Pubdate: Thu, 02 Jun 2016
Source: Portland Mercury (OR)
Column: Cannabuzz
Copyright: 2016 The Portland Mercury
Contact:  http://www.portlandmercury.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1174
Author: Josh Jardine

MY BUNK IS MY COFFIN

It's Easy to Overdo Edibles. Here's Proof.

RECREATIONAL CANNABIS EDIBLES are legal in Oregon starting June 2, 
which is great news. To be honest, I've actually been crafting them 
for recreational and medical use for more than 20 years. I often get 
asked, "Have you ever gotten too high on edibles?" And the answer is: 
Of course-regular readers will recognize impulse control isn't one of 
my strong points.

The real question, though, is: "What's the worst experience someone's 
ever had from eating too many of your special cookies?" That's a long 
list from which to choose.

There was the wedding in Athens, Georgia, that resulted in more than 
150 guests stumbling and falling in the gravel parking lot, as the 
sickening sound of bodies hitting the ground mixed with peals of laughter.

Another wedding in Memphis, Tennessee, in which guests painted the 
elevator walls of the legendary Peabody hotel with vomit after 
ignoring warnings not to mix booze and cookies. (I'm rarely asked to 
attend Southern weddings anymore.)

Sending one of the world's greatest drummers on a daylong excursion 
through the hallways of a gigantic Seattle hotel, trying his keycard 
in every single door-as he was unable to remember his room number and 
too high to be able to form words to seek assistance from the front 
desk (RIP, buddy).

But for an experience that may as well have been a rejected script 
from American Horror Story: Southern Rock, nothing compares to this 
"Tour Bus from Hell" episode.

We were on a particularly long and brutal tour of the South and 
Southwest. A great deal of cannabis was being consumed on the daily, 
starting with fat, hash-laced joints before 7 am, and often ending 
with particularly strong cups of opium tea post-show. (Don't you 
judge.) The night prior to our first day off, I busted out the 
Tupperware with three dozen extra-strong cookies. How strong? A 
quarter of one of these cookies was enough to put a 200-pound man 
into a drooling, six-hour stupor.

I was in the back lounge of the tour bus sitting with the bass 
player. Upon seeing me unpack the goods, she squealed with delight 
and ate an entire cookie. Having eaten handfuls of mushrooms with her 
before, I knew she could handle it. But as we sat chatting, she 
reached into the tub and ate a second one. "I'm really hungry," she 
said through a mouthful of a third, something she repeated while 
eating two more. I went to my bunk with her calling out, "One more, 
and I'm going to bed."

I awoke the next morning to find nine of the cookies gone. One by 
one, the band and crew stumbled from their bunks, eager to enjoy our 
first day off in 12 days. But the bass player was nowhere to be seen. 
Her husband, one of the band's guitarists, didn't seem concerned, 
citing her ability to sleep through earthquakes when home. We went 
about our day.

When 8 pm rolled around, she finally emerged, looking as though she 
was an extra from The Walking Dead. Although the tour bus was parked, 
she stumbled to the front lounge holding on to the walls for dear 
life. She sat down next to me staring at nothing. "Rough night?" I 
asked. She didn't speak for five minutes. When she was finally able 
to form words, this is the story she told.

"I couldn't stop eating cookies. I went to bed feeling pleasantly 
high, and was asleep as soon as I crawled into my bunk. I woke up at 
some point needing to pee. I tried to move my legs to swing out of 
the bunk, but they were frozen solid. Figuring they had fallen 
asleep, I tried to lift my arms to pull myself out. Nope. I was 
completely paralyzed. I figure I would ask [her husband] to help me, 
and that's when I realized I couldn't turn my head or make any 
sounds. I was paralyzed head to toe and completely mute. And then I 
started hallucinating that my bunk was a coffin. I tried to scream a 
few times, but couldn't manage to open my mouth. I laid there in the 
pitch black of the bunk, wondering if I had died and this was how I 
would spend all of eternity."

We all sat silent, horrified. Except for one of the other guitarists, 
who grinned pure evil while holding out the Tupperware. "Cookie, darlin'?"
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom