“Blood Diamond”

I’ve written about stupid names for strains of weed before, but now I think I’ve figured out why stupid names matter. To market weed effectively, the cannabis industry needs names that appeal to the intellect and aesthetics of a 15 year old boy. I smoked weed for the first time on my 15^th Birthday. I think a lot of people start smoking weed at about that age, so the same logic that applies to naming a hip-hop artist or a professional wrestler also applies to naming weed.

You need a name that sounds cool to a 15 year old boy. That’s why we have pot called: “Green Crack,” “God’s Pussy,” and “Chem Dawg.” From that perspective, the latest “hot” strain around here, “Blood Diamond” fits the bill. I would have bought “Blood Diamond” weed when I was 15, and I would have liked the name too. I haven’t smoked any “Blood Diamond” yet, but it gets rave reviews, from everyone except trimmers.

To me, it’s all just “weed.” I’m sure I’d like “Blood Diamond” weed if I smoked some. I like all weed, and most of the weed around here is pretty good. Don’t ask me to tell you which weed is better. If I’m high on good weed, the last thing I want to think about is how this weed compares with the last weed I smoked. I’m high now. That’s what matters.

I think “Blood Diamond” is a poetic name for weed right now. The term “Blood Diamond” was coined for diamonds mined in conflict zones where they fund bloody civil wars. Many brutal conflicts rage in, diamond rich, Central Africa. Warlords use the money they make from mining and selling these diamonds to buy weapons, ammunition and supplies to advance their personal ambitions of wealth and power through violence and bloodshed. The UN Banned the import of diamonds from conflict zones, but the black market has ways around such things, so “Blood Diamonds,” diamonds from Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Angola and a few other countries, still find their way onto young women’s fingers here in the US.

Now “Blood Diamond” marijuana is finding its way into America’s bongs. While “Blood Diamonds” in Sierra Leone finance a bloody civil war fought by child soldiers, “Blood Diamond” weed supplies an army of underage street dealers who risk violence, expulsion from school and jail time, on the front lines of America’s War on Drugs.

In war zones, arms dealers will happily accept payment, in diamonds, for weapons and ammunition, so warlords dig for diamonds to finance insurgencies that terrorize and destabilize fledgling democracies. In Trinity County last week, cops raided a house in which, in addition to the typical, industrial quantities of cannabis, and commercial quantities of hard drugs, authorities found over a hundred firearms and more than 10,000 rounds of ammunition.

Conflict zones have no environmental regulations. In Central Africa, brutal warlords use forced labor to dam rivers, and dig dangerous mines in the riverbeds to find “Blood Diamonds.” Here in Humboldt County, greedy growers clear forests, bulldoze natural habitat and drain salmon streams to grow “Blood Diamond” weed.

“Blood Diamonds” sparkle as bright as diamonds mined in peaceful democracies like Canada, and most diamond dealers have a “don’t ask; don’t tell” policy. The same can be said for the marijuana industry. Cannabis consumers rarely know much about where their marijuana comes from or how it was produced.

“Blood Diamond” is just another meaningless moniker designed to brand cannabis and appeal to prospective 15 year old clients, but it says a lot about the cannabis industry and the War on Drugs with an elegance and sense of irony I really admire. Apparently the product is pretty good too. I can only assume the grower who developed this strain, knows the industry, and the plant, very well indeed. I appreciate his honesty and eloquence.

It’s About the Laundromat

I know a few of the business owners in Garberville, and I even consider a couple of them friends, but when they all get together, it can get ugly, and a few of them make our greed-bag dope yuppies look like Mother Theresa by comparison. I’m not a big fan of the black market marijuana industry, but if you buy a bag of weed from one of our local growers, at least it will get you high. On the other hand, if you try washing your clothes at either of our local laundromats here in SoHum, you’ll pay a premium to use the machines, but your clothes will come out of them dirtier and smellier than when they went in.

Whether you go to the laundromat in Redway or the one in Garberville, it’s the same story. Those machines will ruin your clothes and charge you for the service. I don’t know where she finds those machines, but I’ve never seen weaker, more anemic agitator action in my life, and they just give up if you try to put more than about five socks in one load. You will find no running water at either facility, so if you get laundry soap on your hands, there’s no place to rinse it off. God help you if you need to use a restroom, and the places couldn’t be uglier.

A friend and I were talking. We both live off-grid, and so we both understand the real cost of conventional luxuries. “My washing machine uses a lot of juice.” he said.

“You have a washing machine?” I replied.

“Oh yeah,” he said, “I had to get one. It didn’t matter how much it cost or how much electricity and water it uses, I absolutely had to get one.”

“Why?” I asked.

“I can’t go into that laundromat. I had to stop. I kept getting into fights.” he told me, adding, “I cannot go into that laundromat, either of them, without getting into a fight. I mean, I’m not a violent guy. I could be totally plastered, at a rowdy bar, and I will have no problems, but if I walk into one of those laundromats, stone cold sober, I swear, within fifteen minutes, I’m ready to kill somebody.”

I know how he feels. My partner Amy washes most of our clothes at home, by hand, rather than use those machines. Truth be told, we have no place to wash clothes in Southern Humboldt. Instead, we have two facilities offering coin-operated, wardrobe ruining, anger generators. This we all learn, over time. Pamela Van Meter owns both of them. This petite, elderly woman also owns The Paper Mill, the only copy shop and stationary store in town, and the place where I buy pen refills when I need them.

I would describe Ms. Van Meter as a perfect lady. She always dresses nicely. In the summer, she loves to wear white. I distinctly remember her, strolling down the fairway at Summer Arts and Music Festival, all dressed-up in a crisp, spotless white dress, with a lacy white parasol over her head. She looked great. Many times I’ve seen her stepping out of her spotlessly clean white luxury SUV in a spotless white pantsuit. You’d think she knew something about doing laundry.

She knows something about doing business though. I’m sure those laundromats help her “clean-up” more than they help her customers clean anything. She knows that she’s got us over a barrel, so she lets her attendants catch the shit, while she skims the cream. You can’t help but feel the contempt for the customer when you’re in there.

Even if you arrived at the laundromat in a good mood, by the time you’ve pushed your quarters into the machine, spent an hour or so in the bleak, depressing interior, staring at the cracked plaster walls, and then noticed that big oily stain across the front of your new shirt, the big oily stain that wasn’t there when you put the shirt in the machine, your mood has changed. You could walk into the laundromat as happy as Spongebob Squarepants, but by the time you leave, you feel like Mad Max.

When a merchant sets up a vibe like that, it’s bound to reverberate through town in various ways. Imagine some tourists, who, after emerging from two weeks of backpacking in the King Range, spend their first hour back in civilization, at one of our laundromats having the clothes they hope to clean, ruined, while they wait. They’re pissed about the big oily stains. They want to wash the laundry soap off of their hands. They need to use the bathroom, and they can’t wait to get the hell out of that place.

They’re not happy. If they go to a restaurant after that, they’ve already forgiven about as much as they’re willing to forgive for one day. If the restaurant screws-up their order, there’s going to be hell to pay. It becomes a vicious cycle, as the employees who absorb all of this dissatisfaction, become dissatisfied with their jobs, and the more dissatisfaction people feel, the more hostile they become.

I recall remarking to my partner as we drove through Garberville for the very first time, almost 20 years ago now. “This seems like a very sad little town.” I said. I don’t think it’s gotten any happier. Happy people spend more money, but once you’ve been ripped-off, you’re out for revenge. In this way, a few greedy merchants can suck the goodwill right out of a town.

Personally, I think the Garberville/Redway Chamber of Commerce would do much better to focus on solving these kinds of problems within the business community, rather than scapegoating and harassing the people who live here. The new No Loitering, No Panhandling, No Smoking signs that just went up all over town don’t make the place any classier. If anything, those signs make me want to take up smoking, just so I can lurk menacingly on the sidewalk, in my stained shirt, blowing smoke in people’s faces while I beg them for spare change.

Keep this in mind. If you have an unpleasant encounter with an obnoxious person in dirty clothes on your next visit to Garberville. Don’t take it personally. It’s not about you; It’s about the laundromat.

A Milestone, Not a Millstone

According to WordPress, this is the 400th post here at lygsbtd. I may not always be funny, but at least I’m persistent. In fact, it’s been so long since this blog was funny that people have begun to take me seriously. I appreciate the attention that my recent guest editorials at LOCO have brought me and my little endeavor here, but I’ve written better posts.

Two Sohums comes to mind as a recent example of what I wish I had for you every week, or maybe Drugs and Razors Don’t Mix or perhaps New Cannabis Strains for 2014. I know there’s a really funny book about SoHum buried in here, and I should dig it out, polish it up, and find someone to publish it. Instead, week after week, I keep racking my brains to come up with something new, to keep you coming back for more.

Until now. Today, in honor of my 400th post here at lygsbtd, I say, “To hell with my regular readers, I need a week off!” by presenting to you this rerun of a funny post from a while back.

A Summertime Tour of Garberville, CA

Well it’s summertime in Garberville again, which means it’s hot enough that you can fry an egg on the sidewalk, if you don’t mind a little dog-doo and a few cigarette butts in it. Still, it’s the best deal you are likely to find on breakfast in Garberville, so bring a spatula. Yes summertime is the time of year where tourists flock to SoHum in droves to see the highest priced gasoline in the entire country.

Tourists often find our local culture just a little odd, and you can see the puzzlement on their faces as they wander the streets wondering: “Does everyone in this town smoke cigarettes?”, “Why, of all of the dog breeds in the world, does everyone here have a pit bull?”, “How come every single parking space in town is full, but all of the stores are empty?”, “Did all of these people come to Garberville just to stand on the sidewalk and smoke?”

I wonder these things myself sometimes, but I know that there’s more to Garberville than brand new pickup trucks, second-hand smoke, and ugly, ill-mannered dogs. No, there’s something special about Garberville that you just don’t find everywhere, at least you won’t find it anywhere between Willitts and Eureka. . That is, a bathroom. Since Garberville is the only town with services between Willitts, about a hundred miles South of Garberville, and Eureka, about seventy miles North, damn near everyone going North or South has to stop in Garberville or risk kidney failure.

Yes, Garberville comes as blessed relief for many road weary travelers, and since every bathroom in Garberville is clearly marked “For Customers Only”, they all feel obligated to spend a dollar or two while they are here, even if they had the good sense to fill-up in Willitts, and know that gas will be at least a few cents cheaper in Eureka.

But Garberville is so much more than a key chained to a foot and a half long piece of PVC pipe that is teeming with bacteria. While you are here, you might as well see the sights, and experience the historical significance, aesthetic highlights and cultural diversity that makes Garberville so unique.

First on our tour, close to the center of Garberville, just West of the only stop sign in town, you’ll find the historic Cadillac Wok Chinese Restaurant. The Cadillac Wok has been open for more than fifty years at that same location, and so far as I know, no one has ever eaten there. Perhaps you’ll be the first.

Just across the street from Cadillac Wok, you’ll see the Garberville Post Office. These have become increasingly scarce in Humboldt County, and who knows how long the one in Garberville will remain open, but most days you can still stand in line behind dreadlocked twentysomethings buying multiple thousand dollar money orders with stacks of ragged bills, just like in the old days.

Cut through the back parking lot of the Post Office, and you’ll see what remains of the last full-service gas station in town. Ironically, the old Ed’s Full-Serve was closed down because its restroom failed to meet specifications of the Americans With Disabilities Act. The station closed despite the fact that many disabled Americans really appreciated the service of having someone pump gas for them.

Across the street from the old gas station, you’ll see one the the most popular skate boarding spots in Garberville. You can find the shredded kneecap skin of dozens of local youths embedded in the concrete there, just under the retaining wall at the end of the long sloping parking lot belonging to the Sentry grocery store.

Just North of the skateboarding wall, you will see a windmill, and metal sculpture of a horse, directly beneath the windmill, you will find a barrel full of water that the windmill circulates.

If you stare into that barrel long enough, you will see golden coy fish swimming in it. They say nothing’s easier than shooting fish in a barrel. Don’t try it, those fish are armed, but they won’t mess with you if you don’t mess with them.

The horse sculpture and windmill stand next to a coffee kiosk called Geddy Up. The interesting thing about Geddy Up is that the floor on the inside of the kiosk is significantly higher than the sidewalk outside. Because of this, when you order coffee there, you find yourself talking directly to the belly button of the attractive young female barista inside, who is always wearing low rise jeans and a halter top. Maybe that’s why it’s called Geddy Up. The belly buttons make good coffee, but that’s mostly beside the point.

Just a half a block North of the coffee bellys, you’ll find a man with dark hair, glasses and mustache smoking a cigarette. He’s been there as long as I can remember. He occasionally says “Hi”, and he’s always smoking.

Just downwind from the smoking man, you’ll find Garberville’s newest eatery: The Healthy Choice, a great place to grab a salad or smoothy while you enjoy all of that second-hand smoke.

A little way North of the smoking man, you will come to The Hemp Connection. Here you’ll find the latest hemp fashions, smoking accessories, and the latest issue of High Times magazine. You’ll also find another smoking man, 4:20 Dave. Somehow, I find his smoke much less offensive.

Continuing North on Redwood Drive, you’ll pass the North Valley Bank. This bank is significant because every dog in Garberville relieves itself on this stretch of sidewalk. The bank has posted little doggie doo bags, and signs encouraging people to clean up after their dog, but mostly the signs distract pedestrians who read the clever signs, and then step right into a steaming pile.

Across the street from the steaming pile, you will see the Town Clock. Beneath the clock, you will find The Town Clock Square. Town Clock Square contains a shop where you can get a hoodie that says “Humboldt” on it, another shop to buy smoking accessories, and a place where you can get a haircut while you shop for a gun.

North of town Clock Square, past the Garberville Theatre, you’ll come to The Branding Iron Saloon, which features Lotto drawings every five minutes and a pole where local women practice their pole dancing skills. The Branding Iron Saloon is a place for serious drinkers, but the pole is strictly for amateurs.

Beyond the Branding Iron Saloon, at the far North end of town, you will find the only patch of shade in all of Garberville, in a controversial patch of greenery known as the Demulling Memorial Grove. Because the Demulling Memorial Grove is the only green and shady place in town, people tend to congregate there. Because people tend to congregate there, many people want it shut down.

Just South of town Clock Square, you’re back at gas station alley. Whether you choose Shell, Chevron, or Union 76, you can rest assured that you are getting the most expensive gasoline that you’ll find anywhere in America.

I hope you enjoy your visit to Garberville, and come again soon.

How E-Cigarettes and E-Joints Can Save the World

Lately, I hear a lot about e-cigarettes in the news. I’ve also noticed them popping up for sale in our local gas stations and grocery stores. Even though I’m not a cigarette smoker, anything involving both electronics and drugs, naturally arouses my interest.

I’ve only seen a couple of people using e-cigarettes, but I find them much less unpleasant to endure than regular cigarettes. I can see how e-cigarettes could do a lot to improve relations between smokers and non-smokers. E-cigarettes might even make the exiled smoker, the lone individual standing outside, under the eves, a thing of the past.

The price of e-cigarettes seems like the sticking point for most smokers. I haven’t done the math, but the device costs more than a couple of packs of smokes, and the refills for it don’t come cheap either. It already costs a lot to smoke cigarettes these days, and most of my friends who smoke, hand roll, with the cheapest tobacco they can get, if they don’t pick up cigarette butts they find on the sidewalk. There’s another problem e-cigarettes might solve; no more cigarette butts on the sidewalk, at least if they can bring the price of e-cigarettes down to a price more smokers can afford.

E-cigarettes look kind of cool too. The one I saw close up, had a blue LED that glowed bright whenever the smoker took a drag from it. I love blue LEDs.

I’ll bet you can get them with color-changing LEDs. I’m sure you could bling them out in a million different ways. You could get them made out of 24K gold or platinum. They’ll have pink ones for girls,

..and black, or camo-colored ones for guys.

They’ll even have ones that look just like a classic Marlboro for old geezers who still remember what real cigarettes looked like.

Even so, I’m not about to take them up. First, I’m too cheap. Second, there’s really no “cool” way to announce that you have a drug problem, and third, I don’t need another drug problem. Nicotine and I never saw eye to eye. I tried it back when I was a teenager. I gave it a chance, and it didn’t do anything for me. If only these e-cigs had something I liked in them…

Now I understand that that you can get e-joints. That is, an e-cigarette loaded with THC instead of nicotine. A new shop just opened up on the plaza in Arcata that specializes in just such devices. I love good old-fashioned marijuana buds, but I think these new e-joints, or “vaporizer pens” as I’ve heard them called, generically, could be a real game-changer in the marijuana industry, as we move inexorably towards legalization.

Right now, the biggest bottleneck to scaling up the whole marijuana industry, is trimming. Currently, the market demands manicured sinsemilla buds, which require a lot of manual labor. It takes about an hour to trim an ounce of buds, a really proficient trimmer might be able to trim an ounce and a quarter per hour, either way, there’s at least 12 hours of excruciatingly dull, manual labor in every pound of marijuana bud, just in trimming alone.

Several companies make automated trimming machines, but thus far, none of them produce a product that can compare to hand trimmed buds. With the high prices of black-market marijuana, every gram has to be marketable, and a poor trim job can break the deal, so trimming machines have not become very popular with growers.

Sinsemilla buds also have a very limited shelf life, and must be handled with care. Like potato chips they can become stale, or get crunched down to worthless powder. The way I see it, e-joints can solve all of these problems, and more.

Back in the early “90s in Boston, when I worked for the Mass. Cannabis Reform Coalition, I met a guy, I can’t remember his name, who owns a patent for a method of extracting pure THC from raw cannabis herb.

He described a future world in which he was a multimillionaire, and everyone “smoked” these little electronic devices that would deliver a precise dosage of pure THC, along with whatever flavor you might enjoy.

At the time, I thought “Fuck that! I don’t want some corporation getting between me and my marijuana. I want to smoke the marijuana that I grow in my own back-yard, not some soulless corporate cannabis extract.” Today, I feel differently. Today, I think that guy is a genius. Think about it.

On the production side, the difference between e-joints and sinsemilla buds is like the difference between Heinz 57 Ketchup and fresh heirloom tomatoes. E-joints offer these advantages:
1. You can make extract from the whole plant, male or female, mature or immature. Growers wouldn’t lose the THC contained in shake, trim, leaf or stem. I’ll bet they could even extract clean THC from moldy bud. All cannabis contains some THC, so probably any cannabis could be made into “fuel” for e-joints.
2. Extraction would completely bypass the need for trimming, and greatly reduce the cost of production. A single industrial extraction facility could replace an army of trimmers.
3. Subjective qualities like aroma and flavor, as well as aesthetic flaws, like spindly buds or brown leaves make no difference in an extract. Manufacturers could produce a very consistent e-joint product, as consistent as a Budweiser or a Big Mac.
4. Cannabis extract for e-joints would be easy to store and transport, vastly simplifying national distribution.

On the consumer side the advantages are obvious:
1. No joints to roll
2. No lighter to burn yourself with
3. No smoke, which means no carcinogenic combustion products
4. No smell
5. No ashes
6. No roaches
7. No gooey sticky resin clogged pipes
8. No bongwater
9. No coughing
10. No raw throat
11. Most importantly, e-joints should bring down the cost of getting high. Around here I hear a lot of talk about “boutique growers” serving “marijuana connoisseurs,” but in the open market, a lot of consumers want a product of reliable quality at a reasonable price. Marijuana consumers have been denied that for far too long, and these e-joints just might be the ticket to a mass-produced, nationally distributed, recreational cannabis product with a price based on the economy of scale.

I might still prefer to smoke my own home-grown marijuana rather than the soulless corporate substitute, but e-joints, complicated little gadgets though they are, might simplify the process of getting high for everyone.

My younger, hipper friends are all down with e-joints. They all have vaporizers already. They see e-joints as a major advance in stoner technology, the wave of the future. They say vaporizing is cleaner and healthier than smoking, and that it gets you just as stoned. I’m sure they’d all embrace e-joints, at the right price point, even here in Humboldt County.

Yes, I think these “vaporizer pens” could change the world. For one thing, it won’t be long before no one knows how to roll a cigarette anymore. Imagine it. People will have to go to The Haight in San Fransisco, which by then, (because nobody could afford the rent to live there anymore) will have been turned into a theme park for Hippie nostalgia,. It will be like Colonial Williamsburg, except that instead of having people in period costumes making tallow candles and shoeing horses, they’ll have actors wearing wigs, grannie glasses and tie-dye t-shirts, show people how they used to roll joints in the old days.

By that time everyone will have an e-cig of one form or another. They’ll have e-crack, e-meth, and e-heroin. They’ll have e-MDMA and e-LSD. They’ll have e-Prozac for mom and e-Adderall for the kids. They’ll even have drug-free e-flavor for people who don’t take drugs but want to enjoy a refreshing calorie-free vapor-snack.

Thanks to e-cigarettes the future will look like Humphrey Bogart meets Obi Wan Kenobe.

We’ll all have our own little rechargeable, chrome plated, illuminated pacifiers to fondle endlessly, and no one will have to stand outside to get their fix anymore. Doesn’t that sound like brighter e-tomorrow? Now I think I’ll just unplug my e-joint and enjoy a celebratory e-toke.

Ashtrays and the Evolution of Smoking Culture in America

Ashtrays and the Evolution of Smoking Culture in America

I can’t believe how rapidly smoking culture has evolved, just in my lifetime. When I was a kid, my parents both smoked cigarettes… indoors. Damn near every table in the house had an ashtray on it, some had two. They had fancy ashtrays, for special occasions, and they had everyday ashtrays. They even had extra ashtrays in a drawer in case they had company.

I remember that you used to be able to buy ashtrays in stores, and they had lots of different kinds. They had cheap disposable ashtrays stamped from foil,

nice expensive ashtrays that looked like they belonged on an executive’s desk,

glass ashtrays,

metal ashtrays,

ashtrays carved from solid rock,

and an amazing assortment of ceramic ashtrays.

These things really existed. I distinctly remember ashtrays,

avocado-green boomerang-shaped ashtrays,

round mosaic-tiled ashtrays, as big as a dinner plate, that weighed at least ten lbs,

stacks of brightly-colored mod-looking ashtrays manufactured from some sort of polymer resin.

I know I remember ashtrays.

You would see one of these things, and you immediately knew what it was. You wouldn’t dream of using it for anything else. Even if it was brand new, people would look at you like you had lost your mind if you decided to, for instance, eat pudding out of an ashtray.

The intended purpose of an ashtray was to provide a non-flammable place to rest a lit cigarette, a suitable receptacle for flicked ashes, and a surface onto which a cigarette butt could be safely snuffed out. Ashtrays came in a bewildering array styles because people wanted their ashtrays to match the decor of the rooms those ashtrays would inhabit.

Do you remember ashtrays? I know there are young people out there right now thinking “ash trays?”, like they never saw those two words combined before. They have no idea what I’m talking about. They’ve never seen an ashtray, not even on TV. If you wanted to show a kid an ashtray, where would you go? If you wanted an ashtray for yourself, where would you go to buy one?

The disappearance of ashtrays, coupled with the number of people I’ve seen sitting under the eves of their own homes tells me that very few people smoke cigarettes indoors anymore. If you can’t do it in stores, bars or restaurants, and nowadays people won’t even do it in their own homes, cigarette smoking seems to have become an exclusively outdoor activity.

I’m mostly happy about this. I don’t smoke cigarettes, and I have become much more sensitive to cigarette smoke. I can’t imagine living with someone who insisted on smoking cigarettes indoors today, but I also feel for smokers. It must be a drag to have to excuse yourself from a warm cozy room to go stand outside in the cold, rain, snow, wind, heat, whatever, with nothing but a coffee can full of sand for your butts, like some kind of exile. That’s harsh.

At the same time, marijuana smoking has become much more accepted. As a result, you can find boutiques all over this country that cater to marijuana smokers. You’ll find these shops stocked to the gills with a dizzying array of new smoking products ranging from vaporizers and dabbing nails, to hookahs and bongs to bubblers, hand pipes and rolling papers, no ashtrays, oddly enough, but tons of other smoking accessories.

I don’t know what pot smokers are supposed to do with the ashes that result from smoking marijuana, but the free market has provided them with a million new ways to turn marijuana into ash. After that, pot smokers are pretty much on their own.

From the look of all of this new smoking gear, nearly everyone who smokes marijuana, does it indoors. Half of the new vaporizers plug into a wall outlet. Not many of those out in the woods. Nobody takes a glass bong the size of a bassoon to go get high in the park. Giant, conspicuous smoking apparatuses like that, stay at home, in a room.

I’m sure that part of the reason people smoke pot at home is the legal environment. Because of marijuana prohibition, pot smokers have gotten used to smoking in secret, so they do it privately, behind closed doors. Even now that two states have made smoking marijuana a legal recreational activity, both Washington and Colorado still prohibit marijuana use in public. It seems that even as legalization takes hold, considerable social pressure remains to keep marijuana smoking an indoor activity.

Today, we see cigarette smokers outside under the eves with their cancer sticks and their can of sand, while marijuana smokers sit comfy and warm in their blacklit bedrooms with their Rube Goldberg meets Dr. Seuss smoking contraptions,

and maybe an old saucer that they drop their ashes into, or perhaps a potted plant. I use an oyster shell, personally. I don’t know what other people do.

It’s got to be rough for people who smoke both marijuana and cigarettes. They smoke some pot, but then they’ll have to step outside for a cigarette. They’ll have to ask someone to hold their contraption, go stand under the eve, smoke their butt, come back in, enjoy a few tokes, then it’s back out under the eves again. These people need revolving doors, and when was the last time you saw one of those.

It kind of reminds me of segregation. I know it’s not the same thing by a long shot, but cigarette smokers used to rule the world. They wouldn’t even ask, “Do you mind if I smoke?” before they lit up. The air belonged to them, and if you didn’t like it, too bad. Businesses put ashtrays everywhere, just to remind cigarette smokers that they were welcome to fill the establishment with foul smelling fumes, and free matches, bearing the company logo were always close by.

Now cigarette smokers stand out in the cold like dogs who don’t know how to behave indoors, while marijuana smokers sit on the sofa in climate controlled comfort, fondling their preposterous pyrex party pipes, looking around for someplace to dump their freshly cashed bowl. My how the tables have turned, but I’ll bet you won’t find an ashtray on any of them.

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A Summertime Tour of Garberville, CA

 

A Summertime Tour of Garberville, CA

Well it’s summertime in Garberville again, which means it’s hot enough that you can fry an egg on the sidewalk, if you don’t mind a little dog-doo and a few cigarette butts in it. Still, it’s the best deal you are likely to find on breakfast in Garberville, so bring a spatula. Yes summertime is the time of year where tourists flock to SoHum in droves to see the highest priced gasoline in the entire country.

Tourists often find our local culture just a little odd, and you can see the puzzlement on their faces as they wander the streets wondering: “Does everyone in this town smoke cigarettes?”, “Why, of all of the dog breeds in the world, does everyone here have a pit bull?”, “How come every single parking space in town is full, but all of the stores are empty?”, “Did all of these people come to Garberville just to stand on the sidewalk and smoke?”

I wonder these things myself sometimes, but I know that there’s more to Garberville than brand new pickup trucks, second-hand smoke, and ugly, ill-mannered dogs. No, there’s something special about Garberville that you just don’t find everywhere, at least you won’t find it anywhere between Willitts and Eureka. . That is, a bathroom. Since Garberville is the only town with services between Willitts, about a hundred miles South of Garberville, and Eureka, about seventy miles North, damn near everyone going North or South has to stop in Garberville or risk kidney failure.

Yes, Garberville comes as blessed relief for many road weary travelers, and since every bathroom in Garberville is clearly marked “For Customers Only”, they all feel obligated to spend a dollar or two while they are here, even if they had the good sense to fill-up in Willitts, and know that gas will be at least a few cents cheaper in Eureka.

But Garberville is so much more than a key chained to a foot and a half long piece of PVC pipe that is teeming with bacteria. While you are here, you might as well see the sights, and experience the historical significance, aesthetic highlights and cultural diversity that makes Garberville so unique.

First on our tour, close to the center of Garberville, just West of the only stop sign in town, you’ll find the historic Cadillac Wok Chinese Restaurant. The Cadillac Wok has been open for more than fifty years at that same location, and so far as I know, no one has ever eaten there. Perhaps you’ll be the first.

Just across the street from Cadillac Wok, you’ll see the Garberville Post Office. These have become increasingly scarce in Humboldt County, and who knows how long the one in Garberville will remain open, but most days you can still stand in line behind dreadlocked twentysomethings buying multiple thousand dollar money orders with stacks of ragged bills, just like in the old days.

Cut through the back parking lot of the Post Office, and you’ll see what remains of the last full-service gas station in town. Ironically, the old Ed’s Full-Serve was closed down because its restroom failed to meet specifications of the Americans With Disabilities Act. The station closed despite the fact that many disabled Americans really appreciated the service of having someone pump gas for them.

Across the street from the old gas station, you’ll see one the the most popular skate boarding spots in Garberville. You can find the shredded kneecap skin of dozens of local youths embedded in the concrete there, just under the retaining wall at the end of the long sloping parking lot belonging to the Sentry grocery store.

Just North of the skateboarding wall, you will see a windmill, and metal sculpture of a horse, directly beneath the windmill, you will find a barrel full of water that the windmill circulates.

If you stare into that barrel long enough, you will see golden coy fish swimming in it. They say nothing’s easier than shooting fish in a barrel. Don’t try it, those fish are armed, but they won’t mess with you if you don’t mess with them.

The horse sculpture and windmill stand next to a coffee kiosk called Geddy Up. The interesting thing about Geddy Up is that the floor on the inside of the kiosk is significantly higher than the sidewalk outside. Because of this, when you order coffee there, you find yourself talking directly to the belly button of the attractive young female barista inside, who is always wearing low rise jeans and a halter top. Maybe that’s why it’s called Geddy Up. The belly buttons make good coffee, but that’s mostly beside the point.

Just a half a block North of the coffee bellys, you’ll find a man with dark hair, glasses and mustache smoking a cigarette. He’s been there as long as I can remember. He occasionally says “Hi”, and he’s always smoking.

Just downwind from the smoking man, you’ll find Garberville’s newest eatery: The Healthy Choice, a great place to grab a salad or smoothy while you enjoy all of that second-hand smoke.

A little way North of the smoking man, you will come to The Hemp Connection. Here you’ll find the latest hemp fashions, smoking accessories, and the latest issue of High Times magazine. You’ll also find another smoking man, 4:20 Dave. Somehow, I find his smoke much less offensive.

Continuing North on Redwood Drive, you’ll pass the North Valley Bank. This bank is significant because every dog in Garberville relieves itself on this stretch of sidewalk. The bank has posted little doggie doo bags, and signs encouraging people to clean up after their dog, but mostly the signs distract pedestrians who read the clever signs, and then step right into a steaming pile.

Across the street from the steaming pile, you will see the Town Clock. Beneath the clock, you will find The Town Clock Square. Town Clock Square contains a shop where you can get a hoodie that says “Humboldt” on it, another shop to buy smoking accessories, and a place where you can get a haircut while you shop for a gun.

North of town Clock Square, past the Garberville Theatre, you’ll come to The Branding Iron Saloon, which features Lotto drawings every five minutes and a pole where local women practice their pole dancing skills. The Branding Iron Saloon is a place for serious drinkers, but the pole is strictly for amateurs.

Beyond the Branding Iron Saloon, at the far North end of town, you will find the only patch of shade in all of Garberville, in a controversial patch of greenery known as the Demulling Memorial Grove. Because the Demulling Memorial Grove is the only green and shady place in town, people tend to congregate there. Because people tend to congregate there, many people want it shut down.

Just South of town Clock Square, you’re back at gas station alley. Whether you choose Shell, Chevron, or Union 76, you can rest assured that you are getting the most expensive gasoline that you’ll find anywhere in America.

I hope you enjoy your visit to Garberville, and come again soon.

In the Zone… On the Humboldt Co. General Plan Update

In The Zone

(on the Humboldt Co. GPU)

 

Can you think of anything more boring than the Humboldt Co. General Plan Update. Tonight, on KMUD’s newest and dullest talk show, The Hum CPR Show, we got yet another tiresome talking-to on this tedious topic.

We’ve debated the General Plan Update for about 7 years already, wasting hundred of hours of airtime and enough column inches of newsprint to reach the moon, and we aren’t any closer to agreement on it than we were 7 years ago.

Listening to developers, real estate agents and land-owners try to sound righteous about what they do to the land out here can really turn your stomach. Hearing the county try to justify their outrageous permit fees, as a health and safety issue, when they refuse to permit composting toilets, or greywater systems of any kind, will make you choke as well.

None of the people in the debate seem to have a clue about how to live on planet Earth. None of the proposed plans really address Humboldt County’s housing needs. None of the proposed plans will allow anyone in Humboldt County, the opportunity to live anything like a sustainable lifestyle, and none of the proposed plans will enjoy any more voluntary compliance than the current General Plan. As long as they continue to outlaw sustainable living, only outlaws will live sustainably.

The General Plan Update is bound to fail, and fail spectacularly, for a few good reasons. For one, roughly 2,000 people in Humboldt County go without housing or sanitary facilities of any kind. Every day, that number continues to grow. The GPU continues to ignore the needs of this population, and as a result, they will continue to ignore the zoning restrictions of the General Plan, by sleeping, living and relieving themselves whenever and wherever they can.

Tens of thousands of Humboldt County residents, including many, many, landowners live in unpermitted structures, trailers or mobile homes in violation of current General Plan zoning restrictions, but the county lacks resources to prosecute these cases. Just because the county adopts a new General Plan, doesn’t mean they will ever get the money to prosecute these cases in the future.

Finally, since most of what the Planning Department does, is respond to people’s complaints about their neighbors. And since most of those complaints have less to do with health and safety than aesthetics, prejudice and personal disputes, it seems to me that the best thing to do, is close the whole thing down. Stop wasting the taxpayer’s money on petty, vindictive complaints by people who cynically use the County Planning Department to harass their neighbors.

Since the process isn’t working, won’t work, and won’t help, it ought to be more entertaining, and it ought to, at least superficially, reflect what really happens on the ground in Humboldt County. So, I offer these:

New Zoning Designations for the

Humboldt County General Plan Update

 

First, a few desperately needed and long overdue, zoning designations:

 

CMR – Commercial Masquerading as Residential, describes those neighborhoods full of “homes” with bicycles and swingsets in the yard, and laundry on the clothesline, but no one lives inside but marijuana plants and spider-mites.

 

PLR – Parking Lot, Residential These days lots of people live in their vehicle. From converted school buses to “house-bicycles” people, often entire families, have pressed all kinds of vehicles into their primary residence. Still, they all need a place to park for the night. Isn’t it time they had a zone of their own?

 

UBR – Under Bridge, Residential Some cities already issue permits, for a fee, allowing very low income people to use the prime real estate beneath highway overpasses as their primary residence. Can Humboldt afford to ignore this revenue stream?

 

DFR – Debris Field, Residential Many of the homesteads in SoHum contain not a single permitted structure. At first look, many do not appear to include a single habitable space, just acres of junk cars, rubbish and debris, but people live there.

DFC – Debris Field, Commercial Many of Humboldt County’s most profitable businesses operate out of the most squalid surroundings. Humboldt County’s economic engine has never been exactly clean.

OLG – On Line Ghetto Block after block of towering concrete housing projects full of 8’x8′ cells, each containing a bed, a toilet and a high-speed internet connection with unlimited bandwidth.

The following “specialty zones” will help foster harmony in special neighborhoods catering to the diversity of Humboldt County lifestyles.

CCL – Competitive Christmas Lights Won’t it be so much easier to decide who has the most impressive display when all of the Christmas light fanatics live in the same neighborhood.

YMCA – Yoga, Massage, Crystals and Acupuncture This zone allows the listed establishments, plus vegan eateries and tea houses, no cafes.

DD + EP – Dangerous Dogs and Exotic Pets Why not put all the pit-bulls in the same neighborhood with the idiots who keep tigers, chimps and pythons.

BYOB – Bring Your Own Birds Backyard chickens, ducks, geese pigeons, flamingos, falcons and peacocks all have their appeal, but they also create a special burden on a neighborhood. In this zone, they can squawk, honk, crow and shit whenever and wherever they please.

CG – Compulsive Gardeners Are you sick and tired of neighbors who can’t just leave the fucking dirt alone? I know I sure am, but they just keep digging it up and planting shit in it. Soon their whole place becomes an overgrown, water-sucking jungle, and they start dumping their excess zucchini and tomatoes on your doorstep. Get them out of your hair by giving them their own zone where they can plow, till and weed to their heart’s content, and they can let their vegetables rot in their own fridge.

DYM – Dope Yuppie Mansion A zone for the successful dope yuppies among us, where they can build the kind of ostentatious country home that doesn’t belong in Connecticut either.

PS – Pot Squat This zone is for all of the substandard housing, adjacent to commercial marijuana operations, occupied by otherwise unemployed tenants.

RHH – Redneck Hell Hole The place to see NASCAR decals, confederate flags and Calvin peeing on stuff. Cars on blocks, refrigerators on the porch and motorcycle repair in the living room are all accepted in this zone.

HA+D – Hanging Around and Drinking Always a popular activity here in Humboldt County, now people will have an acceptable zone to do it in.

SS – Smoking Section Smokers really take it on the chin lately. I see them cowering under the eves in the rain, outside the back door, fondling their butts. Shouldn’t they have a zone where they can all commit slow suicide together.

M+M – Musicians and Meth fiends. Both of these groups tend to keep odd hours and make a lot of racket.  Why not zone them together?

DPS – Discarded Potting Soil This zone designates new land created by the accumulation of discarded potting soil.

Zones for the dregs of society. Even the most contemptible members of our community need someplace to live

SOF – Sex-Offender Friendly With so many people returning from prison with release orders that forbid them from living withing 1000 ft. of schools, parks and playgrounds, shouldn’t the county designate a zone to accommodate them.

UWB – Uptight White Blight For those obnoxious people who think they should be able to dictate what their neighbor looks like, what their home looks like, and what they do with it. Even child molesters and rapists deserve better neighbors than these. By establishing this zone, they can all spy on and out-conform each other without disturbing the vibrant diversity of people and lifestyles that makes up the rest of our community.

Are you “zoned out” on the Humboldt County GPU yet?  I know I am.