420: Cannabis Celebration Day

Image by Jurassic Blueberries, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

April 20th (also known as “420” in cannabis counterculture) is considered a day of reverence and celebration for people who have a relationship with cannabis. 420 has other meanings, including the times of day that cannabis consumers often imbibe the plant during the day (4:20 AM or PM), the act of smoking cannabis, etc. The origin story of 420 is controversial, with several opposing groups claiming that they originally founded the holiday.

Perhaps the most accepted story is that of the Waldos, a group of high school students in San Rafael, California in the early 1970s. The story is that the group chose to meet at a wall (hence the “Waldos”) outside their school at 4:20 PM each day after school in order to toke up and search for a rumored nearby cannabis crop.

Other stories include the number originating as a police code that announces cannabis use is taking place, April 20th being the primo day to plant an outdoor cannabis grow before the summer, or that there are 420 active chemicals in cannabis. However, criminal codes (both federal and Californian) do not correlate with cannabis-related crimes, gardening schedules can vary by location, and there are approximately 315 active chemicals in cannabis. Besides, the term “420” supposedly originated as a time, not a signifier of anything in particular or a date.

Regardless of the term's true origin story, 420 is now synonymous with cannabis and is well-known even outside of the cannabis community. If you are looking for a way to celebrate today, I would suggest learning more about cannabis from sites like Erowid and NORML (National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws). Arming oneself with knowledge is always a great use of time! If you do choose to imbibe today, please be safe and smart—although the plant has very little negative effects compared to most psychoactive substances, it is still important to make good decisions while journeying with cannabis.

Book Review - Buddhism in a Nutshell

For the past five weeks, my girlfriend and I have been taking an introductory level Buddhism course titled Buddhism in a Nutshell at my local Buddhist center, the Kadampa Center in Raleigh, NC. Many of the center's members suggested this book to me over the past several months, and I decided to purchase it for reading alongside the course.

Simply put, I have been completely blown away. This is hands-down the best book I have read about Buddhism to date, at least for someone at a true beginner's level of understanding the basic concepts—like myself. I took notes furiously throughout my reading of the book, and will be putting into practice many of the meditations, dedications, and advice that it contains for several weeks, months, and years to come.

Buddhism in a Nutshell was written by Lama Thubten Yeshe, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and Venerable Amy Miller and published in 2010. It covers a lot of subtopics under the wider topic of Buddhism, including defining what Buddhism is, a brief biography of who the Buddha was, an explanation of dharma, what karma is and how it works, the four noble truths, the fundamentals of meditation, various approaches of teaching Buddhism, the importance of finding a qualified teacher, the intriguing-yet-confusing (to me!) concept of emptiness, and an appendix featuring a list of recommended reading and resources.

The book also includes an audio CD that contains 11 hours of teachings spoken by Venerable Amy Miller, which I have started but not yet completed. From what I have heard, I can report that these recordings are very helpful for a beginner like myself.

Reading this book alongside the classes I have been attending has been very helpful, as it goes into much more detail than the classes have, and reading the book has suited my personal learning style better than the verbal-based lecture style.

My only criticism whatsoever of Buddhism in a Nutshell is related to the poor editing job that was done prior to its publication. There are misspellings, grammatical and syntactical errors, and punctuation mistakes scattered throughout the book. Normally, that would cause me to bump my rating for a book down, but I am willing to overlook it in this case due to the high quality of the teachings.

Suffice it to say that if you are interested in learning about Buddhism and are looking for an all-around guide that will cover a wide variety of topics without getting so complicated as to confuse you, I can wholeheartedly recommend this book and its audio CD companion. Once I have studied it some more and am comfortable with the teachings, I plan to lend my copy out to those who would like to read it, and will consider purchasing copies for friends and family who would benefit from its teachings.

5/5 stars. 243 pages.

Bicycle Day

Image by lab604, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Bicycle Day everyone! For those of you that are unaware, April 19th is a day of celebration in the psychedelic community because it signifies the day that Albert Hofmann, the creator of LSD, took his first intentional LSD trip back in 1943.

You see, Hofmann first synthesized LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide) on November 16, 1938 in the Sandoz laboratories in Basel, Switzerland. He was researching lysergic acid derivatives to obtain a respiratory and circulatory stimulant (an analeptic). The chemical was set aside for nearly five years until April 16, 1943, when Hofmann decided to revisit it. While re-synthesizing a new batch of LSD, he accidentally absorbed a small amount through his fingertips and found that it had powerful effects, which he described as being:

"... affected by a remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness. At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant intoxicated-like condition, characterized by an extremely stimulated imagination. In a dreamlike state, with eyes closed (I found the daylight to be unpleasantly glaring), I perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors. After about two hours this condition faded away."

Three days later, on April 19, he decided to intentionally increase the dose for a self-experiment, at a level that he thought would be a minuscule dose—250 micrograms (an actual threshold dose is 20 micrograms). This is a fairly large dose in actuality, and it hit him like a ton of bricks. Less than an hour later, he began experiencing abrupt and intense changes in perception, and asked his laboratory assistant to accompany him home. The personal use of motor vehicles was restricted because this was during World War II, and the pair had to make the journey by bicycle.

During the bicycle ride, Hofmann struggled with difficult emotions and thoughts, believing that his next-door neighbor was a malevolent witch, that he was going insane, that LSD had poisoned him, among other anxious thoughts. A house doctor was called for, who could find no physical abnormalities aside from Hofmann's extremely dilated pupils. This reassured Hofmann, who later wrote:

"... Little by little I could begin to enjoy the unprecedented colors and plays of shapes that persisted behind my closed eyes. Kaleidoscopic, fantastic images surged in on me, alternating, variegated, opening and then closing themselves in circles and spirals, exploding in colored fountains, rearranging and hybridizing themselves in constant flux..."

So how does one celebrate Bicycle Day? Well, there isn't really a defined method of celebration, but one could take LSD, ride a bicycle, check out Hofmann's book My Problem Child, donate to MAPS to support psychedelic research or to Erowid to support harm reduction and drug education, attend a local psychedelic dinner, or spread the word about any of these things. At any rate, be safe in whatever you do, and Happy Bicycle Day!

Weekend Thoughts - 4.16.16

Image by Andrea Kirkby, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! Below, I have rounded up some things for you to think about this weekend:

1. Catching automobile drivers who have been texting while driving is fairly difficult now, but a proposed New York law may rely on making it possible to identify offenders. A device dubbed the "textalyzer" would scan cell phones owned by people involved in crashes for recent activity, and those who refuse to submit to the scanning process could potentially lose their license, akin to the penalty for refusing to submit to Breathalyzer tests. The technology is supposedly not able to see specifically what the cell phone user was doing on the device—just if it was recently active. Police would need a warrant to determine whether an on-the-road conversation was actually occurring prior to the crash. This proposed law raises several issues—such as the device's level of accuracy and the ability to obtain other data from cell phones without the owner knowing about it. This will definitely be something to keep our eyes out for.

2. The arrest of this Guy Fawkes mask-wearing man while sitting silently during a hearing at the Arizona Capitol might be disturbing for some, but it is worth viewing and sharing. The nonviolent man was handled roughly by police – presumably solely for wearing the "Anonymous" mask on top of his head – including a period of time while they choked him, before being forced to leave the building. He now faces criminal charges including trespassing, resisting arrest, and aggravated assault of an officer. The hearing was held to discuss suspected election fraud that occurred during the Arizona Democratic primary, which included wait times of up to five hours, missing candidates on polls, and the premature announcement that Hillary Clinton had won the state—hours before voters had finished casting their ballots.

3. For those of us who use ad-blocking applications to experience a decluttered version of the world wide web, a new web browser called Brave has the potential to replace third-party ads with its own privacy-friendly ads on media sites while sharing 70 percent of the revenue with publishers. However, publishers are not having it, threatening to sue Brave Software for a copyright violation called "republication".  There is little legal precedent for the case, and if it does see its day in court, there is no telling what the ruling will be.

4. An Italian artist named Gianluca Gimini spent the past seven years collecting improvised drawings-on-the-spot depicting bicycles drawn from the memory of friends and random strangers. The collection of photos demonstrated some trends in peoples' inabilities to remember the basic construction of bicycles, and Gimini rendered photo-realistic models of many of of them, which are simply amazing to look at.

That's all for this week's edition of Weekend Thoughts. Until next week, keep thinking wilder.

This Week in Psychedelics - 4.15.16

Image by Dahtamnay, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Cannabis

• How Can Cannabis Help Transgender People? (Leafly)
• Do More Teenagers Smoke Pot When It's Legal? (Reason)
• Cannabis Extracts: The Science Behind Cannabinoid and Terpene Extraction Methods (Leafly)
• Half of Britain now backs legalising cannabis, poll finds (Metro)
• Call for legalisation reignites cannabis debate in France (FRANCE 24)
• The Word "Marijuana" Versus the Word "Cannabis" (The Stranger)
• DOJ Accepts Decision Saying It May Not Target State-Legal Medical Marijuana Suppliers (Reason)
• Cannabis Consumers: Debunking the 5 Biggest Stereotypes (Green Rush Daily)
• How Cannabis Affects Male Infertility (ATTN:)
• A Look Inside Mettrum, A Medical Cannabis Provider (The Huffington Post)
• MassRoots Files To Be NASDAQ's First Cannabis Stock (Forbes)
• Pennsylvania Poised to Become the 24th Medical Marijuana State (Reason)
• Disabled Man Sentenced to Life in Prison Over Marijuana (ATTN:)
• Pizza box unfolds into a weed pipe (Boing Boing)
• Wide World of Cannabis: The Women Behind Weed Legalization in Chile (Merry Jane)
• This Man's Letter to Justin Trudeau About Marijuana Is Going Viral (ATTN:)
• Dosing Homemade Cannabis Edibles: Why It's Nearly Impossible to Calculate Potency (Leafly)
• The Plight to End Stoner Culture and Make Cannabis Mainstream (Merry Jane)
• Waterstones defends selling 'how-to' guides on growing and dealing your own cannabis (Express)
• The Shake: The Feds Grow Brickweed and Cannabis Is a Staple in Spokane (Leafly)
• Father and son's cannabis growing operation in Nelson medically motivated (Stuff.co.nz)
• Ted Cruz Reiterates His Support for Marijuana Federalism (Reason)
• In Photos: These "Dragon Balls" Contain 3,000 Grams of Pure Cannabis Oil (Leafly)
• Judge Revives Maine's Marijuana Legalization Initiative (Reason)
• Pot shops in Pagosa Springs, Fort Collins subjects of cannabis recalls (The Cannabist)

LSD

• World's First LSD Imaging Study Shows How Psychedelics Reduce Brain-Rigidity & Restore a Child-Like State of Imagination (High Existence)
• The LSD study: you're being subtly deceived (again) (Bernardo Kastrup's Metaphysical Speculations)
• The LSD study: an author responds (Bernardo Kastrup's Metaphysical Speculations)
• America's Psychedelic Majority: How LSD Changed Culture Forever (Rolling Stone)
• Medical Marijuana is Legal; Time for Cocaine and LSD? (Clapway)
• Scientists Say Time Travel is Possible with LSD (Clapway)
• LSD As a Treatment for Mental Illnesses (KDRV)
• Feds bar Minnesota brewery from marketing LSD Ale (The Washington Times)
• LSD has improved my life, so why should the state decide whether I can take it or not? (The Guardian)
• Will LSD ever be accepted as mainstream treatment? (BBC News)
• LSD May Chip Away at the Brain's "Sense of Self"Network (Scientific American)
• Crime Files Reopened: How Machynlleth car crash led police to smash a world-wide drugs ring (Daily Post)
• Police: Cuba City man arrested with LSD-laced candies (Dubuque Telegraph Herald)

Psilocybin/Magic Mushrooms

• Girl, 16, Busted With Psilocybin, Cocaine in Lake Elsinore: Police (Patch)

MDMA/Ecstasy

• MDMA For PTSD And Anxiety: Molly, Ecstasy May Be Legal As Medical Drug In Five Years (Inquisitr)
• MAPS 30th Anniversary Fundraising Dinner to Raise Funds for MDMA PTSD Study (Psychedelic Times)
• Former police officer escapes serving jail time after pleading guilty to possessing cocaine and MDMA (Herald Sun)
• Club-drug trafficker eluded justice for 16 years, feds say (Orlando Sentinel)
• Hundreds of MDMA pills found in 'yoga and meditation' room (Mackay Daily Mercury)
• Middle schooler busted with ecstasy tries claiming pills were just Smarties (New York Daily News)
• IT worker who died after consuming lethal liquid ecstasy could not have been a better son, family tell inquest quest (Belfast Telegraph)
• Teenagers arrested after ecstasy tablets found in car (STV News)
• Police: Manchester 'Molly' dealer nabbed after chase (FOX 61)

Ayahuasca/DMT

• Ayahuasca therapy boom: Risky or life-changing? (CNN)
• The new age of ayahuasca (ABC Online)

Peyote/San Pedro/Mescaline

• Church's Suit Over Cannabis Use Is Burned Out (Bloomberg)

Iboga/Ibogaine

• Making Ibogaine Treatment Legal in Vermont: An Interview with Bonnie Scott (Psychedelic Times)

Dissociatives

• Everything You Need to Know About Ketamine (THUMP)
• My Story: A Ketamine Diary with a Forrest Gump Twist (National Pain Report)
• Man caught collecting package containing over €100,000 worth of ketamine sentenced to 10 years (Irish Independent)
• Police: Meriden man found with PCP was "screaming, foaming at the mouth, banging head on car" (Meriden Record-Journal)

Opiates/Opioids

• "Narco-State Afghanistan" Leads to Heroin Addiction in the USA (Global Research)
• Why Fentanyl Is So Much More Deadly Than Heroin (Forbes)
• The stunning spread of the opioid painkiller and heroin epidemic, in one map (Vox)
• US Anti-Opium Effort in Afghanistan Is Total Failure (High Times)
• Four Takeaways From The National Rx Drug Abuse And Heroin Summit (Forbes)
• Harvesting opium in Afghanistan's poppy fields (The Baltimore Sun)
• The Pendulum Swings for Opioid Prescribing (Journal of Palliative Medicine)
• Naloxone not enough to solve fentanyl problem (Medical Xpress)
• Amid Heroin Epidemic in US, Mexican Gov't Doesn't Know the Extent of Opium Cultivation at Home (CNS News)

Kratom

• Can Kratom Enhance Psychedelic Therapy for Addiction Treatment? (Psychedelic Times)
• Why Is Kratom Considered a "Drug" When it is Simply a Herb? (Kratom Project)
• Can kratom cause liver toxicity (cirrhosis) (Kratom Project)
• Suffolk County Considers Banning The Drug Kratom (CBS New York)
• How to Help Keep Kratom Legal – Sign a Petition and Write to Law-Makers (Kratom Project)
• Herbal 'Opioid Alternative' Lead to Addiction, Severe Withdrawal Symptoms (Monthly Prescribing Reference)

Kava

• With SquareRüt Kava Bar, local couple hopes kava takes root in Austin (My Statesman)
• Culture as a key to cutting NZ's Pacific crime rate (Radio New Zealand)
• Man pleads guilty to possessing commercial quantity of kava after he was caught with 33kg at Darwin Airport (NT News)

Miscellaneous Psychedelics/Psychoactives/Drug Policy

• Over 1,000 Leaders Worldwide Call for End to "Disastrous" Drug War, Ahead of UN Special Session (Drug Policy Alliance)
• The Hopes and Fears of Psychedelic Science (VolteFace)
• TripSit releases V3.0 of its drug combination chart (TripSit)
• Airport Drug Sniffing Dogs Find Lots of Sausage But No Drugs (TIME)
• Finding Drugs On Social Media: Young People Turn To Tinder, Instagram To Buy Weed, MDMA And Others (International Business Times)
• Drink Cop Saves College Freshman From Rape (Digital Journal)
• Another Sexual Assault in Service of the War on Drugs (Reason)

Disclaimer: "This Week in Psychedelics" does not censor or analyze the news links presented here. The purpose of this column is solely to catalogue how psychedelics (and other psychoactives) are presented by the mass media, which includes everything from the latest scientific research to misinformation.