Wednesday, August 14, 2024

The Mushroom Diaries - vol. 28


 It's been well documented here at the lounge that i have absolutely no use for religion, particularly western religions, mind you i don't view many eastern "religions" as religion but more philosophies, in particular Buddhism and it's many forms (something i've stolen from Alan Watts) and while i read a lot of that philosophy i still don't prescribe to any specific one, years ago after much dwelling on the subject i narrowed the meaning of existence down to one sentence, the one commandment if you will, don't be an asshole, or as much as possible don't be an asshole... pretty much sums it up... honestly like most western religions i make it up as a go along or maybe the reality is i'm much closer to the views of Carl Sagan when i discuss "religion" in the fact if by god or religion one means the natural world, the wind and sea, fire and air, the periodic table of elements, chemistry, organic chemistry, the vast and spectacular universe, then yes count me in, we are all born of stars and to those stars someday we will return... (though full disclosure i am and ordained Dudeist priest...)  

Speaking of organic chemistry... the beauty of things always brings me back to those lovely bits of fungus which allow us to tap into parts of our brains and consciousness which seem to bring us closer to the middle of those stars of which we are born, opening doors to things we haven't developed the ability to tap into yet... as i skip towards the void i think about it now and then, one can't help but ponder their mortality as the days roll by, not in a "i'm scared to die" way but in the fact that i know it's out there and i know it's coming and that's okay, it makes me appreciate the here and now more and understand that's really all i have, to live here and now, to try and not be a fuck-up though the relative success of that statement can be debated greatly most likely varying on when and who one asks.... and while we all must traverse each day and the mundanity it brings i've learned not to really think about it, each moment is a lovely thing, like sitting here and typing and listening to cats purr and the rain, drinking a cup of coffee, thinking of a song i heard and humming a tune in my head... watching the boyos i know i've done some things right and made some mistakes but i also realize i have to let them do what they're going to do, to let them succeed and fail on their own, not that i don't try and guide them but that ultimately we all live our own lives and must accept and own what we do... that while i can try and pass on some sort of knowledge or wisdom like young people they'll most likely shrug it off only to remember it years later and think, damn, the old man was trying to tell me something helpful... (how do i know this? cuz i've had those epiphanies thinking about the things my father told me, not that any of it is special, it's the circle of life as the cartoon movie says...) but back to the mushroom... 

The internet if for the most part a vast and enormous wasteland of dog shit... social media is an even bigger pile of dog shit with the added bonus of being put in a bag and lit on fire, a vast majority of the "content" put on these mediums amount to nothing more than seconds and minutes and hours of one's life being wasted "doom scrolling", i mean fucking hell the name says it all, doom scrolling... and yet here i sit on the oldest of the platforms, the blog, typing away knowing full well that all these posts are much too long for any modern citizen to read, that it takes a special sort of weirdo to actually read a whole post on the lounge (and hopefully enjoy it or get something out of it)... yet every now and then something pops up on the old interweb that's useful... don't get me wrong, i spend a fair amount of time online researching books and music that i love as well as getting sucked into the commerce side of it, either trying to find those books and records or occasionally jumping to the other side and selling things instead of tossing then into the landfill... to be honest i'm nothing more than a hippie in grunge clothing and i fret every time i must drag the garbage cans out to the curb... but let's stick to the path before i get lost in the woods here... 

Our hero has stumbled upon a site that is selling mushrooms... and not the sort that one puts on a salad but the one our hero has been known to take while laying on his couch in a dark room... now with the inordinate amount of scams perpetrated on the web i did my research.... or as much as i could... the site kept popping up on one of those social media cesspools that i peruse under an alias mainly to avoid all the people i've known, i kept checking the comments and seeing if these were real people or some elaborate site set up to steal bank info, i read all the info on the site, read the comments that stated that regardless of what one thought it was legit and that people actually got what they paid for, some even posted pics in the comment section and a few explained the company was exploiting a loophole in the system (so get while the gettins' good)... another interesting fact was that they took credit cards... being a med card holder i know that cannabis dispensaries can't take credit cards due to the fact weed isn't technically legal in the federal sense, it's all cash or debit card, but this place took credit cards, which one savvy commentor pointed out meant it was somewhat risk free as the credit card company would reimburse you if you got scammed... of course that didn't ease the paranoia that crept in late at night when i was stoned after i placed my first order... in fact i had already worked out my line of defense should the fuzz show up at my door, the ignorance is bliss/ banking issue defense... basically stating that i thought it must be legal cuz they took credit cards and dispensaries didn't and boy oh boy i would never do a thing like that if i knew it wasn't on the up and up... i'd smile and point to my spotless record and apologize, i  know how the system works and figured at best it would be a stern warning and at worst a slap on the wrist...  

As for the site? it's brilliant, yes the prices are a little high but as has been pointed out one is paying for a service... and my oh my, they have 5 or 6 different strains of boomers, the Golden Teachers, Cambodians, Puerto Ricans, Albino Penis Envy (super strong) and something that may just be the greatest invention since fire... they have taken the magic and put it into a gel tab, meaning no horrible taste, a little easier on the stomach, i read the few reviews as this was a new item and decided hmmm, why not? they were a bit more expensive than the run of the mill boomer but sometimes one must treat themselves... one pill is apparently equal to one gram and so when they arrived i was like a kid on Chrimbo morning, i couldn't wait to try them... and so at the first opportunity, see the night i got them, i took one cuz as the old saying goes, you can't take less but you can always take more... and to quote the kids, OMFjah... this shit is brilliant, one sent me to a damn fine place and i was thinking how two would fucking be stellar! of course the next thing i thought was, fucking hell i need to get more of these cuz who knows how long this little thing will last and so i began scrimping and saving the dosh because as i get older it's a bit harder to find the connections for these things, the cannabis has been sorted with the card but knowing how much i enjoy the boomers i tend to try to stock up (keep em cool and dry and they stay good for a long time)...  

I'll freely admit that i was worried about the old supply line cuz my old connection had seemed to dry up, the guy i knew who introduced me to his knew guy seemed to have disappeared and since it had been a little over a year since i had talked to the new connection who had only met me once it felt a bit strange texting out of the blue and asking to get a zip of the boomers, last time i kept roughly 20 grams from the ounce because i as i've stated i feel like mushrooms are an essential part of my existence at this point, yes i'd be fine if i didn't have them but damn if i don't enjoy using them, they seem to teach me things, help me sort through things, remind me to be empathetic and kind, it's amazing the positive effects they have and i understand completely how valuable they'd be for those battling things like depression and PTSD... hopefully one of these days the people will let the powers that be know that this isn't some Class A but medicine, a way to sort out the inanity of modern living, a way to get us back in touch with our natural world, a way to be a kinder and gentler species, if we want to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, fuck the soda commercial, pass these out and let the love in... let the healing begin... (but let's face it, the ever present cynic in me knows big pharma will do all it can to keep something that grows naturally out of the hands of the masses... it hurts the bottom line...) 


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