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42! Now we just need to figure out the question…

Ok, seriously, who amongst us doesn’t use Facebook, and briefly, why not?

I used to use it, primarily to keep up my favorite musicians and events. Apart from that it was just basically a blur of annoying invites to games, silly videos or pictures that you have to ‘like’ before opening, advertisements and mundane status updates regarding the every day lives of people you never speak to or see so I stopped. ‘OMG it’s so COLD! lol’

However I can see how it would be useful to keep in touch with people abroad an so on.

My question is, how did you convince yourself to try a ‘heavy’ psychedelic? By ‘heavy’ I am referring to anything that is a step up from weed. Or did you need no convincing and just thought that it was something you had to try. I am asking this because my current cultural environment is generally strongly against most drugs and I have been pondering whether or not to dabble with them myself.

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Nair! atnt, check my response to Si on his “should I kill the forum” thread, I use Facebook (from a distance) and I hate it for all of the reasons you mentioned. But if they closed the forum for example, I’d need to know about what’s going down… I’m very pseudonostalgic for times past when people would actually go downtown to hang out and catch up with people in real life.

This one’s for Gromit (these are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by anyone associated with this forum):
Psilocybic mushrooms. These are NOT muscaria mushrooms which are famous for their use in Siberian shamanism (whereby the shaman eats the mushroom, metabolizes the active ingredients, and the initiates then drink the shaman’s urine. Good times in a dark, oil lit Siberian yurt). There are other types of mushrooms which are purported to have entheogenic effects, notably certain gymnosperms and cordyceps, but like muscarias they are extremely rare, and cordyceps in particular might be growing out of the carcass of various insects, so there’s a yuck factor there. But the psilocybes are awesome and abundant (Liberty Caps and psilocybe cubensis are both very common). If you’re thinking about trying something psychedelic, it might be wise to start with natural, inexpensive and highly effective shrooms instead of LSD or DMT. Expect them to taste kinda bad (hold your nose, mix them with chocolate or brew them with strong tea [boil them in the water for a few minutes]), they may make you queazy a tiny little bit, it’s highly doubtful they’ll do much worse, and you can expect your trip to last for five or six hours (except on your first go it’ll seem like it lasts for the whole day, it’s just that rad). You WON’T have any giant freak-out where you never come down (unless you have a latent mental illness like Schizophrenia, in which case then you’ll know), but you will be giddy and somewhat incomprehensible, so make sure you are in a nice comfy place with dim lighting, nice music (Shpongle or Ott are recommended), maybe a few beer in the fridge. Fruit is also good. Do not answer the phone- unplug it. Do not answer the doorbell under any circumstances, try to make your presence as discreet as possible. Do not do them in your folks’ place unless they are on vacation. Resist the urge to go outside unless you’re in a remote unpopulated area. At least wait until you’re coming down- when you can carry on a semi-coherant conversation, you’re not gibbering and you don’t look like a crazed baboon. ‘Exploring’ is highly dangerous when high. Do enjoy these things with one or two good friends. You’ll quickly realize that psychedelics are very personal, nobody’s experience is alike, and it just can’t be imagined beforehand. But after you come through it you’ll realize they’re NOT scary, it’s just scare-tactics that are used to keep them oppressed. If you already like herbs, you’ll dig mushrooms, and if you dig mushrooms you’ll probably also dig LSD and DMT. And the come-down on shrooms is very gentle.

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That was an awesome reply Jahful, another piece of information that I will consider during my pondering. This might seem foolish to some, but another major concern I have when it comes to trying any new drugs is the effect that it will have on the ability for me ‘perform’ academically. I have a pretty huge workload, 3rd year in uni, and anything that significantly inhibits my cognitive ability is generally not a good idea. I have completely cut back on the grass, basically only smoke it on holidays or if there is a rare dry spell in the shit storm of work that gets piled on us. So basically what I am getting at is have you found that the use of mushrooms, or any other psychedelics, effects your ability to do to academic work. Having to remember lots of things, on a short and long term basis, I did start to notice the slight effect on my short term memory if I smoked more than a few times a week.

I have obviously read up on these things but whenever you read the ‘Symptoms and side effects’ of any drug it seems a little exaggerated and dramatic. I prefer peoples opinions and being a person with a few close friends, none of who have tried anything but weed, opinions are hard to come by.

Beards look fine man, keep the beard.

I have no stories about drinking urine, but I have urinated on someone who set himself on fire. He was playing with petrol and he set his left shoe on fire, in his freaked out frenzy he kept shouting ‘Piss on it! piss on it!’ So I did as I was told.

Nice pee story! I know this is getting silly but the pee drinking thing (human and bovine) is also a small thing in Vedic belief. Ok, so NO BEER Gromit, but the fungaloids shouldn’t have any residual effects after your body metabolizes the chemicals. I honestly think that if you could spare the day, you’d be fine, but if you’re massively stressed you should wait until your course finishes for the year (the stress could become intensified). They won’t hinder your intellectual pursuits in the least, just the opposite.

Onwards towards Inity and Overstanding!