The advertising flier left no doubt about its pitch: a giant marijuana leaf with a phone number that ended GOT KUSH. A friend’s teenage daughter brought it home from last weekend’s Earth Day celebration on the Santa Monica Pier.

What else would I expect from a concert held on 4/20 — a shorthand reference to smoking pot — that featured reggae artist Ziggy Marley, son of Bob?

“Have you or anyone else experienced an illness [for] which you believe marijuana could provide relief?” the flier read. “If you don’t qualify for a recommendation, your visit is free.”

I’d seen similar ads before. Walk along the Venice boardwalk and it’s hard to not get handed one of those head-shop postcards promising instant approval to smoke marijuana.

I’d dismissed the claim as a marketing gimmick. But it left me wondering: Could you really just walk in off the street and get marijuana?

The West Hollywood clinic took walk-in patients, so I stopped by Wednesday afternoon. I rode the elevator up with a brawny man in a wheelchair and the middle-aged woman accompanying him. We made small talk about the heat wave and the difficulty of finding a place to park.

In the waiting room, I filled out a sheaf of forms, accurately answering questions about my medical history, current symptoms and past use of cannabis.

I gave the polite, tattooed man behind the counter my driver’s license, credit card and a coupon giving me a $25 discount on the $175 exam.

Fifteen minutes later, I was greeted by the doctor, a silver-haired man in a white lab coat, his name embroidered across the front. Diplomas lined the wall behind him. On his desk was a collection of family photos.

He looked over my medical forms and asked about the arthritis I’d noted. I told him the truth. Some days my fingers are so stiff it hurts to grip a doorknob or a steering wheel. I’d tried prescription drugs in the past, but stopped because of the side effects.

The doctor inspected my swollen fingers, gently squeezing the tender joints. He checked my pulse and blood pressure, then took a stethoscope and listened to my lungs.

His 10-minute exam was about as thorough as the one I’d received last year from the hand specialist at the orthopedic center, who sent me home with Celebrex.

This new doctor told me marijuana could help. He recommended I not smoke it. Bad for the lungs. Better to use it with a vaporizer. Or ingest it, infused in tea or baked in brownies.

Then he handed me a prescription for marijuana. Good for one year; no refill limits.

Idon’t know why I was surprised. I’m the kind of person covered by the state’s 1996 Compassionate Use Act, which allows the use of medicinal marijuana in California.

The law allows physicians to recommend marijuana for the treatment of “cancer, anorexia, AIDS, chronic pain, spasticity, glaucoma, arthritis, migraine, or any other illness for which marijuana provides relief.”

I was with the 56% of California voters who approved the law 12 years ago. It’s not my place to judge an adult who chooses a bong hit over Vicodin.

So why did I feel vaguely criminal as I stuffed my cannabis card — resembling a tiny passport, embossed with a marijuana leaf — in my wallet?

Because I’m from a generation in which marijuana was plainly illegal and thus the province of the young — clandestinely purchased with a wad of singles, smoked with a rowdy crowd of buddies, accompanied by laughter and loud music.

And because I’ve heard from friends — and my own teenage daughters — that getting a cannabis card at 18 has become a rite of passage in some quarters.

Why bother trying to find a dope dealer when you can shop for weed at a place as familiar as a mini-mart?

Iwas buzzed in at the marijuana dispensary across the street from the doctor’s office. I handed my prescription to a hand that reached out through a hole in a black-glass window that I couldn’t see through. I was buzzed in through a second door and stood dumbstruck in front of a counter with more than a dozen varieties of marijuana on display.

A thin young man with a ponytail explained the different types and their effects on the body and mind, just like those pamphlets I get when I pick up my blood pressure and cholesterol medications from Rite-Aid.

I was struck by how ordinary it all seemed, trying to decide between marijuanas. A sativa or an indica? I felt like I was at the apple bin at Trader Joe’s choosing between Fuji and Gala.

I left with a red vial of sweet-smelling Yumbolt, at $55 for an eighth of an ounce. I carried it home in the trunk of my car, convinced that every cop I passed could tell I was transporting marijuana.

At home, I couldn’t get the bottle open. My fingers weren’t strong enough to pop the top. Which is just as well.

I’m not going to smoke it. The feds don’t recognize California’s medical marijuana law. The DEA has been raiding dispensaries here; I don’t want federal agents knocking on my door.

So, on Friday, I brought the bottle into my office and my editor watched me flush it down the toilet.

The experience left me with so much to think about, it’s best I’m clear-headed while I work through it.

Associated Press PORTLAND — It’s autumn and the crops are in, but for the state’s marijuana growers, more of what may be Oregon’s most lucrative harvest didn’t make it to market.

The Oregon Department of Justice says a record 245,000 plants were pulled up this year, more than double the 120,000 a year before.

While authorities are getting better at finding where marijuana grows, says Don Nelson, who tracks the issue for the department, growers are getting smarter too.

Nelson says authorities are getting more helicopter flight time, which is deemed critical to finding the illegal plants.

But he says the growers are learning to grow the plants under trees and in no particular pattern to make them harder to find.

Police say the overwhelming percentage of the large grows are run my Mexican drug cartels. The marijuana crop in Oregon–and several other states–is more valuable in cash terms than any other crop.

How to Germinate Successully.

Since acquiring good seed can be dangerous, expensive and very time consuming, the “seed sponge” system for starting seeds proves to be the most successful.  The sponges and styrofoam holder are very inexpensive and can be reused.   The photos on the next page demonstrate how easily the sponge once removed from the styrofoam holder can be inserted into the 4” Rockwool cube after the seedling has reached sufficient root development.  If you are a die hard soil or soil less mix grower, the sponges will transplant into any medium.   The center hole in the seed sponges is about 1 1/2inches deep and ready to accommodate a seed.   The seed sponge is about 3 1/2inches tall and 1 1/2inches     wide, tapering to the bottom.

So far the ONLY resource I know of (check your local grow suppliers)       The Grow Store;
5050 S. Federal Blvd., Englewood,  Co. 80110.    (303) 738-0202    They ship anywhere!!  The styrofoam holder comes with the seed sponges.  The one shown here has been altered but they usually hold 15 sponges which can also be purchased separately.

WHITE AFGHANI: is a cross between White Rhino and Afghani. Flowering is about 45-60 days and the yield is great.The plants are defined by the customary dark Indica leaves.  The stems are very sturdy to support large, weighty colas and the smell is tinged with skunk but very aromatic.  This is a dependable, problem free plant, highly recommended for indoor growing.  The seeds cost @ $90.00 for 10.

The comprehensive search for seed and what SHE will look like all grown up. - Part 1.1

Marijuana seeds are very easy to come by.  For the most part, your success of germinating them will be very high.  The biggest consideration in what type of cannabis to grow should be the price you will pay if (WHEN) busted.  If you are going to ante up the $$$ for a grow room set up and put yourself in jeopardy of lots of jail time, you might as well grow excelsior pot rather than ditchweed.  The DEA looks at quantity not quality. There are a lot of disreputable companies ready to suck up your bucks for nothing in return as this is all cash through the mail with no guarantees. There are quite a few reputable seed banks that you can reach through the Cannabis.com site. Their service, diligence and very high product quality are why they are featured here.Prices tend to fluctuate and availability is unpredictable so keep checking back until you find what you want.

A house lost amid Elk Grove’s urban sprawl offers more than meets the eye. The gray-beige paneling and brick façade are neat, if not a bit weather beaten. A cheery ceramic disc hanging by the front door proudly proclaims the last name of the homeowners. Inside the doorway, beyond the painted portrait of a wedded couple and past the big-screen television is a sliding-glass door, through which one is led to a pot smoker’s paradise.

An enclosed outdoor canopy conceals various smoking paraphernalia, lighters and lawn chairs. Welcome to the family weed shack.

While Don’s parents own the house, he and his friend Nick are free to toke there so long as they remain inside the weed shack. They are not the only household heads: Don’s mother also indulges, a secret her son discovered years earlier when he walked in on her one day burning a fatty. Don had never noticed anything different with her; she was always just like all the other moms.

In fact, Don and Nick—whose last names we’ve withheld—say they were given their first tastes of marijuana by their respective mothers, although both were quick to add the choice to use was made of their own free will.

Such permissive attitudes would seem to run counter to conventional parental wisdom—it would have even during those heady years immediately prior to Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” campaign, when everyone and their, well, mother seemed to be getting high. Nick and Don are also products of elementary school anti-drug campaigns that beat into kids the notion that marijuana is evil, that to be a truly solid citizen one must live drug-free—wacky tobacky included.

Explaining the ills of pot is fine with Lisa Mondiel. She’s with the California Coalition for Youth, which maintains that marijuana’s properties make it a mind-altering drug and—worse—a potential “gateway drug” to harder substances.

Numbers back up the coalition’s contention: 62 percent of adults over the age of 26 who began smoking marijuana before the age of 15 admitted to cocaine use during their lifetime, while 9 percent reported heroin use, according to an Office of National Drug Policy study. Those who initiate use of marijuana at any age are more likely to use cocaine and heroin and become dependent on drugs, ONDP found.

Don and Nick disagree that marijuana is a gateway drug, although they admit that during their three-year pot-smoking career, they’ve taken Ecstasy, snorted cocaine and eaten magic mushrooms. They certainly dispute the notion that they’re addicted to pot.

“We don’t need to smoke,” Don says firmly. “When I don’t smoke for a while, it just comes up in my head, ‘I haven’t smoked weed for a while. Bummer.’ But it’s not like I have to get high immediately. It’s one of those things that doesn’t have withdrawals. You don’t get depressed.”

They also adamantly distance themselves from stereotypical “potheads.”

“People just need to come home and take two hours out of the day, whether it’s to meditate or run or just smoke pot,” Don says. “For us, smoking pot is easier than running a mile.”

Nick adds that they usually engage in some activity after burning one, as opposed to potheads who sit around all day and, well, just smoke pot for hours on end, with brief interruptions to crash and consume munchies.

“That is their life. They have no other way to entertain themselves, I suppose,” Nick says. “Then there are those who use marijuana as a tool, to smoke and do other things afterward. It’s pretty much just like smoking a cigarette.”

The nonchalant attitude toward marijuana extends to young people who don’t even partake. Take 20-year-old Adam, who consented to an interview as long as his first name was changed and his last name was not used.

Adam speaks highly of his housemate. Laid back and easy going, Adam’s housemate works two jobs, has a girlfriend, owns two trucks and keeps up with his Sacramento City College schoolwork. For the most part, they appear like two regular college chums roughing it on their own in their quiet south Sacramento neighborhood.

There is one slight twist to their tale of congeniality, however: Adam’s housemate smokes marijuana. Adam does not.

“Living with someone who smokes marijuana is pretty much just like living with any other Californian,” Adam says. “I don’t live in a drug den. I live in a house. I have a roommate who smokes pot. It’s pretty much just two guys living without their moms.”

The neighbors have never complained. The cops have never busted down—let alone knocked on—the front door. The house does reek of marijuana while Adam’s housemate smokes, but Adam doesn’t really mind so long as the fans are on and an air freshener is handy.

He simply shrugs at negative connotations directed at potheads.

“Someone who is drunk is more likely to break something than someone who is high,” he says with a laugh. “He just sits on the couch and watches some TV. Sometimes he vacuums. Someone who is drunk will puke. I’ve never seen or heard of anyone who has thrown up from smoking too much marijuana.”

Theirs is a story that could just as easily be told from the opposite perspective, from the stoner with the same no-BFD attitude sharing what it is like living with someone straight (in terms of indulgence, not sexuality). For Adam’s part, living with a pothead has made him neither a proponent nor opponent of the substance.

“It’s something that can be abused, but it’s not heroin or something like that,” he says. “I have a job, I go to work. He has a job, he goes to work. It doesn’t affect your day-to-day life all that much. Everyone has a hobby or a vice.”

Pot smoking is one popular hobby. The ONDP conducted a poll that showed roughly 32 percent of graduating high-school seniors in 2006 were smoking—or had at least tried to smoke—marijuana during the past year. That would indicate there are tens of thousands of young users in the Central Valley, with many more who will join their numbers once they figure out how to score.

<>So the anti-drug dogma is not sticking with the younger generation, especially among those like our head cases who have experienced first-hand evidence to the contrary.

Looking back at their earlier days of innocent education about drug usage, Don and Nick explained that marijuana never really was given much attention except that it was “bad.” Both believe if kids actually were told the truth about marijuana rather than just that it’s bad, there would be fewer questions that need to be answered by self-experimentation.

Ironically, Mondiel sees eye to red eye with Don and Nick. As the program director of the youth hotline, she often gets calls from parents who panic about their child’s newfound friend Mary Jane, and from friends of teens who are worried about their friend’s marijuana usage. The main cause for concern is marijuana’s reputation for being “a bad drug.”

“Kids need to know all of this information about marijuana,” Mondiel says. “You can’t just tell them not to smoke just because it’s ‘bad.’ And I don’t even want to say it’s bad, but just that there needs to be more information so kids know exactly what kind of substance marijuana is.”

Much to the contrary of the push to demonize marijuana, Mondiel suggests that anti-substance-use organizations would be better served focusing on alcohol abuse.

Now it’s Don in agreement.

“I tried driving home drunk once; it was one of the most horrible fucking experiences in my life,” he says. “It was only around the corner, maybe 50 feet. I had to stop and say, ‘All right, that’s enough.’ I mean, I know how most people perceive pot as a mind-numbing drug. It’s a common misunderstanding that if you’ve smoked a lot of pot, you can’t drive. But for people like us, there’s a tolerance to the drug. You won’t get any more high than the first time.”

The key, everyone interviewed for this story agreed, is to preach responsibility.

“I think if we had open communication between parents and kids, letting them know that certain behaviors are OK and setting boundaries with them, it might work better,” Mondiel says. “More information on the actual substance rather than just saying it’s bad leads to a better informed decision. You can’t say marijuana is illegal for being a drug because cough syrup is a drug, too, and so is Excedrin.”

Believe it or not, Don and Nick practice responsibility inside the backyard weed shack.

“We’ve had kids about 14 come in here with people and I’ve actually cut them off,” Don says. “I mean, you have all of high school to figure out whether you want to smoke weed or not. I’m not going to be the one who gets you started on it. You have to be ready for it in your mind. And you need to know what’s enough for you.”

If Adam has learned anything from living with a pothead, it’s that you cannot have a generalized opinion about them.

“These aren’t bad people, the ones I know,” he says. “They’re not the ones who go to schools and sell to 12-year-olds. Those are the ones who need to die. But, I mean, they’re over 18. They have the right to be their own dumbasses.”

August 15, 2007 - College Station, TX, USA

College Station, TX: The enactment of state laws legalizing the medical use of cannabis is not associated with an increase in the drug’s recreational use, according to statistical data published in the International Journal of Drug Policy.

Investigators at the Texas A&M Health Science Center, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, analyzed cannabis use trends among two high-risk subgroups (arrestees and emergency room patients) in five cities and five metropolitan areas in states that have enacted medical cannabis laws. In the four states (California, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington) analyzed, researchers reported, “The introduction of medical cannabis laws was not associated with an increase in cannabis use.” Previous studies performed by the University of Michigan and others have also reported that liberalizing marijuana penalties is not associated with an increase in pot use.

By The Associated Press

PORTLAND — Federal subpoenas seeking medical records of 17 Oregon medical-marijuana patients have growers and users upset and nervous even as a federal judge considers whether to throw the subpoenas out.

“It’s crazy. It’s really scary. If they can get my records, they can get Gov. [Ted] Kulongoski’s, they can get yours,” said Donald DuPay, a former Portland police officer and 2006 candidate for Multnomah County sheriff.

DuPay says his records are among those subpoenaed.

A federal grand jury in Yakima issued the subpoenas in April as part of an investigation of some growers in Oregon and Washington.

The patients are not targets of the grand jury.

A Seattle spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration declined to comment.

The subpoenas were served on the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program, which issues permits to patients and their authorized growers.

A second subpoena went to The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation, a private Portland clinic where doctors determine whether a patient’s condition would be eased by marijuana.

The DEA raided DuPay’s Portland home in June and seized 135 marijuana plants DuPay said he was growing for patients. DuPay, who hosts a local cable-access program on medical marijuana, says he has not been arrested.

On Aug. 1, lawyers from the state and from the ACLU, representing the Hemp and Cannabis Foundation, asked Chief U.S. District Judge Robert H. Whaley in Yakima to throw the subpoenas out.

James Hagerty, the assistant U.S. attorney who convened the grand jury, acknowledged that the subpoenas were written too broadly. What the grand jury wants, he said, is not “medical records” but current addresses and phone numbers for the 17 patients.

He said the grand jury is investigating four or five people for growing marijuana to sell under the medical-marijuana law.

The 17 get or got medical marijuana from the people under investigation, he said

Oregon voters enacted the state’s program in 1998, and 14,868 Oregonians hold patient cards. An additional 7,115 have state permission to grow medical marijuana. They can’t sell it but can accept donations to defray costs.

Eleven other states, including Washington, have medical-marijuana laws and at least two more are considering them.

But federal law forbids the use or cultivation of marijuana. Federal authorities have attacked California’s program by raiding marijuana dispensaries and prosecuting growers there for years.

Last month, the DEA sent letters to landlords of dispensaries in Los Angeles warning of possible prison sentences.

But the Oregon subpoenas apparently are the first time the DEA has come after medical records, “and of course, it is very worrisome,” said Bruce Mirkin, a spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, an advocacy group in Washington, D.C.

“People have an expectation of medical privacy, and I think they have a right to expect medical privacy,” Mirkin said.

“It’s one thing to talk about people selling a product that is in fact not legal under federal law. We may think that’s stupid. But that’s in a whole different realm than obtaining people’s medical records.”

The Web site for the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program promises patients and caregivers that their medical records are legally protected.

Kris Hermes, a spokesman for the advocacy group Americans for Safe Access, said the subpoenas suggest the DEA is looking beyond prosecuting dealers.

“It sends a message to the other states and their programs that they’re vulnerable to federal interference,” he said.

The past 20 years or so have seen a large increase in drug testing in the workplace and elsewhere. This testing has usually taken place in a laboratory setting; home drug testing is a relatively new phenomenon.

With increased demand for pre-employment and random drug screening of employees came a huge market for home drug testing. Several products are available to consumers and can ease one’s mind. Whether the person is a recreational or habitual user or even just worried that diet or environment may create a false positive, having results from a home drug testing kit can accurately predict the outcome of the official test.

Creators of home drug testing kits also had another group in mind: worried parents of teenagers. As one of the largest consumers of this type of product, parents can now easily test their children if drug use is suspected. Some experts question whether or not this can damage the parent/child relationship, while others argue that it is a parent’s right and obligation to know and to seek treatment for their child if need be. Parents appreciate the privacy and anonymity of home drug testing.

Testing is usually performed by the traditional urine sample method; however, the oral swab method is becoming more respected and popular. The kit can be obtained via mail order, at specialty shops, or even from major pharmacies. After the sample is taken, it is sent to the company’s laboratory for testing. One can expect results in just a few days. Some of the home drug testing kits offer immediate results (within about ten minutes) but then also offer laboratory certification of the results.

Most home drug testing kits test for the ten most commonly abused substances. Home drug testing kits, like many laboratory tests, do not detect the timeframe of usage. Marijuana is the most commonly tested and is available in all screening kits. Some all-in-one kits contain tests for marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamines, opiates, PCP and common prescription drugs.

A variety of methods are available for on-site and home drug testing. Employers like the benefits of cost cutting and convenience; parents like the option of privately testing their children. The home drug testing and on-site drug testing market flourishes because of the obvious benefits. Some human resource experts believe that on-site and do-it-yourself drug testing kits are the wave of the future.

About the author:
Drug Testing Info provides detailed information about employee, random, high school, hair, and urine drug testing and drug testing kits. Drug Testing Info is the sister site of Prescription Drugs Addiction Web.

Identifying the PEAK FLORAL STAGE of the plant’s growth is as critical as recognizing male and female plant types.  Making a harvesting error of too soon or too late really diminishes the quality and quantity of your endeavor. 

When you think your plants are ready to be cut, give them another 5 days.  This is a very universal conclusion agreed upon by most of the growers I have followed.  They say this was a hard lesson learned over time.

More…….