Doctor G: In Defense of the Noble Joint

In Defense of the Joint

There are as many ways to smoke herb as there are people that smoke it.
And each one of us has his, or her, own preference. Some prefer one hit pipes,
some a bong or water pipe. Others have a favorite Chilum, or antler or briar.
Some use mirchum, other have a carved stone. Each person has their own
reason and logic for the choice they have made.
And then there is the joint. Like other implements, joints come in as many
flavors and types as the people that smoke them. There are plain papers, there
are flavored papers, there are white or yellow. Some papers are â??slow burningâ?�
others are â??all naturalâ?�. Some papers as sized to make cigarette sized smoke
others are for larger smokes. There are pre glued tubes and all manner of ways
to hold herb to be smoked.
Over the past thirty five years I have used virtually every manner of
smoking implement. I have used the simple ( heat a butter knife until itâ??s red hot
then press it into a small pile of herb on a non flammable surface, â??hot knifingâ?�), to
a â??PROTO Pipeâ?� or hookas, water pipes and vaporizers. My personal preference
has drifted back to the simple joint.
I prefer joints because itâ??s all there in one place. Nothing to add, no
separate stash, nothing to drop or break. No screen to wear out. I can keep a
joint and one kitchen match in a waterproof container and when the time is right
everything is there. The wind wonâ??t whip the weed out of my bowl. If I drop it wonâ??t
break. If I am approached by law enforcement itâ??s eatable; all in all itâ??s the
simplest and most elegant method of obtaining my buzz.
There are many choices of rolling papers and as I get older and more
aware of my health I have become much more picky about what goes into my
body. When I was younger I tried the flavored papers. They left an interesting
flavor on the lips but did nasty things to the herb. I used slow burning papers
(more sanitary than licking the whole thing) but didnâ??t like how they accomplished
the process. Iâ??ve used the old stand by, Zig Zagâ??s or the Bugle papers that came
in a bag of tobacco. But as the years passed and I read more and more about
how different chemicals affect the human body in the long term I chose to seek
out a less hazardous wrap.
After extensive testing I settled on rice papers; plain, clean burning. As I
read more about the processes and chemicals used in glues I settled on glueless,
pure rice, unbleached, standard sized papers. Now it must be understood I am
not a spokesman for any company, but as my researches continued I found a
brand called Club made the cleanest and least dangerous papers for my joints.
Now when I smoke that is the paper of choice for me.
I understand the other views; my sons have a wonderful collection of glass
pipes and they insist they are superior. And I agree, they do not impart a flavor,
they do not corrode and send deadly fumes deep into the lungs like some metals.
But they are so damn fragile and you still need to put a metal screen in them.
Most screens are cheap brass and the reason you have to replace them is
because they corrode in the extreme temperatures and the presence of oxygen,
so there is still a minor amount of metallic poison being deposited in your lungs.
Screens are the problem with many pipes, stone and ceramic. While the base
material may not react to the heat and oxygen the screens always do. Some
screens can be found that are high temperature and non reacting but access to
such material is very limited for the average person.
Yes, vaporizers have gotten past most of that, but the heating elements
are still subject to at least a small amount of corrosion and while it is less than the
corrosion of a screen it is still present and potentially a contaminant to the lungs.
While the amounts in question may be minuscule, over a lifetime like mine of
smoking (thirty five years and at least twenty more to go) the eventual build up
may have unintended consequences.
Water pipes and bongs I hear the crowd call. Well yes, the water does
filter out many of the heavier tars and pollutants. But, unfortunately, THC is water
soluble and some of your high is left in that nasty mung water as you draw the
smoke through. Using alcohol (drinking not rubbing) in a bong is no better, itâ??s
actually worse as the THC is even more soluble in ethanol. Rubbing alcohol can
be used to clean pipes but should never be ingested as it is poisonous and if you
are lucky it will blind you and if you are not it will kill you. Donâ??t even think about
methanol or other wood alcoholâ??s, equally fatal. Good cleaning compounds, but
fatal to the human body.
Well wait, I hear people say, what about the waste as the joint burns and
you are passing it around? When you are really stoned and have been for thirty
five years that sort of thing gets looked at. I have taken measurements of joints
as they burn and found that the actual amount of â??lossâ?� while passing is one to
three percent of the overall volume of the cylinder. By weight with a one gram
joint (pretty good sized fatty by anyoneâ??s standards) the â??lossâ?� is between one and
three one hundredths of a gram. Not really enough to get high from and honestly
not enough to register on a THC test.
Joints go out when you arenâ??t hitting them. So when you are stoned
enough thereâ??s no danger of setting fire to the couch or the floor. The back half of
a joints acts as a filter for the front half and the back half burns measurably
slower as the collected tars and resins retard the burning speed of the herb. If
you are really concerned about the health aspects of the tars and resins you can
use a cigarette filter holder to collect the tars and resins in a filter media before it
gets to your lungs. Research has shown that cannabis tars and resins do not
contain the deadly nicotine that kills your lung cilia and is water soluble. That
means if you do stop smoking for a while ( three to six months) the tars and
resins in your lungs will dissolve and be expelled naturally.
So if you find yourself smoking with me, break out the ungummed Clubâ??s
and roll a nice one.

How to Roll a Joint (Gumless)
Start by cleaning the herb thoroughly. Remove all extraneous matter, no
stems, no seeds. Break the weed up into a consistent sized material. Larger
chunks burn slower and will cause a joint to run, finer dust like material will burn
slower as well and also cause the joint to run. The more consistent the size of the
material the more consistent the rate of burn. Take your rolling paper and fold in
along the quarter line lengthwise, making a trough between the quarter line and
the mid line fold. Into this trough place enough weed to fill the trough to
overflowing. Holding the paper on one end with a finger ( index) in the trough use
your other finger to separate the herb into two piles, with a gap to the bottom in
the middle. Now using your thumb and three fingers on each end start at the
piles and roll toward the center. Your thumbs should tuck the small part under the
long part and your fingers can roll back towards the ends. When less than one
eighth of the long edge is still un rolled lick along that edge, moistening both the
edge and the surface it will touch. Gently bring the two surfaces together and
allow then to dry. Handled carefully this bond will hold for time required to finish
the joint. If you are having trouble passing these joints put a clip on them and hold
them by the clip.
Like learning to play the piano practice make perfect and unlike the piano
the practice here is a lot of fun. So get out there and practice, practice, practice!!

Again Doc G, another masterpiece!

Keep em coming,

....by the way do you have a collection of your stories/books anywhere?

thanks

I agree completly except for the skin selection part, I like a nice OCB king. Keep 'em coming.

i like hemp papers....

very well said i totally agree with everything mentioned but im still gunna stick to my zig zags

Zigs all the way man!

rizzla are pretty good

In some ways I do agree with you. You make quite a few points that are well worth considering, however I do believe you to uh....care too much, in a sense.
Sure your way does seem to be fairly healthy, and I do enjoy a nicely rolled joint. I just think it is going overboard to eliminate the gum on rolling papers.
And for the record, glass bongs or pipes do not need a metal screen. I use glass screens in all of my glass pieces. They look like a little glass star.

you said that thc is water soluble, i was almost certain that it was not... i thought it was only soluble in alcohol and dairy products (as a result of the fat content, not the water), i could be wrong though

While THC is more attracted to fat compounds the attraction to water is utilized often in the cannabis concentration process. Water Hash for example uses THC's affininy to h2o to produce a virtually pure THC hash that will knock you out. So yes, butter and fats have a greater attraction to THC but water will also trap and hold THC. Sorry you may be right I am a fanatic on this subject, but then after 35 years I feel I have a right. Oh yea...if you knew what was in glue.........
Doctor G :cool:

haha damn docta g, your like, scientific stoner man