cannabisnews.com: Confessions of a Cannabis Smoker





Confessions of a Cannabis Smoker
Posted by FoM on October 25, 2001 at 11:04:19 PT
By Lauren Booth
Source: Independent
The announcement that possession of cannabis will no longer be an arrestable offence was as surprising to me as it was welcome. Who'd have thought that David ("I'm even tougher than Straw") Blunkett would be the one to admit finally that smoking spliff is groovy, not deadly? What can it all mean? One thing's for certain: cannabis is officially out of fashion. I presume that the Home Secretary and his advisers have chosen now to reclassify the drug because (as the young spinners in Downing Street know perfectly well) the public's love affair with weed has been fading for 15 years. For kids with no hope on sink estates, the "buzz" from smoking cannabis isn't harsh enough to combat their reality. 
For professionals between 18 and 50, meanwhile, its gently sedative effect is completely incompatible with our busy lives.That's not to say that I've anything against cannabis. On the contrary, despite being too busy and "grown-up" to enjoy it properly these days, I'm still a great fan. There have been too many occasions when I've been afraid for my own well-being because drunks (some strangers, some not) have become violent when under the influence of a few pints of the legal stuff; no one has ever intimidated or threatened me after a couple of spliffs, though. So I naturally have a soft spot for the latter.But while the occasional joint can be brilliantly relaxing, just getting to that first drag can take hours, even days to organise. First, there's the call to the "mate" who sells it. Then you wait ages for them to bring it over or for them to be at home so you can pick it up. This is an anxious time. Not because you come into contact (as in Blairite nightmares) with hardened druggies desperate to shove a needle into your eyeball, but because it's polite to share a smoke with your dealer. This means spending an awkward half-hour sitting on a raggedy sofa and feigning interest in Chelsea's away record in 1987. When you get home, there's the fiddly ritual of rolling a spliff to contend with. Finally, when you do get a rewarding lungful of smoke, you lose two hours of your life lying on the sofa surrounded by the entire contents of the fridge watching Rikki Lake.If there is a potentially dangerous side-effect to the Government's new legislation it may be a sharp increase in obesity. Doctors dealing with anorexics have long accepted that where all else fails, the magic ingredient in marijuana gets even the most stubbornly controlled appetite raging again. I can't help feeling that if the Ministry of Health had run an ad campaign saying "Just say FAT" instead of "Just say NO" in the 1980s, featuring a fat Feltz surrounded by roaches and pizza crusts, then most teenagers would never have touched spliff in the first place.As it is, we did. I once got horribly stoned in Sydney with a Vietnam vet. We staggered to the shops, starving. "Twenty fags, a packet of red papers, eight KitKats, four Bountys and a Creme Egg please," I asked at the petrol station checkout. The Aussie behind me started giggling, then the man behind the counter joined in. The next thing I knew I was writhing on the floor in an agony of euphoria and hysteria, unable to stand up for laughing.Grass, cannabis, dope, spliff. With only two exceptions, just about everyone I know has tried it, inhaled it and got on with their lives. I've been an on-off toker since my best friend nicked her mum's stash when we were 14 years old. How fantastically daring we felt gluing dozens of Rizla papers together and imitating her mum's rolling technique. With supreme concentration and determination we gently flaked the grass into a single saggy joint. It was only afterwards that we realised one vital ingredient was missing – tobacco. For six hours we stumbled around her flat in a marshmallow-headed horror. Years later, her mum said she knew what we'd done but had found our antics so amusing that she decided the joint was punishment enough. She herself was a sometime dealer to rock groups. We were just second-generation dopeheads.Perhaps the real question isn't why has this happened now, but why has it taken so long for a natural herb to be given the same legal status as questionable anti-depressants and violence-inducing steroids? It comes down to control. The most frightening thing for the ruling class is that after a smoke, potential voters either don't listen to what the politicians say or, far worse, listen too carefully. It's impossible to sell the idea of war to people singing "Give peace a chance", and Blair and Bush are about as easy to take seriously as Cheech and Chong when you're stoned.Dope-smoking paraphernalia are also used to carry an alternative political message. Take last month, when a journalist colleague had a dinner party. On the table were two bottles of Pouilly Fumée and some of the green stuff. Four of us thirtysomething parents started chattering, fairly lucidly, about the situation in the US. Suddenly the record company rep leapt to his feet and shouted: "Shh, shhh, listen to me everybody." He held aloft one of those ready-made cardboard roaches that come with sayings printed on them. "This says it all," he said with the gravity of Tony Blair in one of those endless recent press conferences; and he read out the writing on it: "The 21st-century pharaohs have the slaves begging for work." We sat, awestruck by the truth of the soundbite. Occasionally one of us muttered "Yeah" or "So true." After some time, the journalist announced: "Right, that's it, I'm definitely not working for Murdoch any more." Such are the mellowing powers of cannabis.The thing about smoking dope is that it never really felt illegal. Being both white and middle class, I've never been arrested for possession despite my sometimes blatant offences. As a 15-year-old in my school uniform, I walked past the same two policemen every morning. We'd exchange nods and I made only a cursory effort to hide the pre-school joint I was smoking. They never said a word. It depends where you do your smoking, though. Cocaine is fine at private Soho clubs, but only Blur guitarists or modern artists dare to smoke in such establishments without fear of reprimand. I'm always nicely pleased by the amount of sweet-smelling fumes floating across the lawns at Kenwood House during the midsummer classical music concerts. The chattering classes of north London like a bit of Leb with their pain and Boursin.There have been studies that appear to show that even short-term use of cannabis can be detrimental to parts of the brain. The long-term effects can include damage to the cognitive skills. Would these killjoys please, please, tell me which legal habit doesn't have seriously damaging side-effects when taken in excess? Both smoking and alcohol are taxed and therefore some might say have been "endorsed" by successive governments, and the figures for the physiological and neurological damage caused by both are well known. If we go down the "careful of the brain cells" route, then let's ban mobile phones right now. Yes, it's probable that I have lost the odd brain-cell over the years with cannabis. But I have also, as a result, inflicted on myself less of the other kinds of damage that people like to inflict on themselves: not just from alcohol, say, but from stress-related illnesses, the inability to relax or connect with others and, worst of all, from just taking themselves (and life) too seriously. Cannabis-users have been through the looking-glass and can be more rounded human beings as a result. This is not a side effect that society should undervalue.As usual, simple economics shows us what is acceptable to the powers that be and what is not, and the tacit acceptance of cannabis as part of mainstream culture has been visible on our high streets for decades. In 1996, I bought a brilliant game called "Grass" from a well known newsagent's. "Grass" consisted of a pack of large cards in a mock-hemp string bag and a very complicated set of instructions on how to play. The basic idea of the game was to "peddle" as much grass as possible and retire before the police put the "heat" on you or one of the other players "stole your stash". I can recommend it as fun for all the family, and that's not me being subversive: the newsagent in question was WH Smith.These are strange days indeed, and – once past the initial euphoria and foolhardy hope that maybe, just maybe, there's a liberal streak at the heart of New Labour – I have realised that reclassifying cannabis is still a fairly hollow gesture. At a time when human rights are once again being threatened in the name of "liberty", this feels like a sop to quieten us liberals. It changes nothing of any importance, and looks kind of groovy on the front pages of liberal newspapers. But at least, for once, New Labour is willing to let us have our hash cake and eat it. Newshawk: puff_tuffSource: Independent (UK)Author: Lauren BoothPublished: October 25, 2001Copyright: 2001 Independent Newspapers (UK) Ltd.Contact: letters independent.co.ukWebsite: http://www.independent.co.uk/Relatted Articles:Campaigners Applaud Cannabis Reform http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11177.shtmlWhy Britain is Going Dutch http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11175.shtmlUK Bases Its New Policy on the Belgian Policy http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread11176.shtml 
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Comment #15 posted by Spiderman on October 27, 2001 at 05:58:15 PT
Good reading is also a skill
I can't believe that this article generated such a negative response. Lauren Booth is something of an idealogical pin-up of mine, and I'm a little sadened to see her attacked so vigorously. The points in contention are that she seems to be infering that smoking cannabis makes you fat, that someone doesn't know what the term 'ruling class' means (she didn't invent it, by the way), that cannabis is incompatible with modern middle-aged lives and, someone helpfully adds, mixed with tobacco. Sorry chaps, but I can't help bult feel that Lauren is something of a very English pearl being disected by an audience somewhat removed from the weekend home-owners and scraggly-bearded students that consume the nutritious Independent each day. She didn't suggest that smoking pot makes you fat. She used the important word 'may' in the initial observation (meaning "it might", "I don't know", "there is a possibility", "perhaps" - since when did asking questions become unwelcome here?), before suggesting that if the government had used this as an anti-drug message it might have been more effective than Nancy Reagan's. That's not the same as admitting that it is true, or that the government doesn't lie. She's no blind follower of administrations, as she amply proves in the eighth and final paragraphs (or did the philosophers who ripped into her here get that far?). p4me gets particularly in a lather about this sentence: "The most frightening thing for the ruling class is that after a smoke, potential voters either don't listen to what the politicians say or, far worse, listen too carefully". Why, I wonder, is this such 'crap', as he so eloquently put its? My political interests soared after I started smoking. I read the papers, watched the Parliament channel, joined a party, and cannabis was a big influence toward this. p4me doesn't care to expound too deeply on why he thinks it's crap, so perhaps he can elighten me: is it that you think cannabis can't be a catalyst in political thinking, or is it that you think the ruling class isn't scared by intelligent voters? (though, to be fair to the guy, he did say he doesn't know what the term means. It's a historical label left over from the days when the caste system represented government by default; people were effectively born as peasants, land-owners or into the ruling-class. To use this archaic term now is a gentle implication that our leaders are there by birth or fortune and that the government is somehow medieval in its form - a healthy insult, I think. However, for the purpose of reading it, just substitute the term with 'government' and move along)The comment about professionals having too busy lives for cannabis. It isn't the smoking of it she's referring to, and two paragraphs later explains herself perfectly, by detailing the not-unreasonable lengths one has to go to aquire the stuff (I'm afraid The Independent is not USA Today and sometimes ideas do run longer than a couple of sentences). If it wasn't for a happy circumstance allowing me to get it pretty easily at the moment then it would be an awful task for me also - it's the getting it that's taking her time, not the relaxing. Fair enough, nice to see you all reading, but really, I never thought it'd come to this. She wrote a fair article that was critical of the government and endorsed cannabis use, but because of a few sentences that were grabbed as soundbites she's been dragged through the bushes. And yes, good tobacco is a lovely ingredient in a spliff, every bit as essential as the little piece of cardboard stuck in the end. One last point (if anyone's still reading and hasn't left to get a Hershey's bar or put MTV on). Do any of the scathing scholars who laid into her actually know who Lauren Booth is? Somehow, I feel that if it had been George W. Bush's sister-in-law writing this same article on the front page of the opinions section a national newspaper, there'd have been less derision and more appreciation. A lot of people seem to think it's cool these days to screach about 'bad journlism', and this is fair enough and very true up to a point. But when people scan something and completely ignore the justifications of itself a couple of paragraphs down, maybe it's worth remembering that reading too is a skill?Cheers from Blighty, and keep reading The Independent!
The Independent
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Comment #14 posted by Dan B on October 26, 2001 at 09:17:52 PT
Hmmm . . . That Came Across All Wrong
Just in case anyone thought differently . . .What I meant to say with my last post was that not smoking has led to an increase in my weight--and I wasn't exactly thin to begin with. I was applauding Freedom fighter's ability to remain slim through all that time, too. Six-foot-five! Down here in Texas, we'd say "now that's a tall drink o' water."Dan B
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Comment #13 posted by Dan B on October 26, 2001 at 01:58:24 PT
Other Side of the Phatty-Fatty Myth
Wow, Freedom Fighter! I'm only 5'9", and I weigh 195! But then, I haven't had a smoke since January. I was 185 back then (not fat then, by the way, although I now have some pretty sizeable love handles going). The worst part? We moved in September, only to find out that the guy who lives in the apartment below us is a cop. Damn my luck!Dan B
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Comment #12 posted by FoM on October 25, 2001 at 22:46:40 PT
freedom fighter
and I shrunk an inch shorter... LOL! Me too!
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Comment #11 posted by freedom fighter on October 25, 2001 at 22:39:33 PT
Fatty myth
Smoked 27 yrs... Senior H.S, 6ft6in 190pd 17-yr oldToday, stopped smoking due to prohibiton(div. etc),
6ft5in 195pd 41 yr-old Gee, 5 pd overweighted! Must be all that Maxi. Harmful effect, (no more phatty, more beers) and I shrunk an inch shorter...Gee!ff
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Comment #10 posted by p4me on October 25, 2001 at 22:21:11 PT:
more crap
Of course we do not want to talk about civil liberties, corruption of the government and media or pragmatism so maybe I should stick with a few things from the article.First and conclusively: Bullsh**. Let me be humble in forcing my thoughts upon you. It is not that I think that I am just more brilliant than everybody. With all the federal agencies that have people reading this site to protect us, I want them to know that there are some of us that will take the time to research what is going on and write about it. I wish there was a counter here at cannabisnews to let the feds know how many people are really coming to this site and trying to inform themselves of what is really going on.1- If there is a potentially dangerous side-effect to the Government's new legislation it may be a sharp increase in
   obesity. R U kidding me. First in this country half the people are considered fat with one-third being morbidly obese. So how much fatter do you think we would get? This statement seems like a reason to make soft drinks a class one narcotic along with ice cream and candy bars. But we do not want to mention anything about adding caffiene to soft drinks to increase sales and we surely do not want to call caffiene a drug. This is red ribbon week and we only want to educate people the way Partnership For A Drug-Free America suggest because they know what is best. 2- The most frightening thing for the ruling class is that after a smoke, potential voters either don't listen to
   what the politicians say or, far worse, listen too carefullyThis shows a need for an international symbol for "crap,crap, and more crap." I cannot figure what is meant by the term "ruling class" and why it is the MOST frightening thing. Just a stupid sentence to be brief.3-For professionals between 18 and 50, meanwhile, its gently sedative effect is completely incompatible with our
   busy lives.Do what? Where is that international symbol when you need it? Is she saying once you reach 51 it becomes completely compatable with your life? No. She doesn't know what she is saying and neither do I.Three strikes and you are out. I do want to mention one thing that might be fairly unknown to some. I do not know the prevalence of this across Europe or much detail about it , but the English commonly mix tobacco with their MJ. Hence the sentence: With supreme concentration and determination we gently flaked the grass into a single saggy joint. It was only afterwards that we realised one vital ingredient was missing – tobacco.Vote all incumbents out all the way down to dog catcher. Out with the old and in with the new.
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Comment #9 posted by FoM on October 25, 2001 at 18:33:03 PT
Here's the links!  Duh!
Marijuana Munchies May Hold a Key to Obesity
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread9340.shtml
Marijuana-Like Substance in Brain Trigger Appetite
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread9337.shtml
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Comment #8 posted by FoM on October 25, 2001 at 18:31:17 PT
Doug
I didn't find any about being able to eat more but I'll look again but these concern appetitie and marijuana. I am not the slightest bit heavy. I weigh around 100 pounds but back in my just say no days, like EJ said, I weighed almost at my highest a rotund 150 pounds! 
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Comment #7 posted by Doug on October 25, 2001 at 17:45:38 PT
Weight Gain
A few months back there was an article, referring to a "study" that showed that mj smokers consumed 40% more calories than their straight brethern. But they didn't weight any more. The study was suppose to show yet another problem with smokers -- they eat all this bad food. But the study mentioned in passing that perhaps smoking marijuana increased one's metabolism. Perhaps FoM can find a link to a study of this article, which I read here, and there was a long thread of comments attached.  I thought the study interesting, but mosly because it showed more calories consumed but no more fat. If indeed smoking cannabis increased one's matabolism, this is a very important finding. I'd like to see more research about this. One can image weight loss clinics of the future taking advantage of this fact.  And as another anecodote, I had a friend in town many years ago who grew the best bud around. He weighted the same as I did. But eventually he stopped, and eventually became a born-again Christian. I think it was because he finally produced one-hit dope, and it was just too much for him. Anyway, shortly after this he literally ballooned.
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Comment #6 posted by E_Johnson on October 25, 2001 at 16:32:14 PT
The phatty fatty myth must die
I lost weight after I started smoking too. And my workouts seemed more effective and I got a bigger rush after working out.I wonder what's really going on. I haven't been a stable size eight since high school. But now I am. Umm... but was smoking weed then, too.Hmmm the only time I've had a problem with chubbing out and gaining weight easily was the years when I was kowtowing to the regime and just saying no.I wonder if this has anything to do with cannabinoids and delta wave sleep. One reason why I started smoking again was because of fibromyalgia. They have linked that to deficiencies in delta wave deep sleep, which is the phase of sleep where you repair the microdamage in your muscles from daily activity.Now I sleep better and I don't have that pain any more, but my body also responds much better to exercise. I find that I have to work out less to maintain my fitness than I had to before.This is such an interesting substance. In the end, the forces of ignorance cannot but lose this struggle.And I totally agree with the point about overeating. I love food so much now, I get more satisfaction from less food.Maybe God gave us Marijuana Prohibition to teach us what bad journalism is.OKAY WE'VE LEARNED ENOUGH THANK YOU
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Comment #5 posted by CorvallisEric on October 25, 2001 at 14:40:00 PT
overeating
Don't know how this might apply to anyone else, but here's my experience. I tend to overeat from compulsion, nervousness, excitement, depression, etc., not from any particular fondness for food or genuine hunger. When I'm stoned (which is infrequent), I can simply turn off the compulsion, enjoy a few tiny morsels of 10 different foods, and move on to something more interesting because I deliberately choose to. Maybe this fits Andrew Weil's "active placebo" theory about cannabis - you decide what you want it to do, then it helps you do it (my interpretation of his idea in 'From Chocolate to Morphine').
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Comment #4 posted by Elfman_420 on October 25, 2001 at 13:15:38 PT:
Cannabis = weight gain?  
If there is a potentially dangerous side-effect to the Government's new legislation it may be a sharp increase in obesity.I have lost about 15 pounds since I started smoking over a year ago. I was, and still am overweight for my height, but at least I'm going in the right direction.Well before I started smoking, my friend who had never smoked before was 6'4" and about 265 when he left for college. He took up smoking and when I went to visit him with my mom a couple years ago, both of us were surprised to see that he seemed to have lost at least 30 pounds. I don't know why it happens, I can't explain it, though I have some theories. Why is this always brought up though? Recently I have become vegetarian, and I have now started losing slightly even more weight. Sure, after smoking it's nice to have a slice or two of pizza, but I have also found that healthy food can be just as appetizing if you condition yourself.
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Comment #3 posted by kaptinemo on October 25, 2001 at 12:41:35 PT:
I don't like it either
But we're bound to see more of it in the future.If only to help tight-a**ed antis get over their paranoid fears. I predict a lot of low-brow, sniggering pothead jokes catering to the lowest common denominator to begin making the rounds, over there. And here. 
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Comment #2 posted by E_Johnson on October 25, 2001 at 12:19:36 PT
Tap dancing marijuana minstrel show
I hate this kind of article where a pot smoker panders to all the myths the audience wants pandered to, but then tries to minimize them with an air of nonchalant so-whatedness. WHATEVER!For professionals between 18 and 50, meanwhile, its gently sedative effect is completely incompatible with our busy lives.Bob Marley's life wasn't busy? Please check the man's recording catalog and tell us that he wasn't one of the hardest working musical artists of his generation.Marijuana is perfectly compatible with workaholism. If you work to relax, marijuana is going feed that syndrome!Check my life, suss and suss me out.I'm a freakin pothead workaholic, I am never happy unless I am productive.Check my life, if I am in doubt.
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Comment #1 posted by TroutMask on October 25, 2001 at 11:34:38 PT
UK Media
I think it's awesome (and personally unexpected) that the UK media is treating these developments so happily and lightheartedly. Very encouraging. Very little "the sky will now fall" BS from the antis.-TM
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