With The Virginian Pondering Hot Springs Pot & Port Townsend

 

There has been some discussion, of late, regarding traveling to the Pacific Northwest this coming summer.

COVID put a stop to doing so during the past couple summers. I have not been in Washington since August of 2017.

There is a big birthday party planned at a location on the Skagit Flats, in July. 

I have been communicating with another Washingtonian, currently exiled, like me, to another state, specifically, Virginia, whilst I am exiled in Texas.

The Virginian has been trying to convince me to make it to that aforementioned birthday party. 

We both live in repressive states where marijuana is pretty much illegal. Unlike freedom loving Washington, and the rest of the west coast, including Alaska, where marijuana has been decriminalized, particularly progressive, non-repressive Washington, where it has been decriminalized for years.

So, the Virginian has been wanting to try a thing or two or three she has not previously tried. One being marijuana, another being skinny dipping in Baker Hot Springs. I forget number three. Maybe floating the ferry to Port Townsend. 

Marijuana was legal when I was in Washington in 2017. But, I saw no stores selling it. The surprise that visit was it was my first return to Washington after the voters voted to take the state out of the liquor selling business. So, I was a bit surprised to go in the Lynden Safeway to see a couple aisles devoted to products like vodka and whiskey. When I was a kid Lynden made it illegal to sell any type booze inside the city limits.

How come Washington, and some other states, have on the ballot things like initiatives, propositions and referendums, letting the voters vote on things like legalizing marijuana or taking the state out of the liquor selling business?

Voting in Texas is so BORING due to there being few things of the initiative, proposition, referendum sort to vote on, letting voters approve of this that or the other thing.

Anyway, regarding pot selling stores in Washington. I Googled "pot selling stores in Washington" to find there are a lot of them.

My old hometown of Burlington, has one, called Western Bud, part of a pot selling franchise with multiple outlets. Western Bud sells a variety of pot products, including cannabis chocolate chip cookies.

So, I've got the pot problem solved for the Virginian. Port Townsend is easy. Just walk on the ferry.

But, it has been a lot of years since I have been to Baker Hot Springs, consequently I have no memory of how to get there, other than take the exit off Highway 20 to Baker Dam, but the multiple junctions taking one to Baker Hot Springs, that is a blank in my memory....

You Know You Are From Washington When You Have A Favorite Brand Of Cannabis Mayonnaise

On Facebook this morning I saw a Heinz or Hunts version of mayonnaise which contained cannabis. This later  disappeared from Facebook when I went to find the pot mayonnaise image for blogging purposes.

I thought I would make mention of this and ask anyone who might know, who lives in one of the free American states, like Washington, Oregon, Colorado,  Arizona, Alaska, and others I am not remembering right now, if such a product is now sold in grocery stores.

I Googled looking for the image of the Heinz or Hunts green colored product, to no avail. But, I found others.

Also Googled to learn there are now 16 states which have pretty much decriminalized the use of marijuana. Along with Washington, D.C.

When Washington the state legalized the sale of recreational marijuana products, one of my nephews sent me a package which contained mint chocolates infused with cannabis.

I am fairly sure sending such to one of the backward, repressive states is likely breaking some sort of law.

It is so strange how states can be so different. One state, with the population highly educated, with good schools, resulting in a progressive liberal population, while another state, with the population not so well educated, with the schools not having a good reputation, resulting in a repressive, conservative population.

I remember shortly before moving to Texas, being at a festival in Fremont, in Seattle.

Fremont declared its independence from the U.S. decades ago, claiming then to be the Free Republic of Fremont. I may have the name wrong.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Fremont acquired some communist era artifacts, like statues. All in good fun, but of the sort which would have ignorant right wing nut jobs ranting in other parts of America.

Like where I am now.

Anyway, I was at this festival in Fremont, it may have been the Summer Solstice Festival, the one which begins with the big naked bike ride, which I have never seen. So, Wanda and I are wandering around and we see this guy hawking hash brownies for $1. There was a policeman about 10 feet from the hash brownies guy, who had a steady stream of customers, which soon included me and Wanda.

Well, that was one tasty brownie and it made for a much more interesting Fremont Festival experience.

Point being, well before the product was legalized, a permissive tolerance policy was pretty much in play in Washington.

And then I moved to Texas, where the concept of a permissive tolerance policy has just way too many syllables for most Texans to understand.

Speaking of Washington, also on Facebook I saw a semi-amusing item credited to comedian Jeff Foxworthy, who, apparently, now lives somewhere in Washington and who has lived there long enough to make the following observations about living in Washington...

1. If someone in a Lowes/Home Depot store offers you assistance and they don't work there, you live in Washington.

2. If you've worn shorts, flip-flops and a warm-jacket at the same time, you live in Washington.

3. If you've had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed the wrong number, you live in Washington.

4. If you measure distance in hours, you live in Washington.

5. If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once, you live in Washington.

6. If you have switched from 'heat' to 'A/C' and back again in the same day, you live in Washington. (That is “if” you have “AC”)

7. If you can drive through 2 feet of snow during a raging blizzard without flinching, you live in Eastern Washington. If you live in Western Washington and can’t drive through 2” of snow and are in a ditch or have stalled out in the middle of the road, you are now pissing off all those who migrated from Eastern Washington to Western Washington, who now regret their choice. 

8. If you get your kid's Halloween costumes to fit over 2 layers of clothes or under a raincoat, you live in Washington.

9. If driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled with leaves, mud or ice, you live in Washington.

10. If you know all 4 seasons: almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction, you live in Washington.

11. If you feel guilty throwing bottles, cans or paper in the trash, you live in Washington.

12. If you know more than 10 ways to order coffee, you live in Washington.

13. If you know more people who own boats than have air conditioning, you live in Washington.

14. If you stand on a deserted corner in the rain waiting for the "Walk" signal, you live in Washington.

15. If you consider that if it has no snow on it (with the exception of the recently erupted), it’s not a ‘real’ mountain, then you live in Washington.

16. If you can taste the difference between Starbucks, Seattle's Best, and Tullys, you live in Washington.

17. If you know the difference between Chinook, Coho and Sockeye salmon, you live in Washington.

18. If you know how to pronounce Sequim, Puyallup, Issaquah, Snoqualamie, (he misspelled Snoqualmie) Wenatchee , Spokane , Umpqua, Yakima and Willamette, (the Willamette is a river in Oregon. When my mom and dad moved from Washington to Eugene, where I was born, they were giggled at due to mis-pronouncing the name of the river which runs through Eugene as Willa-meetee), you live in Washington.

19. If you consider swimming an indoor sport, you live in Washington.

20. If you can tell the difference between Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese and Thai food, you live in Washington.

21. If you go camping with a tarp, scotch guarded cloths and waterproof matches on you, you live in Washington.

22. If you have actually used your mountain bike on a mountain, you live in Washington.

23. If you think people who use umbrellas are either wimps or tourists, you definitely live in Washington.

24. If you buy new sunglasses every single year because you cannot find the old ones after such a long time, then you live in Washington.

25. If you actually understand these jokes and forward them to all your Washington friends, you live or have lived in Washington.

___________________

Now I am off to Amazon to see if I can order some Cannabis Mayonnaise. One would think if such is available it would be on Amazon, what with Amazon being headquartered in Seattle...

Why Is No Move Fort Worth Building 50 Blocks Of New Sidewalks?

This blogging falls into the category of news I read in west coast online news sources, usually the Seattle Times, about news I would not expect to be reading in a Texas newspaper about a similar subject in Texas, or in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram about something to do with Fort Worth.

Today we have a double dose of such items.

The first is a headline on the front page of the Seattle Times, online. An article about a recipe adding marijuana to a homemade chocolate-nut spread.

A couple days ago I read an article about a trio of Texans who were refusing to be Medical Tourists, forced to travel to California, Oregon, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Canada or other civilized areas of the world and America to legally acquire marijuana to treat their medical woe.

If I remember right this trio of Texans were veterans, you know, veterans of military service, wounded defending our supposed freedoms, one of which, for a large part of America, including Texas, is not the freedom to choose to treat an ailment with the well known effective treatment of cannabis, because, you know, unlike being in a war, marijuana is dangerous and needs the government to protect you from its danger.

Over the years I have multiple times verbalized my disgust at Fort Worth's backwardness regarding sidewalks.

(That and Fort Worth's multiple city parks without modern facilities such as running water and restrooms, with, instead, way too many outhouses)

Time and time again, in Fort Worth, I was appalled to see a young mom pushing a baby carriage on a dirt path worn into the side of a busy road.

Or an elderly person wobbling on a cane.

Such third world backwardness would not be tolerated in most towns in America, and much of the rest of the world.

So, this week Seattle's mayor and other city leaders announced a $22 million plan to build 50 blocks of new sidewalks this year.

Funds for this sidewalk upgrade come from the $930 million Move Seattle levy voters voted for in 2015.

Imagine that. A town's voters allowed to vote on something which improves their city. Quite the contrast with a town like Fort Worth, where voters have not been allowed to vote on a public works project with a price tag about the same as Seattle's Move On project.

Fort Worth's public works  project, which the public has never voted for, is known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District, or, more commonly, America's Biggest Boondoggle.

Apparently Seattle is going to upgrade 50 blocks of sidewalks this year.

Fort Worth's Boondoggle has been boondoggling along for most of this century with little constructive to show for the effort, but currently showing a large area of ghost town-like wasteland where a bridge was once being built, with the entire fiasco symbolized by a bizarre traffic roundabout in the ghost town zone with a giant aluminum homage to a trash can at its center...

Why Aren't Retail Marijuana Prices Dipping In Texas?

I saw that which you see here this morning on my old home zone newspaper's online version.

An article about the price of pot dropping in Washington's marijuana stores.

This is sort of one of those articles I see in west coast newspapers which I would not read in a Texas newspaper, due to the fact that the land of the free known as Texas still criminalizes marijuana consumption in this current age of some enlightenment in other locations in America.

In other words the reason retail marijuana prices are not dipping in Texas is there are no marijuana retail  stores in Texas.

It is now legal to mosey around a Texas town with a gun displayed in a holster, like a cowboy in the Wild West, but smoking marijuana, like a cowboy in the Wild West is forbidden.

In some ultra wet locations in Texas while a modern day cowboy can mosey about openly carrying a pistol he can also openly carry and consume an intoxicating alcoholic beverage while smoking a tobacco cigarette, but not a marijuana cigarette.

Seems sort of convoluted to me.....

Was Someone High On Wax Before This Week's FW Weekly Went To Print?

When I picked up this week's Fort Worth Weekly this morning, and saw the headline for the cover story it had me wondering what fresh ridiculous nonsense is this?

The cover story is HIGH ON WAX, with a sub-headline of There's a new, cleaner way to smoke weed. And it's legal in Texas.

I got a text message a few minutes ago telling me that this week's Fort Worth Weekly has messed up bad, real bad.

I figured the real bad mess up must have  to do with the cover article.

I figured right.

Just a few paragraphs into the article I came to this gem....

"Originally called hashish, or hash, wax began its rise from obscurity in California around 1980. Wax is cannabis oil extracted directly from the buds that you would typically smoke in a joint."

West coast children of the 60s, does it come as a surprise to you that hash began its rise from obscurity in California around 1980?

What embarrassing, ignorant, inaccurate nonsense.

The article goes on  to elaborate on how one can make their own hash wax. And eventually makes an odd case as to how doing so is legal in Texas.

When it is not legal in Texas.

Two comments to the article sort of nail the problem Fort Worth Weekly has created for itself....

The headlines for this article are very incorrect. I hope people don’t go to prison relying on this misinformation! Wax, concentrates, dabs, shatter, etc. (Tetrahydrocannabinols) are listed in the Texas Controlled Substances Act as a Penalty Group II Controlled Substances. Possession under 1 gram is a State Jail Felony punishable up to two years in prison without any parole. Possession over 4 grams is a First Degree Felony punishable by 5-99 years or LIFE in prison! To say this is “legal’ in a headline is reckless to say the least! I would have loved the opportunity to tell this reporter this before you published this article.

David Sloane, Attorney
Public Information Officer
DFW-National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML)

This article is misleading and very unethical as a journalist to publish. This article needs to be retracted. Wax is still illegal in Texas and for you to misinform your readers could lead to peoples arrest, fines and so forth. Do the right thing and retract.

____________________________________________

Clearly Fort Worth Weekly no longer has an adult on board its sinking ship.

Is Gayle Reaves still available?

Where Can You Get Medicinal Marijuana In Texas To Ease Chemotherapy Misery?

File this in the folder that contains yet one more thing you'd never see on the front page of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Dallas Morning News or any other Texas newspaper's online edition.

The front page of the Seattle Times online this morning had this ad repeated three times, including a banner ad at the top.

The ad is asking what your answer would be if your teen asked you how marijuana can be harmful if it's used as medicine.

Washington's voters decided marijuana was not all that harmful, and thus legalized recreational use of the herb for adults.

The teen might have asked if marijuana is not harmful and is okay for adults to use, why can't I?

I don't know what my answer to that question would be.

Start Talking Now is the website to which the ads are trying to direct readers. Apparently Start Talking Now is a project of the Washington Healthy Youth Coalition. Does Texas have a Healthy Youth Coalition?

Something Illegal From Spencer Jack's Dad Showed Up In My Mailbox Today

I opened my mailbox a few minutes ago and found an envelope from Spencer Jack's dad, my Favorite Nephew Jason, also known as FNJ.

A few minutes later I opened the envelope and found that which you see here.

As you can read, FNJ had had himself some mighty fine Skagit strawberries and was wishing he could figure out a way to ship some to his FUD.

A couple days ago Spencer Jack and his dad successfully shipped FUD some FNJ2 (Favorite Nephew Joey) smoked salmon and dungeness crab.

I do not think strawberries would transit as well as smoked salmon. Especially when the temperature is nearing the 100 degree zone.

Back to today's incoming.

So, unable to mail his FUD some strawberries, FNJ decided to send me a different popular Northwest delicacy.

Special chocolates apparently available throughout Skagit County, year round.

Made in Seattle.

I looked at the little packet, read that it contained two 5mg squares, thought to myself this must be really good chocolate. Then I flipped the packet over to find out this is really special chocolate....

This product contains marijuana, SPOT uses cocoa butter fat, oils and/or alcohol to extract cannabinoids for use in our products. Always safe, natural and tested.

This product is infused with marijuana or active components of marijuana. Products containing marijuana can impair concentration and judgement. Do not operate a vehicle or machinery under the influence of this drug. There may be health risks associated with consumption of this product. It should not be used by women that are pregnant or breast feeding. For use only by adults twenty-one and older. Keep out of reach of children.

This product has intoxicating effects and may be habit forming. This product may be unlawful outside of Washington state.

Yikes! What was my nephew thinking? Sending something like this to my mailbox? Doesn't he know Texas is one of the most intolerant states in the union regarding marijuana? Texas does not even allow medicinal marijuana, which is a good indicator of how backwards and behind the times the Lone Star State is on this issue.

I have not ingested a cannabis type product this century. I believe the last time I did so was with Wanda at Seattle's Fremont Solstice Street Fair. A purveyor was purveying hash brownies. If I remember right they cost one buck. A Seattle cop was standing a few feet away, an indication that Washington has been tolerant on this issue for a long time.

I recollect that Wanda and I got a bit goofy and giggly after we ate the brownies. But not excessively goofy and giggly.

After I read the back side of the chocolate packet I looked again at the front side, which you see above and read the following that I'd not noticed upon first perusal...

CAUTION: When eaten or swallowed, the intoxicating effects of this drug may be delayed by two or more hours.

Two or more hours? That would almost be my bedtime. I will need to plan ahead before I try this latest Washington product to arrive at my location....

Legalizing Recreational Use Of Marijuana Is Not On The November Texas Ballot

A couple days ago I blogged a blogging titled Looking Forward To Celebrating Indigenous People's Day Possibly With The Texas Kickapoo Tribe in which I mentioned that I often will read something in one of the online news sources emanating from my old home zone and think to myself, self, that is something you'd never read in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

A couple weeks ago my great nephew Spencer Jack's dad emailed me a photo of an advertisement in my old home zone's newspaper, the Skagit Valley Herald.

I blogged about this on my Washington blog in a blogging titled In Washington Marijuana Is State Approved With Loving Farms Open For Business.

If my memory is serving me accurately this is the 3rd marijuana selling store to open in my old home zone.

I have read that the marijuana selling stores in Washington are having trouble stocking their stores with the weed that is now legal to sell. Apparently only marijuana certified by some means by the state can be sold. Which apparently means you can not grow your own and sell it in a state sanctioned store.

It is perfectly legal to grow your own for your own use. And even to partner up with your neighbors and grow a communal pot plot.

Marijuana is very easy to grow, so I really don't quite understand how these pot selling stores are going to make a go of it.

Anyway, back to the you'll never see this in the Star-Telegram, or any Texas newspaper, theme.

How long do you think it will be before recreational use of marijuana becomes legal in Texas? Making it legal seems to be spreading. Lately I read Oregon and New York are considering the de-criminalizing pot issue.

Walking With Village Creek Indian Ghosts Wondering How One Gets Some Legal Washington Marijuana

Today, in the noon timeframe, I was walking with the Indian Ghosts, who haunt Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area, when I heard a familiar rustling noise.

It was an armadillo.

The State Small Mammal of Texas.

This was a big one. I made a noise to catch the foraging critter's attention, which caused it to sort of get on its rear haunches and quickly look around, too quickly for me to get a picture of an armadillo on its haunches before it got back to foraging.

Is an armadillo edible? I have no idea. I remember a restaurant one saw soon upon leaving the freeway, in Woodinville, in Washington, that seemed to indicate armadillo was on the menu, that indication made via text painted on a window. I always assumed this was some sort of joke, the humor of which escaped me.

Speaking of Washington. I knew that today is the day that smoking marijuana became legal in Washington. During lunch I watched coverage of this on CNN. Apparently you can have up to an ounce of pot in your possession. However, it is illegal to sell or grow the weed. I know the state already has medicinal marijuana growers, but that is not were you can get your recreational smoking material.

Very perplexing.

So, even though it is now legal to smoke the stuff in my old home state, there is no way to legally obtain the herb.

In addition to it being illegal to buy marijuana for recreational use, in Washington, it is also illegal to smoke it in public. Which seems a bit odd, to me. The CNN story showed a smoking celebration at the base of the Space Needle. In public. And way back when I still lived in Washington smoking the stuff in public was not all that frowned upon.

Methinks this new law in Washington has opened a can of worms, to coin a phrase (or is this already a cliche?) that may lead to some interesting twists and turns before the legal recreational use of marijuana in Washington situation becomes clear.

Does anyone know what the usual lag time is that it takes one of the non-progressive states to adopt the changes that the progressive states make? I know droopy drawers left Washington sometime back in the last century, while I regular still see that abomination, in Texas, as recently as on the drive to walk with the Indian Ghosts.

Prohibition ended in Washington back in the early 1930s,  while it lingers, in various forms, in Texas,  8 decades later.

March In May To Liberate Marijuana In Texas

There are way too many Americans in jail due to various violations of the various laws that prohibit Marijuana. Criminalizing Marijuana, in my opinion, may be the stupidest thing the American Government does.

Producing and selling alcoholic beverages, that the government sanctions.

I live on the border between a wet and a dry zone. For you non-Texans, here in Texas the Prohibition period never totally went away. So, you have some areas where alcohol is totally banned, as in dry, others where it is totally allowed, as in wet, others where alcohol is partially allowed, as in damp. Within those parameters there are variations, like areas where a thing called a Unicard is required to get an alcoholic beverage in a restaurant.

I have no idea how much of the Mexican Drug Cartel's, currently waging war with each other, business is trafficking in Marijuana. I suspect Marijuana is a large part of the Mexican Drug Cartel's cash flow.

In my opinion Marijuana is far less dangerous then alcohol. If it were legalized, with the quality controlled to make a less powerful cannabis, it would seem like selling the stuff in liquor stores would be a good thing. All that money that now goes to Mexican Drug Cartels would stay in America. All those people in jail, taking up space and costing money, could be released and made whole again.

Farmers could openly grow the stuff, like in the days of yore, or currently in the backwoods of Northern California. Marijuana grows like a weed, hence one of its nicknames. Maybe part of the plant, since it is hemp, could be used as a bio-fuel.

We have had many of our national leaders, including presidents, admit to having experimented with Marijuana, though one claims to have experimented without inhaling. How can a president or other elected official at the federal level admit to the crime of being a Marijuana user and not be an ardent advocate of repealing the Marijuana Prohibition?

Several of the states and cities within states have greatly liberalized their Marijuana laws, to no great harm that I've heard about.

It's all very perplexing to me.

With Texas being the most progressive, liberal, forward thinking state in the American union, I really think Texas should lead the way and end the Texas Pot Prohibition and empty Texas jails of those incarcerated for Marijuana related offenses.

Texas needs to do a better job of putting real criminals, like Fort Worth's corrupt conflicts of interest-laden Mayor Mike Moncrief, behind bars, and free those who really have done nothing seriously wrong.