Menopausal Stoners, Aromatherapy and Propostion 19

I had just finished my post for Black Magpie Theory this morning when I got a call from VeryMissMary.  She was having a nerve spasm, or maybe it was a muscle spasm on account of nerve damage in her spine - defining this stuff gets complicated, and really, when a person is in intolerable pain, specifics don't make a hell of a lot of difference.  What matters is that your friend feels like somebody inside her spine has attached flaming threads to every centimeter of skin and is yanking on those threads until she implodes.  It fucking hurts.

VeryMissMary had taken her prescription pain medicine just as the doctor ordered, but those kind of medicines don't relax the body like good old marijuana.  Naturally, I had a bit of weed on hand so I got out of my night gown and into a taxi.   She took one hit, hooked herself up to her Tens Machine (Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulator) and started to feel better in a few minutes.  Because she's on a regular pain regimen, VeryMissMary doesn't need to smoke much weed to get relief.  We discovered that once her muscles begin to release, it's helpful for me to stand at the foot of her bed, take a big hit and blow the smoke in her direction.  VeryMissMary says:  Now THAT'S aromatherapy.

Unfortunately, she's going to test positive for weed the next time she goes to her pain doctor.  For some reason, doctors in New York State run blood tests monthly to make sure patients are taking their medicine as directed instead of selling it on the street, I suppose.  There's a chance that if she tests positive for weed, he'll make her come in for weekly testing - which is a hassle for anyone.  It should be a crime to requrie a chronic pain patient to endure the chronic hassle of traffic and transportation just because of Weed.

Soon, we're going to have to commit further crimes to get more weed, and then another crime when we smoke it, or brew it into tea make it into Cannibutter.  The good news is that while standing in VeryMissMary's doorway, I was balancing on one foot because I like to get high and do yoga.  We decided to call that W-oga for Weed Yoga.  As she was describing the effects of Cannibutter on a former boyfriend, we decided we needed to post some Weed Recipies - or Wecipies - here at Menopausal Stoners.  We can do that next weekend from the bungalow in Connecticut.

I have to say for the record, however, that it's bullshit that two old ladies like me and VeryMissMary should be criminals on account of her nerve damage and my moderate use of marijuana for marijuana.  We weren't driving or flying airplanes or anything.  We were just chatting while she lay in bed hooked up to a TENS machine, for crying out loud. 

You would think that The Establishment, in its efforts to turn America into a zombie army of underpaid workers who are perpetually on the edge of financial ruin would throw us a bone and legalize weed.  Man can't put up with this shit with Alcohol alone - or pharmaceuticals either.  I would also like to state for the record that we here at Menopausal Stoners fully support the use of pharmaceuticals of all kinds.  Better living through chemistry and all that.  We love pharmaceuticals - especially Valium and Ritalin and the occasional Tylenol 3.  Nobody wants to cut in to Big Pharma's game or Liquor's game either.  We just want to smoke weed when we feel like it.

I'm watching California's Prop 19 situation with interest for a number of reasons - not the least of which is that I'm tired of risking jail time for something so innocuous.  The other reason is that I have a fantasy about opening a weed spa with my cousin the Pilates instructor out in Lake Tahoe.  My mother would never approve - at least not until we started making money.  VeryMissMary is thinking more along the lines of a weed dispensary in New Jersey, since they have authorized medicinal marijuana under very limited circumstances - like your prognosis has to give you less than a year to live.   Pretty dang limited when you consider that people need relief and can't get it through regular medical channels.

People need relief from Reality, too, which is why I like to smoke weed.  I'm not surprised to hear that the alcohol lobby is openly spending money to defeat Prop 19, but they need to relax.  People will still buy as much wine and scotch as ever.  The thing is that when I smoke weed, I have to be prepared to check out for a couple of hours.  Not so with a glass or two of wine. I can drink a couple of glasses of wine at a function for work.  Even if weed were fully legal, I would never smoke weed with people from work.  Waste of Good Weed.  Weed and Alcohol are not mutually exclusive, and in fact, they go well together.  Further, weed makes some people feel socially awkward and otherwise paranoid.  Those people don't even want to smoke it.  And plenty of people have never smoked weed in their entire lives and never, ever want to try it. My mother springs to mind.

It's kind of the same as Gay Marriage.  Nobody is forcing you to marry someone of the same sex.  It's just that some same sex couples want to get married.  And speaking of Gay Marriage, this video is making the rounds:


Phil turned me on to it.  He wrote Hunga Dunga: Confessions of an Unapologetic Hippie and is sort of a Hippie Recruiter for World Wide Hippies.  The more I think about it, the more I think those guys are right when they said, “Hippies may be the only sane and rational force left.”