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Things Weed Smokers Should Know

Weed smokers should know some things before they get stoned.

By Johnny HashPublished 8 years ago 7 min read
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If you smoke weed, then there are things you should know. Like taking an introduction course to save a lot of time and mistakes in the future, it's great to have some wisdom from the elders. We compiled a list of some of the best question and answer sessions from stoner groups since the early hippie years and the start of the legalization movement. Simple questions deserve simple answers, especially for stoners.

Q: For the past few months, I've been collecting my used roaches in a mason jar I got at Michaels. I was planning on rolling some great joints out of this roach pile, but a friend of mine said that roaches contain a lot of tar but very little THC. Am I wasting my time collecting these roaches?

A: There is a considerable amount of tar in roaches, which might make them taste a bit richer than regular dope. The heat of the smoke would also tend to activate what THC there was in the end of the joint. The problem would be the tendency of THC to oxidize rapidly once it is activated. The best suggestion would be to use your roaches the next time you're getting lit. If stored for any amount of time, they would tend to lose their potency faster than normal weed.

I find that if I smoke from the same bag of bud for a few days in a row I get a buzz but I don't really get wrecked, no matter how good the dope is. Would I get higher if I alternated between two or more different strains?

Technically, the same marijuana will cause the same effects every time it is used, provided that there is time to recover fully from the last high, which can take more than a day. The problem you mention is actually quite common, but it doesn’t have much to do with either tolerance or the bud itself. One usually doesn’t go into a new stash until the old one is getting fairly depleted. What this means is that after a time of smoking the leaves and assorted “shake” from the old ounce, you pounce on the buds and flowers in the new one. Not only are tops as much as three times as potent as the leaves, but the relative difference between the two highs will make it even more dramatic. The relative drama, in turn, generally makes you want to smoke more often, and you become acclimated to the dope as you work your way down into the ounce. People often think their shit has gone bad but it’s more a difference in parts of the plant you smoke and the frequency than anything else. If the stash seems a little weak, just stop smoking for three or four days, make sure you’ve got a couple of buds, and prepare for a great high.

I was baking some edible brownies the other day and a friend of mine told me that we would really get blown away if we ate them on an empty stomach. Was my friend right?

There is some truth in the friend's advice. If there's nothing in the stomach to begin with, it will really pounce on that brownie and get it into the system that much faster. There is also a certain mental alertness which comes along with an empty stomach and this, too, would add to the high. A full stomach makes you feel generally sedated and would have the opposite effect. Of course, if you get high on an empty stomach, you will probably end up with a monstrous case of the munchies.

I’ve been smoking for a few years now and I’ve seen weed of every imaginable color, from dark green to bright gold. What causes the difference in colors, and does it have anything to do with how good the marijuana is?

The leaves of the marijuana plant, like all plant leaves, are filled with chlorophyll, which gives them their predominately green color. There are other plant chemicals, like xanthenes, which produce a yellow color, and various others in the same general family which produce a red. When the chlorophyll is killed off by the death of the plant (or in the case of say, maple leaves, the first frost), these other colors come forth in a great variety. The chemicals that produce the colors have nothing to do with the chemicals that get you high; Sinsemilla is often an emerald green, while dope from the Sierra Madre de Sur region of Mexico is a golden brown at times, and much Panamanian and Colombian weed is definitely a rusty brown. Marijuana can be a very pretty plant (unless, of course, they jam the stuff, still fresh, into the brick presses and end up with street dope, grey-green from the wretched curing or mold attacks).

Why is homegrown weed usually so lousy compared to Colombian, African, or even good Mexican weed?

The potency of a marijuana plant is an inherited trait which does not vary from the parent to the offspring. It all depends on what folks are growing at home; it will be as good as whatever produced the seeds, with one or two understandable differences. Central and South American dope is acclimated to a considerably longer growing season than is possible in northern temperate climates. What may happen is that the female plants may not have the time to grow fully developed tops before the frost hits. Also, since home-grown is usually smoked a lot sooner after harvest than imported weed, it has not had a chance to cure and more of the THC is in the inactive stage. Properly aged homegrown dope should be perfectly decent, provided the seeds were from good dope. Watch out for Kansas and Nebraska hemp, though, it's still being cut from old hemp beds in the midwest and sold as “dynamite homegrown.”

Is there anything I can do with the stems from my ounce? I tried making a tea with them, but all I got from drinking the tea was a headache.

You can grind them up, add a little pine resin for glue, and make dandy incense sticks. That's all, folks, there’s no THC worth scrambling for in them twigs.

If you're being commercial about it, spread them out in the sun on some newspaper and in a couple of days it'll be dry and fine. You don’t have to hang it up in great bunches; The THC is bound into the plant, not the sap, so you can dry it right side up or upside down or flat and it’s all the same. If you leave it in the sun or in a warm, dry place for a few extra days, it won't hurt. In fresh bud a lot of the THC is still in the inactive state, and gentle heat helps. If you’re just reaping a few plants, save yourself a hassle later by stripping all the leaves off first, after cutting the tops off to dry separately, before you dry them. You can pack it away a lot easier that way, for later enjoyment.

A friend of mine never seems to have any rolling papers in his house, so he improvises by rolling his dope in newspapers, magazines, or wallpaper. Is there anything dangerous about smoking dope in his kind of paper?

We used to know a Japanese who rolled origami joints from rice paper; brilliant purple rice paper. Very festive. Actually, there's nothing that toxic in printing inks or they’d be dropping like flies over in the press room. If you want to be a real connoisseur, roll in black and white (newspapers, textbooks, holy books, etc.). Black ink is made from carbon black anyway, which is what the paper is going to become after you smoke the joint.

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About the Creator

Johnny Hash

Born in Kingsland, Arkansas. Spent way too much time watching TV. Daily toker. Still in Kingsland, Arkansas.

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