I’m 42 and have smoked weed my entire life. I remember the herb from back in the day before the days of legal dispensaries. Back when it was all Mexican brick weed for the most, unless you had that good connection. The days of old school Skunk Bud, Christmas Tree Bud, Maui Wowie, Acapulco Gold and others aren’t gone for good, but they are getting harder to come by. Good weed should be sticky and covered in a blanket of sparkly trichomes. When you go to break it up it should stick to your fingers or grinder.
When cured to perfection, good herb breaks up beautifully having what I’ve come to call a crawl to it, versus floating away into the air. A crawl means the pile of weed you just broke up will sit there and move slightly on its own like it’s crawling or breathing. Bad weed crumbles to dust and floats away as you try to break it up. I spend a lot of my time out west in Colorado. I’ve visited dispensaries in Fort Collins, Boulder, Rainbow Springs, Denver, Manitou Springs, Pueblo, and Trinidad. I’m not a huge fan of most dispensary weed. It’s not all bad but it’s definitely not all good.
Where I live in the draconian south, things are still stuck in the past and the region has a language of its own. People here commonly use strange words like youinz (you guys), yander (over there), and blasted (shit you don’t like). Here is the word blasted used a few times like I hear it here in the south. That blasted weather was cold last week. Did you hear about that blasted president of ours? My blasted dog ran away. My blasted truck broke down. I guess it’s not just here, even Yosemite Sam called Bugs Bunny a blasted varmint. I can tell you that, I’m not ever buying any blasted weed again.
That Blasted Weed Sucked
If you’ve ever smoked weed that tasted like shit, had zero trichomes and no buzz, you could say that that blasted weed sucked. Chances are that weed was blasted too, meaning someone made concentrates from it already. Blasted weed doesn’t only suck, it’s bad for you. When you buy weed from a legal cannabis dispensary with tested potency it should live up to those test results. If your herb doesn’t sparkle or glisten with trichomes, chances are you got ahold to some blasted weed.
Buds should be covered with glandular trichomes. This isn’t always the case when you buy weed from legal dispensaries though. Sometimes you get weed thinking it’s going to be great only to have your buzz harshed when you get home. In the true fashion of using the word blasted, you find yourself at home saying, that blasted weed didn’t even get me high. Or this blasted weed taste like shit. Little did you know you couldn’t be closer to the truth.
- Good weed- sticky to the touch, covered in glandular trichomes, properly cured.
- Bad weed- no glandular trichomes, shitty taste, dry as fuck, and no high or buzz.
Recently I started researching the difference between weed that was blasted and weed that wasn’t. I always thought you had to grind your herb up fine and pack it tight in a tube to run it with butane. I wouldn’t have imagined people would blast whole buds. Or let alone that these buds would dry up and still hold their shape.
Watch Out for That Blasted Weed
I’d like to share with you what I’m seeing others say. Apparently, we live in a world today where we have to watch the cannabis dispensary’s on the legal medical and retail markets with our full attention. California has heavy reports of dispensaries blasting their buds before curing them and selling them to the public as medicine. obviously, if this problem is going on in California it’s happening elsewhere. Its bad enough we have to worry about spider mites, mold, and banned chemicals like Eagle 20 but now we have to watch out for blasted weed too. If you’re like me, you’re going to be a bit pissed off after learning about this.
Butane can be very dangerous. Since the trend of dabbing is still relatively new, we have no way of knowing any long-term effects from it. The Westword reported in a story back in 2011 that butane may have harmful side effects. Medical professionals agree as you’ll discover by researching information from the NCBI, JAMA, NIH, and other medical platforms.
“The potential health effects after our body metabolizes Butane into Sec-Butanol are gastrointestinal issues, including, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. However, the real seriousness lies in the long-term effects, which may cause sudden collapse, coma, respiratory failure, liver and kidney failure and even death.”-Westword
Here are some signs to look for that say your weed was most likely blasted before you bought it.
Signs of Blasted Weed:
- No visible glandular trichomes on the buds or stems
- Buds tend to be fluffy and brittle
- Poor taste
- No buzz
- Burning in the throat or chest that lingers
Here is a link to a video that I found to be very resourceful regarding how to look for the signs of blasted weed and the dangers from it. The video was published by Jason Porter Collinsworth on YouTube. Thanks for reading and please share any information you have about blasted weed in the comments below. Be safe out there and hopefully you’ll stay away from blasted weed.
Article courtesy of Expert Joints. Written by JamesP from CannaLance (Canna-Lance.com, @CannaLance, @CannaLancer710)