Hello, I'm a recent 215 patient, and found your publication
at a local dispensary. You solicited contributions.

I wonder if I have anything to contribute.
I would use a pseudonym.



Background.. nerd... drug nerd... high achieving chronic.

Lets see... I've got a Master's degree in computer science from UC,
and undergrad degrees in CS from MIT and also Cognitive Science from
MIT. My kid was the best speller in his grade last year. I raised a cat for 18 years. I live in Irvine. My wife is a psychiatrist from a country where ganja is widely used (although she doesn't approve, although its clear that
I'm a better person at home when I smoke). I'm currently employed writing software for a medical instrument. (The best part is working with smart people, but also not killing babies; instead I'm building useful tools
that help people.)

I've been smoking since I was 18. I'm wake and bake if I have it.
Before that I was a *very* uptight bookworm.

More and more over time, "I have it". And its helped so much.



Anyway,

I might have amusing anecdotes for your pub. E.g.:
My 9 year old recently saw my
jar o' buds, and thought they were owl pellets. I've grown in
a closet at UC. And frat at MIT. I've come up with patents while smoking hash.
I saw a block of hash with Kabul in gold lettering in the 80s,
back when the Afghan invaders spoke russian, not english. I was
on the Internet in '87; I wrote a FAQ about acid years before
my parents and everyone else got online :-)
I've read Szasz and the WHO report
on cannabis; I've met Herrer when he visited KUCI. I've had a friend with
MS (a PhD biologist) who used a vaporizer; he sold during his undergrad years to put himself through college. I've known a very white ambulance driver rastafarian.

Once I sent my folks some seeds (I was raised rural so this is not
too weird), there was a grass seed in there, my lawyer dad grew a frickin' sequoia sativa. Then composted it, after confirming it with me.
:-(

I've met parents of freelance cannabis vendors (aka "dealers") and taken my
kid to visit some. They have all been friends introduced by friends. Recently my vendor friend had some logistical difficulties, so I went 215 legit.
(Its not so easy to obtain meds freelance when you're a middle aged introvert.) It also saves me a drive up to LA.

I was amazed when I checked an online weedmap; there is a dispensary that I pass every day to work, near the airport. My physician was just outside of Irvine. Holy cow. I heart OC.

Needless to say, I've visited the local store a few times. "Buy local"
Leave work to pick up the kid, drop by the dispensary on the way.
Twenty first frickin' century.

Only one delivery-only dispensary honored my 10 year old (yes, 1999) recommendation that I had gotten years ago, but never used. Most dispensaries didn't. But the modern recommendation is welcomed. I don't really fear being rounded up from a List, although I'm generally suspicious of government, bigtime. (I've been an Objectivist too.)

It is so cool, and surreal, to be able to shop for grass on the Internet.
Welcome to the 21st century.

Your mag was extremely well produced --albeit a bit hard to read,
a little like Wired, with high contrast graphics hurting reading,
and fascinating. Of course I like the satirical riff on OC Weekly which actually has a fine 'Alternative Healing' section and occasionally great reporting, as you certainly know. Fun pulp. Anyway write back if you
think anything is worth developing. My major theme is that you don't
have to be a low-achieving slackmonster just because you smoke,
any more than you have to listen to Sinatra if you drink martinis.
(Not that slacking, sinatra, or martinis, or any combination thereof, are bad. But the association is *not* obligatory. I fucking read technical magazines stoned. And do everything else at some stne level. Some stoners can't
stand reggae or rammstein. To each their own.)

I smoke with a straight tobac pipe (Dr Grabow). If the stem is lost I use
1/8" polyethylene tubing from Home Depot as a stem; this is similar
to old revolutionary-era pub pipes, which were ceramic. I've made
pipes and bongs from hardware store supplies. If you can't make a
smoking device you shouldn't be smoking. In college we had an airpipe
made from a section of pole-vaulting pole, and once a nitrous-charged
multibong/hookah. I once had to make a pipe from an acorn and a reed
because we had forgotton ours. Engineers must get stoned. I've also
made some nice pipes out of soft flint glass tubes bent over the
gas stove.

I've always been self-exploratory. When I was maybe 10 I put the juice from poison ivy on a square inch of forearm and documented what happened every
hour. Psychopharm experiments followed when I grew older and interested in the mind. I don't consume anything except for beer, tobac, coffee, and
grass now. I favor relaxants over stims now, although my only relaxants
are ethanol and grass, nothing more dangerous. I very much enjoy the
fluency of thought that grass brings, and the disinhibition that EtOH
brings. (Yes, I know the latter is dangerous, leads to dangerous behavior, etc. I never drive after drinking; I know how to drive if I've smoked.
FWIW I am the most polite driver ever if I've smoked as agression (yes,
go in front of me) and overconfidence (no I won't race the yellow) are muted.)

I wonder if brick & mortar dispensaries can compete with delivery-only
enterprises. I loathe "business" but I have to wonder about this ---overhead
of a physical location. I'm also
interested in how "420 culture" is the new speakeasy, and how speakeasies
developed during the 20s or 30s.

Anyway I enjoyed your pub and even if I'm just a source of topics,
or amusement in your press room, I wish you well. I'll riff on anything
from botany to morality to pharmacology to flying with cannabis with various degrees of expertise.

I can also write about not feeling guilty if you need meds, of whatever
form.
(Between you and me, I take fluoxetine also. Recognizing depression
and taking meds was a big step, many 215'ers may need to make the same
step. Fluox for me by itself was not enough, but with the Plant I'm much better. Its doesn't help with social anxiety like cannabis does for me.
(For some, its makes it worse.)
Its not a personality weakness to have a use for pharms any more than diabetes is a personality weakness.)