go ahead; take me out and shoot me.


"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 00:58:41 AM UTC

I would never argue that it has no (4.00 / 7)

negative side effects OR that it's good for you. But neither is alcohol or cigarettes and they're legal.

"I can understand someone from Iowa promoting corn and soy, but we are not feeding the world, we are feeding animals and soft drink companies." - Jim Goodman

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by: Jill Richardson @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 01:14:08 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

some people consider it quite good for depression (4.00 / 4)

but yes, that's generally my point (or one of them); that it's bizarre to have it illegal when alcohol and tobacco aren't.  

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:46:53 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I've used it for migraine treatment for years; (4.00 / 7)

my spouse because of social stuff.

And we've both gone on the wagon for just these reasons. As middle-agers in our early 50's and late 40's, we found memory loss, inability to do and plan projects, and paranoia were becoming too serious to ignore.

So we're enjoying the bliss of a chem-free (except for his occasional beer and coffee) existence. The first month sucked; much physical pain that we'd been able to 'forget' before; and very vivid dreams.

But now we're both feeling better, more able to complete complex projects, we're arguing less, and just maybe we'll loose a bit of that middle-aged tire we've both started working on.

But I have to be honest, I miss it in social situations, and dealing with the constant physical pain in my neck (I suffered a childhood accident, injuring my head and neck pretty severely) and the migraine problems are not fun. They're just less of an evil than the inability to do stuff I want to do.

If my migraines get bad enough that I'm vomiting multiple times an hour, it will be the first relief I reach for, though.  

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by: zic @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 01:48:25 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

interesting (4.00 / 3)

I'd never heard of anybody using it for migraines.

It's a complex substance and doesn't affect everyone the same way. But there are certainly patterns in both what people think it good for and what its downsides seem to be. Still, that's within American culture in my experience. Some cultures incorporate drugs like opium without disruption, which can be helpful for the really poor ones who don't have modern health care or any other way to deal with pain management.

Very broad subject and easy to oversimplify.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:50:53 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Much of migraine is pressure from restricted blood vessels in the brain (4.00 / 1)

which also causes an increase of pressure in the eye; a glaucoma-like reaction.

In reading Oliver Sacks book, Migraine, I learned that mine are rare -- most often triggered by flashing lights, followed by hormone changes. So my cure may also be rare.  

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by: zic @ Sat Apr 11, 2009 at 02:17:25 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

thanks for the info (0.00 / 0)

my sister-in-law used to use caffeine for hers, but she got tired of the up-and-down and now she uses some kind of heavy med for several days a month and the rest of the time she's okay, I guess.

I used to know another person, a guy, extremely smart guy, extremely oriented towards alt/natural cures, everything - who had such bad migraines that they screwed up his life back down to about 50% of what it could have been - never found anything to fix them, far as I ever heard from him. Never got a good night's sleep. He tried living in the mountains in California for a few years, on an unimproved property away from everyone, no electricity, no anything but nature and no humans either. Still didn't work.

I think he's still got a webpage up, with an article (used to be at least) about the last time he'd gotten a good night's sleep was after he hopped a train in his youth. Got off the train after some number of hours and slept like a baby.

They're scary, migraines.


"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Sun Apr 12, 2009 at 00:37:40 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Everything in moderation! n/t (4.00 / 8)

Vote for yourself at www.ni4d.us!

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by: rossl @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 04:46:58 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Including moderation! (4.00 / 7)

Sic Transit Gloria Locavore!

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by: Asinus Asinum Fricat @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 13:37:56 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Ok, kidding aside... (4.00 / 7)

I don't drink much at all.  Maybe two beers a month average.
Really.  

But I have been smoking pot and hash for over thirty years.
I don't smoke but three or four times a year now, but I still smoke.

I wouldn't advise driving under the influence, your judgment is fairly compromised. I find that I get easily distracted, especially around others who are stoned.  

As a kid I drove around stoned and never had an issue, but still...

I would definitely smoke a lot more if I could actually buy it instead of sharing with friends who just happen to have some.

My personal opinion is that the argument for legalizing marijuana is completely justified.  People are going to smoke it no matter what.  And keeping it illegal means that those who grow it, and smoke it, are of the criminal element.  

The only fear I have about legalizing it is that a new criminal element would seize control of it, namely corporate greed.  

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by: Farmboy @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 01:59:23 AM UTC

I dunno (4.00 / 3)

people say that, but I envision it getting so common that people complain about the vacant lots being fire hazards because of all the damn marijuana growing wild there.

But I think there would always be a market for "designer" pot, though.

As for driving...I've known SO many people who drove stoned, and I never saw that there was any dangerous impairment. Maybe y'all get different pot than I used to.

I have on the other hand been in cars where people were driving under the influence of alcohol or stuff like tranks and that can be so scary you want to make them stop and get out. Very different. However, if you don't do it every day, that could be a different situation. I used to hang with people who did it every day, and you adapt.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:54:10 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

"Cops Say Legalize Drugs" (4.00 / 7)

http://www.salem-news.com/arti...

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by: raatz @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 02:55:04 AM UTC

cops are often (4.00 / 3)

great advocates for legalizing marijuana. They have upfront experience with drunks, users of certain nasty pills, and pot users; they know the difference.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:55:14 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I know some people (4.00 / 6)

who have grown their own pot.  It's a great thing, IMHO.  I mean, I don't want to encourage drug cartels and potentially hurt people by spending money on pot.  So once I find a good place where my parents won't find it.....

Vote for yourself at www.ni4d.us!

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by: rossl @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 04:46:13 AM UTC

it's really quite easy (4.00 / 3)

helps to have a sunny climate.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 03:55:36 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

They said (4.00 / 3)

they just took some seeds and put it in a pot in their backyard and watered it and such, but in the end it died before they could harvest it.

Vote for yourself at www.ni4d.us!

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by: rossl @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 04:37:17 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I dunno, Ross (4.00 / 3)

some people don't have a lot of practice growing plants, and there are things obvious to people with gardening experience that aren't always to people without it. Example: anything growing in sopping wet soil is likely to rot from the bottom up - to get this conversation out of treacherously illegal areas; one of the biggest mistakes people make with growing any plants in pots is to overwater them.

Some tips:

Make sure the pot has drain holes. Pots with just a little hole won't always do it. Unfinished terra cotta will dry out faster than other kinds of pots. Pots made of a sealed substance with just a little hole sitting in a tray may not drain at all.

Invest in a moisture gauge. I buy mine from Sutherland's (chain hardware store) for about $4.50. They are fragile and if you drop them often stop working, but they are really helpful if you're not practiced with telling how much your plants need water (and even if you are).

Otherwise, hard to address your comment. Kind of had to have been there, if you get my drift.

"If God were to appear to starving people, he would not dare to appear in any other form than food." - Mahatma Gandhi

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by: Miep @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 05:01:56 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

That's all I really know about it (4.00 / 2)

I wasn't there.  It was a friend - I swear!

No, really.  It wasn't me.

Vote for yourself at www.ni4d.us!

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by: rossl @ Mon Apr 06, 2009 at 16:31:29 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

As someone who has smoked (moderately) for the last 40 years I concur (4.00 / 6)

with the sentiment. Of course it should be legalized, but the police won't like it: they make a hefty profit from distribution and I mean worldwide. Isn't it amazing that every December soft drugs such as hashish and marijuana disappear off the shelves, so to speak, but crack, cocaine & the dreaded heroin are available?


Sic Transit Gloria Locavore!

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by: Asinus Asinum Fricat @ Sun Apr 05, 2009 at 13:43:09 PM UTC