IT’S THE MOST wonderful time of the year, or it can be. The recreational use of marijuana during the holidays is one of the highlights of the season. The pretty lights get prettier, wrapping gifts goes from tedious to terrific, and eggnog becomes nectar of the gods—especially for someone with cotton mouth. Here are some tips and ideas for making this one stoney season.
TIP! At family gatherings, if you’ve discovered that being high is the best way to deal with Aunt Gertrude and her drunken ramblings about “Muslim-in-Chief Hussein O-harm-ya” while Fox “News” blares in the background, consider edibles over smoking. It’s discreet, you won’t reek, and there are only so many times you and your record store clerk cousin can make another run to the store for “more ice.” Mind your portion control, lest you get the giggles during grace and end up playing with your mashed potatoes à la Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters. Plus, edibles travel well, in case you are heading through the woods (or through the TSA) to grandma’s house.
TIP! Don’t have edibles? Think about investing in a pocket vape. With a cleaner, less foggy high, you can find some models that look like the cousin to an iPhone. Or consider a vape stick like the ones from the CO2 Company. A sleek black pen with no buttons to fumble with, this device recharges via an included USB plug, and accepts cartridges that are strain specific and made from outdoor organically grown cannabis. By using CO2 (AKA dry ice), the resulting thick liquid is upward of 60 percent pure THC, and unlike many other concentrates, does not need to be suspended in glycerin. You will blend right in with anyone brandishing their e-cig, although the extraction process used retains the yummy terpenes that give the herb its smell and taste. So be mindful when exhaling.
TIP! If you have a cannabis enthusiast on your holiday gift list, consider a gift card to your local smoke shop. It’s easier than determining exactly which style of wizard-riding-a-dragon multi-chamber color-changing glass bong your brother wants.
TIP! Consider holiday tipping with marijuana. That barista who knows your name and consistently gets your quad shot of ristretto soy latte with an extra pump of vanilla exactly right? Maybe she’d prefer a nicely rolled joint over your 63 cents change. As always, be cool—announcing “here is a joint of Kali Mist for you to smoke when you get off work!” during the morning coffee rush is not being cool, Poindexter.
TIP! Your grandmother does not want rose-scented lotion. She wants her arthritic hands to stop hurting. Make or buy some cannabis-infused hand cream and help her out. The skin absorbs the THC, which reduces the pain and inflammation but won’t get her high.
TIP! Good will toward men comes easier when you are pleasantly stoned.
Back in the day, about this time of year, we used to get colorful Christmas lids, consisting of assorted flower tops of Acapulco Gold, Panama Red, and Michoacán, which was green.
Michoacán was an extremely potent and psychedelic strain of Mexican which has probably gone extinct, due to the spraying of paraquat on the crops from US military aircraft. The only know commercially available hybrids bred from Michoacán are those with Cannalope Haze from DNA Genetics. There are many other hybrids that contain Mexican Cannabis, which may or might not be Michoacán. The other two most widely acclaimed Mexican strains are Acapulco Gold, and Oaxacan.
Oregon Purple Thai is Oaxacan crossed with Chocolate Thai, which is actually, Havvai’ian. You wont even find this modern hybrid anywhere, either, except in further hybridized strains, such as Blueberry.
Acapulco Gold is the Mexican component of Skunk. Skunk is the most intensively cultivated modern hybrid, which was developed by an orchestrated cooperation of pioneer breeders in Northern, California. It’s extremity pest resistant, large yielding, fast flowering, and sturdy. I’m not sure which strain of Colombian was bred into it, but an Afghan was the third component strain.
Flying Dutchmen has a cross of Skunk with Blueberry that supposedly produces an end product indiscernible from Blueberry in effects, taste, smell, and bag appeal, but with the vigor, and other advantageous traits of Skunk, sans the skunky smell which was a mutation from combining three, arguably more fragrant, strains.
David “Sam the Skunkman” Watson, was an intern on the project which developed the original Skunk strain. Today, he’s with Flying Dutchmen. They have a wide variety of Skunk hybrids similar in concept to Blueberry Skunk.
It goes without saying, of course, that Skunk is very potent, so I didn’t.