Am I About to Get High on THC?

The ironic thing about marijuana is that it's probably a safer solution than most prescription medications. So I personally think it's great that it's been legalized in many states. My own state now has several dispensaries, including "recreational" use.

Cannabis photo by Michael Fischer

Now I'm pretty strait-laced when it comes to substances. If I open a bottle of wine, it'll take me a good two weeks or longer to get through it. But when my therapist suggested I might be better off taking a low dose of THC for some situational anxiety, I was intrigued.

It turns out there are several places where I can get THC without a prescription within just a few miles of my home. So yesterday I went to one of them and picked up a little tin of cute little raspberry gummies. And today I'm going to try one half of one gummy. And I'm planning to report the results in real time.

Before I begin, I want to say a few things I learned about how to go about this while I still have my wits about me. 😏

• First, I learned it's best to start with a very low dose and then wait an hour or two before taking more. The gummies I got contain 4.44 mg of THC. If you're not a pot user, it's best to start with about 2.5 mg, so I'm going to cut the gummy in half. I know, I know, you experienced users are probably laughing at me now. But everyone's metabolism is different and some people are more sensitive than others to various substances. If that's you, and you want to try this, play it safe and start with a low dose. For myself, if I'm not feeling much after an hour or two, I'll take the other half.

• Second, it's best to take CBD along with it to take the edge off. I already have CBD oil, so I'm going to take a dose of that this morning, which I usually do anyway. You can buy edibles that already contain CBD.

• Third, if cannabis is legal in your state and you want to find a dispensary near you, you can do a search at leafly.com/finder.

And now I'm going to take some CBD oil and then take a half a gummy. I'll be back and will post right here what my experience is.


11 a.m. - I took a half a gummy. They are not easy to cut in half! I held it under my tongue for 90 seconds, which is how I take the CBD oil. I don't know if that will make a difference, since it's, of course, more solid than oil. It's now 15 minutes later and I do have a nice buzzy feeling, but nothing too dramatic. And I was kind of feeling that way anyhow because it's a lazy, cloudy Saturday morning.

I will post again at around noon or so.


11:30 a.m. - I'm coming back earlier than planned, because even on just 2.2 mg, I am definitely feeling it now! I guess I'm a cheap date. 🤣

11:50 a.m. - I'm getting a bit of a headache. I almost think it's because I have too many tabs open on my browser. Maybe the pot is telling me to take it easy and close a few tabs - relax. I'm also heating up the oven to have some lunch and hoping that taking half a dose means I'll only get half the munchies. ;-)

12:50 a.m. - I took an ibuprofen for the headache at about noon, so that's better. But if I was feeling a buzz, the headache ruined it. I'm wondering whether to take the other half of the gummy now. I might be feeling a slight buzz, but if I do, it's not that different from the feeling on a lazy day.

12:55 a.m. - Took the other half of the gummy - but two hours after taking the first half, so I don't know if it'll be a cumulative effect.

Well, it's now 9:15 p.m., and I think the second half got me relaxed enough to not bother coming back here to tell you what was going on. So maybe that's progress.

Overall, it was uneventful - less exciting than a glass of wine. I will try again, and since the effects were mild, I'll take the whole 5 mg next time, which will save me the trouble of trying to get a knife to go through something gummy.

What to Do When Your Refrigerator Dies - Part 1

One night I noticed my refrigerator light was out. That happens sometimes, so I didn't think much of it. The next morning, I noticed the light was still out and the food wasn't quite as cold. Things in the freezer weren't quite as frozen. Uh oh.

You might read that you should put your food into a cooler with some ice packs. That's a great idea if you know for sure when your refrigerator took its last breath, or for food that can last a good day without refrigeration. It can be painful to follow the wise adage "When in doubt, throw it out" when it refers to an entire refrigerator's worth of food. But it's better to waste food and the money it cost you than to take a chance and become deathly ill (no, that's not too dramatic). So my first bit of advice is:

Step 1. If you're not sure when the fridge stopped working, don't make any assumptions other than to assume the fridge has been out since the last time you remembered it being on. If you can't remember the last time you noticed it being on, assume the longest possible period. Your health is worth more than the food.

Step 2 is similar. I had some of my beloved Trader Joe's gluten-free chicken nuggets in the freezer. Chicken nuggets are already cooked, right? They were still cold. I turned on the oven, but I had a nagging feeling these particular nuggets were not fully cooked. I phoned Trader Joe's and the kind man who answered my call took some time to check it out. They were not fully cooked, and eating them would have been really foolish. Throwing those nuggets out was the most painful part of the whole experience. 😭 Had I eaten them, my experience would probably have been far more painful than that! 🤮

Step 2: Don't make any assumptions about the food itself. If you're not sure an item is salvageable, either call to find out or throw it away. See above note about importance of health over food.

Only now can you move on to Step 3:

Step 3: Salvage what food you can by using a cooler or borrowing the fridge and freezer of a nearby friend or relative.

One of the most helpful articles I found on what can be salvaged was this one from FoodSafety.gov that gives a rundown of what foods can be kept unrefrigerated.

The next steps are to determine whether to repair or replace; to figure out how to eat reasonably well without a fridge for a few days without splurging too much on take-out food; and how to find the right fridge if you need to replace it. Stay tuned!

Tasteless, Invisible Cookies

Blogger says I have to warn you about cookies. Not the delicious kind. No warnings about sugar or fat or calories (which I would not do anyway). These are the invisible, tasteless cookies that the internet uses to remember you, which can be nice. They do a lot of remembering for you. You wouldn't like it if they stopped using the cookies.

Why I need your cookies though is beyond me. I guess Blogger needs them, so they are taking your cookies (but again, do not panic, they are not the delicious cookies in your pantry).

I doubt they'll take many cookies just so you can look at this blog, and you're not going to see a site that isn't taking your cookies, so it's nothing to be too concerned about, as far as I can tell.

It's just a rule that we have to tell you about the cookies. So here it is - you are now forewarned that this blog is making tasteless, invisible cookies to remember you by.