What is Acceptable?

 

We love guns, sex and gambling. Can you imagine anything getting in our way when it comes to the pursuit of the Big Three? If it is our desire to have, hold or own any of the Holy Trio, God help the man or woman who tries to stop us. Because if you do…if you do…Try to stop us…We’re just going to have to look the other way. That’s just the way it is. 

That is the way it is with everything in Life in America. Everything. Except Marijuana.

Starting with Guns: Full disclosure, I like guns. I shot my first handgun a couple of months ago and really enjoyed myself. I was in the country and where I was staying, there were bear sightings. While the .38 wouldn’t have done much to the bear except piss it off, my host felt that because how deep we were in the woods everyone in attendance needed to be familiar with guns, in case anything happened. It seemed perfectly acceptable to be prepared at that moment.

By the way, two gun stories from the last month.

Pastor Terry Jones, the clergyman best known for trying to equate the Koran to the Presto log for his thermo love and causing the killing of some twenty United Nations workers, accidently discharge a pistol after giving an interview in Detroit. So this servant of God whose little voice set off a world-wide panic, guns goes off in the studio’s parking lot, twice, and the cops say, “Nothing here to see.” The Pastor didn’t need to show a long form birth certificate, his .22 was all the proof the local constables required. Totally acceptable.

Just to keep the Detroit connection alive, the Southwestern Regional Director of the National Socialist Movement that’s based in Detroit (again, the word use of ‘Socialism’ when referring to local subversive group and the quiet acceptance of militias by Americans, perfectly acceptable) was shot and killed in Riverside, California by his ten-year old son. I could politicize this by saying that if guns had been allowed in the home, maybe this wouldn’t have happened if the father was bettered armed.  But that logic would only fall on dead ears.

We don’t we know how to discuss this or have a conversation about violence associated with weapons without a gun aficionado commando worried that we want to limit their clips or God Apple Pie, take away some of their rights.

No one listens to stories of gun violence anymore. Let’s face it, even a day-care shooting is old news. It’s just what happens here in America. There’s really nothing we can do about it. It is just what we accept.

Number Two, Sex, my favorite. Ashton Kutcher had a campaign going for a few seconds that said real men don’t pay for sex. That easy to say when you have Demi Moore at home. I wish. But I understood his politics. He was making a point about the sex trade. That most of the women, at least in Californian massage parlors and in the wanted ads, are part of a forced sex slave practice that has flourished well, way before Craig Newmark decided to make his list.

I don’t think there’s a town that doesn’t have a gas station, general store and a bar, where you can’t find some action if you were hungry and had the bucks and time to find it.

Last year in San Francisco, I went to a hearing about the possible opening of a dispensary in a relatively residential location. The hearing lasted hours and I left midmorning around 2 AM thinking there was no chance for a Pot Shop out in the Sunset. While there were liquor stores and a porn video store within blocks, this heavy Asian populated location would never allow a dispensary. I was wrong. The Zoning Commission approved for the opening of a dispensary that would service the patients that are literally in the farthest part in the City. It actually made sense.

It never opened. The local bosses had it shut down. Funny story. This location I later found out from a confidential close-up source is in the heart of the sex slave district. The person who told me this dial a number randomly from an ad we found online and then one from the back of a weekly rag, advertising  for massage by young Asian hottie. The meeting place was the corner where the dispensary was going to open; this is where you go for a rub and tug, but not for medication for treatment of the effects of cancer and other debilitating illnesses.

There isn’t a neighbor in this ‘hood who doesn’t know why there are gentlemen coming in and out of residential homes, at all hours zipping up their flys, looking around hoping they’re invisible. And why not, to most Americans they are.

     Fun little fact. The redder the state, the more conservative the voting and the more repressed the social climate is (Hello Mississippi), the higher the use of online porn. Fact. But this is just another little sextoid that we won’t or don’t know how to talk about. It’s like when a young woman is taken in Europe. It happens. Don’t get your panties in such a bunch. This is perfectly acceptable. Just hope your dad is Liam Neeson.

Ask any Family Values president after getting busted for being with a young boy or girl, or a prostitute, or an aid or page, it just happens. If it wasn’t perfectly acceptable, why would we vote these people back in political office time and time again? They are our leaders, yes?

And then there’s Gambling, that’s easy. People are morons. The House wins. End of story.

Imagine if you had a business where all you had to do is dig about a thousand holes in the floor of your establishment, call them ‘Wishing Wells’ and then charge the rubes various amounts of cash depending on the scale of their dream. Promise Americans that their dreams could come true, that all you have to do is drop your money down the well, and we do the rest. Oh yeah, you get free Cokes and the chance to ogle women in skimpy outfits in return.

And if you build them a casino, they will come.

Every study has shown that gaming and gambling brings down a town. People lose their houses and jobs. The divorce rate goes up. Check it out.

There isn’t a village or hamlet that is immune from having either a Native American sponsored casino or some other den of iniquity from sprouting up just a short drive out of town.

We use to think separating Americans from their money in shell games was a bad thing. Now it’s called Wall Street.

And it’s all acceptable.

Here’s what isn’t acceptable; Medical Marijuana. It is labeled as Schedule One drug, as seen by the protective eyes of the American government and the American Medical Association. The reason Marijuana is classified as a Schedule One drug is because it has been determine that the weed known as Cannabis has no medical value, the only importance it has is recreational. This puts marijuana on par with Heroin, LSD, and other harsh drugs that very few of us like to wake up with.

What is labeled as a Schedule Two drug you ask? The drugs that are seen as not as harmful as marijuana are Cocaine, Meth, Ritalin, Opium, Dexies, Demerol, PCP and speed that you slam. Right now if you ask Attorney General Eric Holder, he’d have to say that marijuana is worse for you that all the above.

Even though every so often a president of the United States commissions a study on the medicinal effects of marijuana to see if there’s anything good in it. This has been done since 1937 when Marijuana was made evil by Harry J. Anslinger following the orders set forth by his uncle, Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon. In every study commissioned, the facts come up wrong. They find that marijuana is not harmful and actually may have some real medicinal advantages. But the Powers That Be told those stupid scientists to go back to the lab until they can find that evil nucleus in the ganja atom. So the studies get buried. Check it out.

When Secretary Mellon was working with Bill Hearst The First and his propaganda machine called The Examiner, they’re desire was to just to wipe out the hemp industry. The medical applications, even though used for thousands of years elsewhere, need not apply here. They were able to make some calls to the AMA, even though the doctor’s group was salivating over the approach of big Pharma with their new medicines and incentive kickbacks (look what happened to Dr. Kimball in the Fugitive) coming their way that replaced the free wives tales and their free medical services of the early 1900’s. The only problem was the docs couldn’t find anything really wrong with weed. That was the first test done on marijuana to find fault with it.

They couldn’t.

Didn’t matter, again the Powers That Be had a bad jones and the only cure they knew was that marijuana needed to be Schedule One drug. It ended the discussion for most of America. How can a drug have any medicinal properties if the institutions we trust and have our faith in tells us, they can’t?

Is it possible that since 1937 our lifestyles and our thinking process have changed? Is there even the remote possibility that we’ve grown in intellect and understanding of how the world around us really works?

In 2010, Eighty thousands Americans were busted for marijuana. In California.

There are roughly four hundred thousand medical marijuana card holders in Cali.

Eric Holder and our president mock medical marijuana patients wondering if all those card holders really need all those cards, or are they faking it?

I don’t know. What is the expectation? Go to prison? Stand up for your rights? Or do what everyone else does and pretend that every weird shooting or sex act or scandal or when daddy loses the house to the Keno girl is just another day in America?

Isn’t this the way it?

What’s the deal? Is the real problem that marijuana is medicinal and recreational at the same time? Is it becomes of the dichotomy of the weed that we don’t know which side of the coin is up? 

I don’t know. Tell me, America, I know you have a schedule to keep. Just tell me, what is acceptable?

1937 at a glance.

Feb 5th - 1st Charlie Chaplin talkie, "Modern Times," released

Feb 16th - DuPont Corp patents nylon, developed by employee Wallace H Carothers

May 3rd - Margaret Mitchell wins Pulitzer Prize for "Gone With the Wind"

Aug 2nd - The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 is passed in America, essentially rendering marijuana and all its by-products illegal.

Aug 18th - 1st FM radio construction permit issued (W1X0J (WGTR) in Boston MA)

Oct 15th - Ernest Hemingway novel "To Have & Have Not" published

Nov 5th - Hitler informs his military leader of his intentions of going to war

Dec 7th - Dutch Minister Romme proclaims married women are forbidden to work

Dec 14th - Japanese troops conquer/plunder Nanjing

Dec 21st - 1st feature-length color & sound cartoon premieres (Snow White)

Dec 22nd - Lincoln Tunnel (NYC) opens to traffic

Dec 27th - Mae West performs Adam & Eve skit that gets her banned from NBC radio

Dec 29th - Pan Am starts San Francisco-to-Auckland, New Zealand service

President Obama Forgets

President Obama’s fund raising drive continued in San Francisco yesterday with a financial pow-wow at the St. Regis Hotel downtown. The President was met by some seventy-five Medical Marijuana protesters who had arrived at seven AM at 3^rd and Mission. The protesters were carrying homemade signs and chanting how the president has turned his back on the Medical Marijuana community.

“We’re here because Obama hasn’t provided safe access for patients that need their medicine. Raids are continuing on dispensaries,” David Goldman of Americans for Safe Access explained over his coffee cup. “The IRS is putting pressure on the banks that do business with anyone in the Medical Marijuana community. The IRS is also disallowing expenses to be used as deductions. No sane business can operate without allowing deductions.”

What would you like President Obama to do?

“Reschedule Marijuana from a Schedule One drug to a Schedule Three drug. Then be consistent with what he said in his campaign. That he wouldn’t go after Medical Marijuana patients. The opposite is true,” Mr. Goldman stated clearly.

Clint from Colorado Springs was walking into Peet’s for coffee when he noticed the protesters.

Toke: May I ask how you feel about Medical Marijuana?

“To tell you the truth, I don’t know,” the clear-eye Colorado man muses. “Do I think there are applications for Marijuana for people who are in pain and suffering? Absolutely. But do I think that there are individuals taking advantage of the system? Yes.”

Toke: Personally, where do you stand on the issue of legalization?

“I know it works in Colorado Springs for some people. But I like things to be black or white. Either make it legal or not. I don’t like the ambiguousness of the issue.”

A couple of veterans held signs garnering the attention of the national media present. One of the soldiers mentioned that even though the Veterans Administration has approve Medical Marijuana for returning vets who are experiencing Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the Feds will not allow for those veterans to use marijuana medicinally. If they do, they stand to lose their benefits for using an unapproved drug.

Even though the government has okayed your use?

The unnamed veteran of three tours just smiled and said, “Crazy, huh?”

 The morning commute communicated its approval with honks and shouts by the supportive cars and trucks passing by. Others had no idea that the president was about to speak across the street at the St. Regis and wondered why there were so many hippie types up so early.

By the time the president and the big black SUV’s pulled up to the side entrance, he was in and gone before he had a chance to read a sign.

But Greg of ‘Black and Brown Just Cannabis Policy’ is hopeful. “We met some new friends and talk to some people about the issues. We’re serious. President Obama is forgetting who got him there. We’re just not potheads. We’re patients. He needs to keep his commitment to us. For many people, it’s life or death. The president needs to be as serious with us patients as he is with raising money.”



April, 20th, 2011- Hippie Hill, Golden Gate Park.

It starts on the downbeat about an hour before noon. Five cats in assorted guises from assorted backgrounds bang on congas, snares, and on upside-down five-gallon buckets, pounding out an Afro-beats while the first couple hundred of celebrators mosey their way into Golden Gate Park, and to establish themselves at party central headquarters, Hippie Hill.

It will be another five hours or so before the land and the world as we know it will bend in time. The reality that we call Marijuana for some, will change their conscientiousness and for others just take their change. For now, everything seems copacetic, tranquil, and even sedate with just of a hint of backbeat in the air. Since early morning, folks of all creeds, colors, genders and baseball affiliations, whether Giant’s or A’s, have been streaming in to what should be the biggest pot party this side of Seattle. Soon there will be nothing but grins, smiles and a lot of nodding. But for now, there are some five hundred people who are animated; chatting gaily laying down blankets and lugging coolers as more and more stoners appears every minute, getting ready for…something.

12:30PM, Downtown San Francisco.

Most of the major dispensaries are offering “Twenty Dollar Eighths” or some other 4/20 special like a free doob or bud. Many have raffles and drawings. SPARC, D-Tree, Medithrive had lines way out the door, with security handling the over-flow. It is a bad day to say hello to friends working in the industry. Everyone’s busy.

Walking from the Haight to the Mission to the Downtown area, a parade of well-wishers and Four-Twentyer’s moved through the City like floats in Ganja Mardi Gras procession. The home team was well represented by the leaves of green strung around the beautiful young maidens’ hippie dresses as they walked in flip-flops over puddles on this overcast San Franciscan day. Dudes in hot red jerseys flashed 420 slogans or something spelled out on their sweatshirts like, “Get Stoned” or “Got Stone?” All were orderly and polite with trails of blue haze following.

If you had a problem with the stench of marijuana smoke, San Francisco probably wasn’t the place for you then. Because of the low cloud covering, it was like someone had Saran-wrapped the City. The smell of weed had enclosed the City from the ocean to the Embarcadero. No one was safe from its odor.

President Obama had left earlier in the morning for an important meeting with Jesse Eisenberg in the South Bay, missing the pot perfume by a couple of hours. The presidential motorcade, along with the city’s perennial downtown construction, made bus service a snail crawl. The ‘71 Haight’, the bus that went directly to Golden Gate Park was filled to the gills with hemp-wearing folks.

Four-Twenty has been happening unofficially in Golden Gate Park for many years now, and the City still doesn’t recognize the need for more public transportation. By the numbers queuing up in line, waiting to get on the’71 Haight’ buses, you could tell they were out-of-towners. All the locals used the underground buses or the less common or known ones.

Hippie Hill is three miles east of the Pacific Ocean. Because of the President’s appearance, or because of construction, or maybe because the members of the Woodstock Nation, the Lollapalooza kids, and Michael Franti’s friends decided to have a get together, the City was clogged and many chose to dance and stroll to the Park in the slight rain. Think like it was a checker board and someone tipped it sloping west with all the pieces sliding and laughing along Fell and Oak Streets.

I can’t imagine what it is like for someone who isn’t getting high on Four-Twenty? Do they sit indoors with canned food, Chuck Norris VHS’s and pray?

3:30PM Hippie Hill.

The Park isn’t in the way I left it. At the entrance on Haight, a gauntlet of gentlemen in fake black leather inquire to the passer-byers if by chance they might need some marijuana for their afternoon’s enjoyment. Edibles are everywhere. Already I’ve heard that some edibles are made with swag and even less, and won’t get you buzzed. As soon as you clear the trippy tunnel, lines of vendors, more edibles and bud-sellers greet you, offering party favors and cold drinks.

Every year Four-Twenty in Golden Gate Park gets larger in population and commerce. It always starts the same way with a low-tech beginning; a drum circle and a few boom boxes playing some old school riffs. By three o’clock, there are anywhere’s from seven to ten sound systems set-up with DJ’s and turntables blaring the ticking of the nanu-beats the kids like to dance to. By most estimates, there are four thousand stoners in the Park and more on the way.

Some stoners do work.

Adam, Brandi with an ‘I” and Chris came in from Modesto for the celebration. “This is my fifth time being here,” Adam says with a big grin. “It used to be just a few of us up there on the hill, maybe there were six hundred people. Now, it’s like…Wow!”

“This is my first time,” Brandi giggles with a wink. Chris nods along letting others do the talking while he tokes on their ceramic pipe.

“But we’re all here for one reason…” Adam says taking his turn on the pipe.

It was a celebration for sure. All age types were there but it looked like if you were between the ages of 16 and 28, you were with your people. To be sure, there wasn’t a dress code or age limit for the event. All were welcome but I think the more comfortable in felt in a dorm, the more at home you would have felt here.

A couple in their sixties, dressed in kakis and rain gear seemed a little bewildered and out of place stood on the edge of the crowd.

“We were at the museum and ran into this…gathering,” Brenda of the Central Valley said. “We didn’t know this was happening.” She says surprised. “But he,” she points to her male partner,” I thinks he wants to get loaded.”

The male partner smiles eyeing a circle passing a joint.

A Little before 4:20.

Remember that not one poster went up. I don’t believe I saw one posting on Facebook regarding the 4/20 celebration in the Park. It’s all word of mouth. Like the eternal joint being passed from generation to generation. And then it happens.

Looking at the clock on my phone, it reads 4:18. Then I hear, 10, 9, 8, 7,…..1. Oh well…

Then there were cheers. Then there was smoke. Then someone to mark the occasion, stupidly set off a M-80 or some other loud, reverberating type of firecracker. Then there were cops on horses. Then there was more pot smoke. Then things were normal again. That all happen in a Golden Gate minute.

More and more people joined the festivities. Work was letting out and more were showing up in suits and non-hemp oriented material. Marijuana was everywhere. The cops kept to themselves off to the side. They were jovial and helpful.

Some kids were selling home-made T-shirts with hand-written fonts saying, “Hippie Hill 2011.” A person asks them if they will trade a t-shirt for an edible. They say they’ll have to call their dad on the cell and see if that’s okay. They’re out selling for him. They were serious.

Later that same night

I went to see the very funny Ngaio Bealum with his ganja-gang of jokesters at the Punchline downtown. Ed Rosenthal was there. Because I had an appointment with the President in the morning, sadly I needed to duck out early before the legendary after-hours party was going to start.   

At ten in the night, the Haight was still jamming. The Big Lebowski was letting out at the Red Vic and more were in line for the late show. Escape from New York pizza had a bad case of the munchies if the massive line out the door was any indication of where stoners go for their pie.

Officer Albie Esparza, the public information officer for San Francisco Police stated that there were six arrest made during the whole day. Three attendees needed medical attention. I asked the very gracious officer if she could give me her opinion on how she thought the day went. “Well, we can’t really give you our opinions, but I’d say, for the five thousand that attended, I’d say it was a relatively relaxed event, for us and them.” the officer slyly recited.   

As I walked home through the Haight watching the packed buses carrying the 4-20ers off to where ever they go, I thought about the officer’s words, very relaxed event. It was.

Just like marijuana itself. Now if we can just teach the world. We can have a day where strangers from all over come together, all for the same reason. Without fanfare or Ticketmaster or the digital press, and it still happens. And no one gets hurt, relatively relaxed speaking.

Peace.

Tomorrow, my meeting with the president.



Ah One, Ah Two and Ah One Toke over...

Ten Reasons Dispensaries are Better than going to a Dealer

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

1)    No Shady Scenes.

We’ve all been there, a 7/11 parking lot late at night where every Slurpee-buying shopper looks like an undercover cop. You’ve just parked your buddy’s car near an apartment downtown where all the neighbors know why you’re walking towards that particular door. Or worse, a friend of a friend who just got out of jail has some killer stuff that will make the whole cross town drive worth it. You name it; we all have a variety of reasons why we will go the extra mile to procure the best stuff possible, sometimes even when the risks are higher than you are.

Now, my closest dispensary is eight blocks away, (a small industrial trailer where they may only have seven to twelve different varieties of Medical Marijuana) but I go to the old reliable, my mainstay downtown on Geary Funny story; I was on my way home on the bus with three clones in a odorless paper-bag. There were two other dudes on the bus who were also clutching paper bags. They’re all-knowing nods and smiles made me feel like we all belong to the same book club.

Going to a Dispensary is incredibly safe compared to my almost forty years of scoring on the street.

2)    Choice.

At my mainstay they have about twenty to thirty varieties each of Indicas, Sativas and now, the very popular Hybrids, for all the baby bears out there that need something in the middle, stacked like good friends next to each other in five gallon mayonnaise jars in a glass cabinet/counter.

Some days the choices are overwhelming. I am more apt to ask one of my Bud-tenders what they like. If some of the guys I’ve got to know over the years are working behind the counter like the Big Kahuna or Mikey the Great, I asked them what’s good for back pain or if I have to work, what won’t heavy me out and allow me to sit and type for fourteen hours. Once a personal relationship is established with your Budtender you’re golden. They tell me what medicine is going to work for me best and I’ve never gone wrong.

Going to a dealer, if you don’t like what they have or turn down their product, it hurts they’re feelings. At the Dispensary, they could care less. There’s another person behind you that will take the WEED you said ‘No’ to.

3)    No reason to stock up.

Before I had my card, if I my stash was getting low, below half ounce, I have to start to make calls to ensure I had product for the future. It was always a process of never running out. Many times I bought Marijuana when I didn’t need it or particularly needed to have it, but the idea of running out or worse- not being able to get any Marijuana because the town was dry or my Man was out of town, would be unacceptable for me.

 The whole deal about instant gratification is getting it when you want it.

With a Dispensary, I sometimes smoke less, really, because I know the pot store is going to be there tomorrow. There’s no rush, man. It’s all cool. One doesn’t need to maintain a bulging inventory unless one likes to have a lot of different shit around the crib to smoke.

Total transparency-Dispensaries are a lot like going to the grocery store. You go in with a budget, but if you’re stoned and have the munchies, you spend more than you’d planned to. Same thing with the Dispensaries- You go in for a Q.T. but the Trainwreck is off the rails and the Dragon’s Breath is out of this world. It’s easy to spend another hundo without trying. And, mark my words, you don’t want to go in there sober...You spend less when you’re already high. Sober, you feel like a Make-A-Wish kid walking into Disneyland. That first time walking into a Dispensary, there’s nothing like it.

4)    You don’t have to buy there.

After getting my MM card, I Googled the pot shop locations and made maps for day trips in an effort to explore all the Magic Kingdoms waiting for this new patient. After checking out the third or fourth place I went to, I slowly realized that I didn’t have to score from every place I entered. If a dispensary’s medicine wasn’t up to my standards or they was just something funky about the place that I didn’t like, I can leave.

The great thing about having a MM card, if you don’t like the customer service or any other thing that directs you to one enterprise over another- why someone prefers Whole Foods over Trader Joe’s for example, exist in the Pot world too. Competition makes for a buyer’s market. One of the Pot Shops here in town has coined the phrase of the ‘Home of the 4-gram eighths,’ as a marketing tool to compete with the other guys. For half a gram, I don’t know, but for some people...

Speaking of other guys—growing up, this one guy in the Middle-west I once bought from, sold what he called his exotics, the good stuff, in bags that weighed 5-grams, but he sold them as quarter-ouncers. Why, because he could.

5)    You can get exactly what you want.

I made the mistake for my first few months of getting the strongest medicine available. I’d walk in and ask one of the boys for their most potent strain of Indy. The real dick-in-the road, polio-inducing, Snoop-Dogg crippling WEED that was guaranteed to hurt. Then I’d spend the rest of the day on the floor.

Now if I need some speedy stuff to write with or some night time stuff that makes John Stewart funnier but still understandable, I know what to ask for, or as I said, I let my Bud-Tender make a recommendation. You don’t take antibiotics when you need a sleeping pill, do you? One shouldn’t take an Indica when a nice Sativa or Hybrid is what you actually need. Its 2011, it time for this stuff to make sense.

6)    Hash, edibles and Clones, Oh my!

Dispensaries have more than Marijuana. While I am not a fan of the modern hash I see, I prefer your old school surfboards of Afghani or Lebanese, oppose to this water-based bubble hash, it is great to have the choice.

I did go through an intense edible period at first though. A small little fun fact, pot brownies and the like are as fattening as their non-magic brothers and sisters. I started to put on some weight after getting my card and couldn’t figure it out until I realized I was doing my new faves, pot caramels and toffee almost daily. A word to the wise and over-weight out there, those little candies can sneak up on you a couple of different ways.

As I stated above, I planted some clones. I’ve gone country. I’ll let you know as the crop progresses.

7)    If you Love WEED...

It’s Friday, a big weekend is coming up. In fact, it is a holiday weekend with Monday being day-off for those that have to leave the house. You’re in line at your favorite Dispensary, and the line is long (seven deep). Everyone wants to score their shit and get on with their lives. Then that moment happens, a feeling of tranquility falls over the Dispensary as the patients realize the uniqueness of the local and what is transpiring in front of us. We’re all buying WEED legally in a place that is authorized to legally sell it. It just doesn’t get any better than this and we all know it.

8)    The WEED is so outrageously good.

Durbin Poison, GDP, those stoopid Kushes that I complain about but still buy. Skunks, Diesels, and everyday there seems to be a new strain discovered or genetically altered, that really, the shit is too good to turn down. Some days, it is very hard to say no. Luckily I don’t have the cash to go nuts. Just enough to go crazy.

And there are thirty dispensaries in my town competing for potheads with the lure of great pot and all kinds of organically-grown Medical Marijuana.  

I’ve actually had to ask for medicine that isn’t so strong. What we call at home, ‘For the ladies...’

9)    There are a lot of them...

Like my friends who do tours of the Wine Country in Napa and Sonoma, I could also tour the dispensaries of Northern California, excuse me, did I say Northern California? I meant the Bay Area. With so many dispensaries in Berkeley, Oakland, and others throughout the East Bay, there is a world out there still undiscovered for the Cannabis explorer. But then I’d have to leave the house.

10)  It just makes sense.

The difference in going to a Dispensary opposed to going over to strangers or friend’s house for pot is almost like the difference between shopping at an Airport kiosk or small corner market for groceries instead of going to Food World. The smaller the place, the less choice you have at, ironically, a higher price. With the advent of dispensaries, the price of Marijuana hasn’t dropped dramatically for the consumers on this side of the counter. (It is a different story for growers.)

No matter what you’ve read, the good news is because the world hasn’t fallen apart with the openings of dispensaries. Crime hasn’t taken over neighborhoods and life has gone on.

For adults to have the ability of going into a safe, secure environment to pursue their own form of happiness, makes perfect sense in a perfect libertarian sort of way.

For me, after risking my life more than once in order to get high, sad but true, Dispensaries only make sense. The time has come to grow up, tax us if you must, but give us access to what we’ve been buying in the dark of night from strangers for years on our own.

What is it, 43 million Americans smoke pot either regularly or just at parties or when they come over to my house. Let’s not play games anymore. Open your doors and let the Black Market in. We’ll all be the better for it.