Never been one to let the carrier drop

Argh. I just posted a reply and lj ate it.

> We’ll try again.

> I think watering down the definition of ‘addiction’ is a bad idea, as it ultimately means > that the word becomes useless.

> Lacking cravings or feelings that you *must* have pot to function or to ever be happy
> again or something like that, it’s not an addiction. In your other post you mentioned that > smoking pot slowed down your thinking for weeks afterwards. Are you sure about that?
> That’s one of those things that are often cited as fact by anti-drug sources, but no
> research really backs it up (chronic pot smoking can slow down your brain, but it picks
> back up after 1-6 months off..and that’s chronic like every day, most of the day..not an
> occasional joint on weekends) and a fair amount of research refutes it. That said, it’s
> entirely possible you have an idiosyncratic reaction to the stuff. It’s not as if it would
> be your first idiosyncratic reaction to something. So if that really is the case, you’ll
> have to do a cost/benefits analysis on it. Just makes sure you’re using real data and not
> disinformation for that analysis.

It’s pretty clear that given my lack of cravings, and my ability to ponder the matter dispassionately (more or less) that I’m in no way physically addicted, and that herb is nowhere near as addictive as it’s legal counterpart (cigs). I find that kind of funny..

As for the slowing down thing: I can sense it. It’s not a huge slowdown.. it’s not like I become a gibbering idiiot – it’s just fractions of a percent for each time I smoke. But right now at least I need those fractions of a percent – I’m juggling many projects, almost all of which require me to be smarter than the average bear – and almost all of which require me to be smarter than the average bear in a _different_ category. We’ve got analog electronics, programming, particle physics.. I’m learning large chunks of new material every week, and of course I have to keep working to keep myself fed.

I do think that weed has some long term effects, because all the people I know who have been chronic weed abusers (read: addicts ;-)) have been noticably slower than other people – and in one case, noticably slower after than before. However, alchohol does more damage – far, far more – so I guess if people have to be addicted to something, I’ll choose weed every time.

Similarly, E. is proported by many studies to be totally harmless – but everyone I know who uses E. regularly seems to have lost 20 points of IQ..

At the same time, I want to rationalize my use of weed because when I smoke alone or in small groups of people (as opposed to at parties for example) I do genuinely enjoy myself. ANd it’s not like I smoke a joint and then sit in front of the TV for hours – I still do productive things. But I don’t think that I learn as fast – I may be able to program somewhat better stoned (although I’ve only tried it a few times) but I’m not nearly as good at system administration, design, or a number of other things.

On the other hand, weed has led me to many nonintuitive ways of visualizing the world that have been very helpful, and has led me to many personal insights. So I don’t know. Anyway, it’s not likely that not using it is going to hurt me in any way aside fromt he enjoyment that I might miss out oon derving from it.

I don’t know. I will ponder this issue more. Maybe I’ll go back and look at my journal to see how long it’s been since I smoked.

[perhaps I should regularly log when I smoke in my journal, if I resume. Then I can look over it to detect patterns. Yes, this is acknowledging a illegal activity in a public place, but on the other hand, it’s a activity that I do not feel should be illegal – and if arrested for it, at least I’ll get the satisfaction of saying to the judge something like this:

—————————————————————————————-

Your honor, we have a problem here. The purpose of the criminal justice system is ostensibly rehabilitation – but I can tell you that no amount of time spent in jail will make me feel regret for inhaling the smoke of a burning plant, and no fine will make me feel that I should not smoke it. This is not the voice of addiction speaking, this is the voice of sanity. Jail time will only make me feel resentful towards a system that is doling out a punishment for a crime that, as far as I can tell, hurts no one – not even myself.

I am, as far as I can tell, a productive, taxpaying member of society. I build useful software and develop useful hardware. I am making serious inroads in making electric vehicles practical for use by Joe Sixpack. I write music that others enjoy and give it away for free. I am a positive force in the world I live in. Marajuana does not appear to have reduced the positive force I exert – on the contrary, I think it sometimes affords me insights into the projects I am working on that I would not have sober.

If your honor can tell me a reason that makes sense to me that I should not smoke marajuana – that I should look on this behavior as undesirable – I will stop. But no sentance that doesn’t involve a rational explanation of why this action is wrong will cause me to stop, or feel regret or remorse. You can lock me up for a hundred years – depriving the U.S. government of a hundred years of my taxes, and the world of a hundred years of whatever positive force I might exert – and I will feel no differently about this crime at the end of the hundred years. I am not a child – you can not change my mind by forcing me to sit in the corner.

You will likely tell me that you are obliged to pass sentance on me not because of your own personal feelings but because of the obligations of the job – that you are not free to decide whether or not to pass sentance. This is a lie – you are lying to yourself. No man or woman is obliged to do his job – that is one of the good things about capitolism. You are free to resign today – or to take actions that even if morally right, would get you fired – i.e. not passing sentance. If you find behaving dishonorably – condemning others to a fate you do not agree with – to be worth avoiding having to find a new job, then I feel sorry for you.

If you agree with this fate, then surely you can give me a rational explanation for why smoking marajuana is wrong.

As a side note, if every man and woman would refuse to do tasks that are dishonorable, even for pay, the world would be a far, far better place to live in. And if every judge refused to pass sentance on people for crimes which hurt no one, soon the laws making those actions crimes would be removed, for the world needs judges.

————————————————————————————–

So I see I have been selected for jury duty.. which is okay with me, civil duty and all, I’ve been registered to vote since I was 18, so it was bound to happen sooner or later, and if once every 9 years is the best they can do, I guess I can live with it..

but here’s the insulting part: they require me to provide a stamp to mail back the form – and I must mail it back, or I’m liable for a misdemeaner charge or something equally horrible. Says right here it’s a crime to intentionally fail to appear as directed – but doesn’t say anything about failing to mail the form back…

Still, they ought to have provided the postage.

And they want me to show up at 8 am. So if I sleep through it, I won’t feel too awful. I mean, really, what are they going to do to me? 😉 But I’ll write it on my calander..

I can’t decide if it’s addiction, or something else. I think not.. I don’t have cravings like I do with cigs. I just genuinely regret giving up something that’s given me much happiness. Maybe I should just give up using it in social situations.. ?

Must think about this.

In the meantime, I think I have a workable Scotty design. Now I just wish those digikey parts would get here..

I jsut got done seeing eternal sunshine of a spotless mind.. and it’s shaking lots of little things loose in my head. I’m not really sure what to say about those little things, except – I would not, in general, choose to give up my memory of a relationship, even one that ended badly.

So, I’m doing something probably ill advised and diverging from Lee’s design on Scotty in favor of one that I can impliment quicker and dirtier. Assuming that I understand the concept at all – but I’m pretty sure I do, it’s a pretty simple concept.

Anyway, the offshoot is that I’ll probably be setting fire to some silicon soon, a concept which makes me oddly cheery.

Tory dropped by again last night. I’ll post a link to our handiwork as soon as I figure out why the Viao has decided it doesn’t have a network card. (this isn’t new – things have been burning out on that laptop for the last few years – it’s well past what anyone would call a normal operating lifespan for a laptop, and it’s been run very hard as well, so I can’t really complain that much).

Anyway, so he also wants to do some live performance stuff soon, so we’re going to try and meet once a week, and sooner rather than later try and get a booking somewhere. Look for us coming to a club near you.

In the meantime, I’m trying to get Esen to do a open mic with me on Sunday – oh, shoot, I just realized I’ve double-booked myself for Sunday. Hm. Will have to talk to Tory about that. Anyway, if she goes for it, it will be my first public performance since high school. I’m not particularly nervious about it though, i mean, so what, I go, it sucks, who goes to the liquid lounge on sundays anyway? 😉

But I am determined to do a open mic somewhere soon..

TO LJ friends, sorry I’m behind on my LJ reading, I’ve been busy working. Will try and catch up today or tomorrow.

Anyway, nothing all that exciting or new. P. called, may be going to a movie, she sounded progressively more annoyed though. ;-(

S.

Okay, so it’s been a while since I’ve posted. I don’t really have anything meaninful to say now, either, I’m just slacking.

I’m currently juggling the parking meter code, the next-generation battery balancing system (which I’m again putting noticible time into), my fusion project (which I’ve got other people putting noticable time into), and my everpresent attempts at creating music.

It’s been a month since I’ve smoked the greenage, and about six since I last smoked tobacco. (I don’t have any real interest in resuming tobacco, although I do have to admit that there are parts of weed I miss.)

I think the next addiction I’m going to give up is C&C/Generals. In fact, that might, from a wasted time category, make more sense than giving up weed.. since I still do productive and interesting things when I’m lit, but time spent blowing up computer-generated charicters is pretty much gone forever. Unless you think military strategy is something I’mg oing to need a lot of in the future – something that seems a wee bit inaccurate. Among other things, the physics model in C&C/gen needs some pretty noticable work – if it were actually to scale, the chinese nuke would wipe the entire map clean.. 😉

The real reason that I’m giving up weed for social events is, as observed recently, fear. I spend entirely too much of my time being afraid, but when I’m not under the influence, this fear doesn’t rule my actions and I can do risky things even while I’m afraid of them. When I’m lit, I’m much less inclined to take risks – and what success in my life I have thus far I owe completely to taking risks.

I had a good week.. P. was on spring break, and we spent it togeather, visiting her family and playing games and whatnot. We managed to get through the entire week with no horrid moments, which I suppose is encouraging for a possible reuinfication.. (as Bush says, I’m a unificator, not a dividificator). In any case, it was fun.

Sadly, my plans to go to Scott’s wedding and SoCal were scrubbed because of a data disaster.. a obscure bug in winCE ate 120,000 transactions on parking meters, and I had to build software to uneat them… Good clean fun, um, kind of..

Other than that, there’s very little to report in my life. I have a headache at the moment… that’s about it.

As usual, I think of lots of interesting and deep and meaningful thoughts to write down, and then when I actually get to the point of writing in my journal, I can’t think of any of them. It’s a conspiricy or something..

Oh, I will do a breif weed retrospective, since I promised I would and since it does seem worthwhile to marshell my thoughts on the matter.

I first smoked herb in the summer of 1995. The first few times I smoked it, it had no real effect on me. I understand this is not unusual. The third time I smoked it, I rather enjoyed the experience.

It definately makes me hear a lot more in music, and see a lot more meaning in everything and many more complex layers of meaning. It also makes me think about trends in my life from a longer perspective, and understand the big picture in a way that I’m not normally inclined to do. That is the primary reason that I continued to use it.

It also brings periods of almost transcendental happiuness, especially when combined with certain types of music. On the other hand, it also brings periods of extreme fear, inclines me not to talk to other people, and makes me even more clumsy than I already am, which is a pretty impressive stunt since I’m already pretty clumsy.

It occasionally provides me with a sense that there is a god, and I am talking to him/her/it (and sometimes, getting answers). Thus far I have considered this to be hallucinatory, although I’ve never gotten bad advice this way..

Is weed evil? No, I don’t think it is. Why have I not smoked for a month, and why am I seriously considering dropping it? Well, there are a few reasons.

First of all, it slows down your thinking for several weeks after use. That’s a awfully high price to pay for one night’s entertainment.

Second of all, it’s a carcenogen, just like tobacco. Okay, so you don’t use as much, it’s probably not as serious a risk, but still, cancer is cancer, and dead is dead..

Third of all, it makes it much harder for me to talk to other people. This is not something I need, believe me.

Well, here I sit, listening to appropriately sad and depressing roxette songs, procrastinating.. I’ve done some debugging today, and implimented one measily feature. Tomorrow I have to pack..

I’m going to Texas with P. to see her family.. which may be awkward, given current situations, or may not be. Anyway, I like them better than my own family and want to see them.. and it’ll be a interesting test of how our relationship has evolved and in what direction.

http://www.plethora.net/~seebs/faqs/hacker.html

This may be the single best document for understanding me I’ve ever read.

http://getregistered.org/?site_id=0000125393&media_id=0000165027

That’s a first. I mean, there are no lies in it, no attacks.. it almost doesn’t look like a republican ad at all..

Well, I just woke up (3 hours later than I expected to, but that’s a good thing I guess) – after having what has to qualify as the world’s weirdest nightmare. It had everything.. really good sex, dead pregnant mothers that when their bodies were exhumed turned out to have no babies..

I wish I could remember the whole thing – it would have made a _great_ book a-la steven king. A lot of it was set in Arkansas – it started out with a news story..

Pity, it’s gone like a soap bubble. I’ve been having lots of nightmares lately..

So today I’m going to clean the basement (heh heh heh) and figure out how I managed to break A$ in a attempt to fix it. (Important lesson here: it’s a bad idea to send off software without testing it first. I wonder what I did this time..)

(I already knew about it being a bad idea to send off software without testing it – this is akin to building a computer and putting the case on without testing it – it virtually guarentees it won’t work. Don’t believe me? Obviously you’ve never built a computer..)

But I’m awake, sort of – and thinking about breakfast.