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Today is Monday, August 2nd, 2010, and it is now 920AM here in the South Bronx, New York City, USA.
Recap: Flew to NYC,USA for a family issue. I was talking about my 1st arrest, and conviction, in Israel.
This entry: I was sitting on the turret, talking to the CO, the commander of the tank, as we waited for the traffic jam to move through the Inspection Station at Rosh HaNikra on the Coastal Hiway, moving from Southern Lebanon into Israel. As I watched that German Shepard I finally understood why Semites hate dogs. I was praying he would hit on another vehicle...I know it isn't morally just to hope for another to suffer just to save one's own skin but fuck it, I aimed for a career in the military!
The tank kicked into gear and rumbled into the paddock. The MPs were looking cock strong, angry at us real soldiers, as if we had made them pussy out of combat, acting as if they were getting bounties for each fool they nabbed.
It took all of 20 seconds, though it seemed like 20 minutes, for that dog to begin bouncing around and barking. The CO gave me a look, because he knew what was happening. The K-9 Handler shouted to an older soldier with a young helper and they took off that panel a hell of a lot faster than I had put it on! He told the Handler that he could inspect the shelf and of course, out came my burlap sack full of coffee beans and Red Lebanese Hashish.
I was told to dismount from the tank and to follow 2 other MPs into an administration building on the Israeli side of the border. Inside they were matter of fact about the affair and I began to convince myself that it might turn out OK, after all we were incredibly short on manpower and I was deployed to a high priority echelon, Intelligence.
When they strip searched me I still imagined that at worst I would have to deal with a loss of rank, having made Corporal upon that re-deployment, and perhaps 1 digit on my Security Rating,something I could easily re-obtain in no time.
Yet, when I entered the large holdijg cell and saw it packed, absolutely packed with soldiers and NCOs I knew that the reason for the MP's non-chalant demeanour was the huge number of detainees and not the lack of intent on their part.
I entered the jail cell of my life. Except for transfers I wouldn't be leaving jail for what seemed to me to be a very long time. Right away I saw 2 men from my brigade, my original brigade since no matter where you end up down the road your "brigade" is the initial one you enter when you first enter the army. In addition I recognised a couple of other faces from Lebanon, times had begun to change in Israel.
Recap: Flew to NYC,USA for a family issue. I was talking about my 1st arrest, and conviction, in Israel.
This entry: I was sitting on the turret, talking to the CO, the commander of the tank, as we waited for the traffic jam to move through the Inspection Station at Rosh HaNikra on the Coastal Hiway, moving from Southern Lebanon into Israel. As I watched that German Shepard I finally understood why Semites hate dogs. I was praying he would hit on another vehicle...I know it isn't morally just to hope for another to suffer just to save one's own skin but fuck it, I aimed for a career in the military!
The tank kicked into gear and rumbled into the paddock. The MPs were looking cock strong, angry at us real soldiers, as if we had made them pussy out of combat, acting as if they were getting bounties for each fool they nabbed.
It took all of 20 seconds, though it seemed like 20 minutes, for that dog to begin bouncing around and barking. The CO gave me a look, because he knew what was happening. The K-9 Handler shouted to an older soldier with a young helper and they took off that panel a hell of a lot faster than I had put it on! He told the Handler that he could inspect the shelf and of course, out came my burlap sack full of coffee beans and Red Lebanese Hashish.
I was told to dismount from the tank and to follow 2 other MPs into an administration building on the Israeli side of the border. Inside they were matter of fact about the affair and I began to convince myself that it might turn out OK, after all we were incredibly short on manpower and I was deployed to a high priority echelon, Intelligence.
When they strip searched me I still imagined that at worst I would have to deal with a loss of rank, having made Corporal upon that re-deployment, and perhaps 1 digit on my Security Rating,something I could easily re-obtain in no time.
Yet, when I entered the large holdijg cell and saw it packed, absolutely packed with soldiers and NCOs I knew that the reason for the MP's non-chalant demeanour was the huge number of detainees and not the lack of intent on their part.
I entered the jail cell of my life. Except for transfers I wouldn't be leaving jail for what seemed to me to be a very long time. Right away I saw 2 men from my brigade, my original brigade since no matter where you end up down the road your "brigade" is the initial one you enter when you first enter the army. In addition I recognised a couple of other faces from Lebanon, times had begun to change in Israel.
Today is Sunday, August 1st, 2010 and it is now 529PM here in the South Bronx, New York City, USA.
Recap: I had been talking about the history of drugs in the Philippines.
This entry: I arrived back in the US late last night/early this morning after a direct flight, Manila to JFK, the largest Metro New York City airport. I had to come back for a quick hop to take care of some things having to do with 1 of my 2 American sons. The flight, directly, is about 22 hours on the clock because you have to cross the Date Line which means you cannot really go by anything other than Greenwich Mean Time or a stop watch.
The flight actually wasn't that bad and I am getting spoiled, this is my 2nd time back here without getting the full on digital search (hand up the Hershey Hiway). I am a convicted drug felon with a record in 2 nations soooooo...
I never got to that part of my life in my "My Life" entries so I suppose I could take some time and talk about it;
My 1st conviction was in Israel, in IDF Court (Military Court). I was assigned as a Liason to the Phalangist Office during my 1st (almost) 7 years in Southern Lebanon, when I was a teen. I had entered Active Duty just as I turned 16 and was deployed to a re-formulated Infantry Brigade, NACHAL, usually known as "Nahal" when talking to English speakers. The word Nachal is akin to the Arabic word, "Wadi," which really doesn't translate well into English. Basically, it is a dry creek bed in the desert that, during the very short tainy season is filled and even overflows with rushing water. The word for my Birgade however is an acronym for words meaning, "Young Fighting Pioneers."
It was one of the original Infantry Brigades in the nascent Haganah, the original Israeli Army but was deactivated in the late 1950s.
In June of 1982 Israel launched a massive invasion of Lebanon with the stated Objective of eliminating the PLO from lands bordering Israel since the PLO, of course, was using those lands to launch murderous attacks against Israeli civlians. Ideally we could have relied on Lebanon, the worst nation in this respect, to handle its own borders and reign in these terrorists.
Sadly, in 1969 Lebanon gave into the PLO and granted the organisation total control of its "Palestinian" Camps and a huge swath of land, in Southern Lebanon, called "PLOlandia." This abandonment of responsibility was formalised in the 1969 Ta'if Accords, signed in Saudi Arabia. Ta'if didn't sit well with every Lebanese faction and the Christians, of whom the Maronites were the most powerful, decided to do something about it.
This led to the First Lebanese Civil War in 1975 and Israeli involvement in 1977.
By 1982 we had come to a secret accord with the Maronites and the 1982 invasion was as much about this agreement as it was about neutralising the PLO's base of power in Lebanon. The 1982 invasion, "Operation Peace for Galilee" was so successful, for Israel, that within days our men were playing football (soccer) above the Presidential Palace in the hills above Beirut, having outrun their own supply lines, despite our government publicly committing itself to an incursion of less than 40km from our northern border.
The heady success of those first few days turned to abject horror when the Shi'a (Shite Muslims) who had thrown roses at us as we moved north began launching Suicide Bombings under Iranian tutelage. By the time my 16th birthday drew near, just after New Year's 1982 the honeymoon was over. On a per capita basis, in statistics relative to the US, we had more than 200,000 soldiers from Israel Killed in Action (remember our population was less than 3 milion at the time so that 1,000 Israelis in per capita terms equivocates to 200,000 US servicemen)!
This then is exactly why my brigade had been re-activated.
Imagine 200,000 American soldiers dying in 12 months? This is the war I entered officially in June of 1983, the war most Israelis see as our nation's equivalent to the American experience in Viet Nam.
Because of my speaking Arabic as a 1st Language, and my then having a promising Security Rating, I was kicked over to AMAN, Military Intel, and assigned as noted to the Phalangist (Maronite Army) Administration Building for Central Sector.
One of the fringe benefits of this deployment was that I was able to hitch rides back into Israel every other weekend for 2 days of rest and relaxation.
The Lebanon of the early 1980s was one that was a major heroin producer (Heroin #2) along with the top flight hashish that the country had been known for since the mid-1960s. Then, like now drugs in Lebanon were centered in the Beka'a Valley. Beka'a is a totally flat valley in the eastern part of the nation, near the Syrian Border. Syria itself had been a player in the heroin trade, as a processor of Turkish opium into Heroin #1, for the Corsican and Southern Italian and Sicilian producers operating in Italy and France. By the mid-1970s the Corsicans were shoved aside, along with Turkey, the major starting point for the Corsican trade.
Seeing a vaccum, some of the hashish producing clans of Beka'a turned their attention to poppy, or as in the case of some very smart producers, grew poppies for 140 days and then got in a crop of cannabis.
Israel up until that point was pretty much a nation without a real drug problem. Traditionally Jews have been users of both opium and hashish but it was seen as a vice of elderly men, or at worst something inbibed in 3 times a year (Jewish male adults are commanded to get high 3 times a year on certain holidays).
1983 changed Israel forever. Along with the equivalent of 200,000 soldiers dying, men were coming home severely addicted to cheap and incredibly potent heroin. In fact, "Rapid Detox" was invented by an IDF physician to treat seriously addicted Infantrymen.
Others, like myself, became addicted through morphine after being wounded in action but the end result was the same and finally the IDF found itself having to launch a major crackdown.
When it came time for my 3rd trip back into Israel for R and R one of my mates offered me a nice paycheck if I would ferry home 4 kilos of Lebanese Red Hashish. Seeing hashish as an innocent thing in comparison to the heroin, morphine and opium everybody was into I readily agreed.
He showed me how to secrete the nearly 10 pounds of hash inside a burlap rice sack packed with coffee beans, underneath a removable armour panel on an MkI tank. The panels were bolted on, remove the bolts of a particular panel and you had a readymade compartment for getting a small load across.
If the tank I was riding on was stopped I just needed to show my AMAN ID and Orders (a written letter stating that I shouldn't be uneccessarily detained at the Border). Sounded simple enough, famous last words.
So, on the day in question I was very confident...until we entered the Inspection Lane and I saw, for the 1st time, MPs with German Shepard dogs inspecting under every vehicle, even tanks.
About an hour and half later we pulled up and as we idled one MP inspected our papers, IDs and belongings in what was a new crackdown on contraband being shipped south (mostly souveneirs like weapons but also artifacts, bulk purchases in black market trade, etc).
As the dog bounced up and down by the armoured panel I felt naseous but it was if it were taking place in slow motion...
I will finish in my next entry...
Recap: I had been talking about the history of drugs in the Philippines.
This entry: I arrived back in the US late last night/early this morning after a direct flight, Manila to JFK, the largest Metro New York City airport. I had to come back for a quick hop to take care of some things having to do with 1 of my 2 American sons. The flight, directly, is about 22 hours on the clock because you have to cross the Date Line which means you cannot really go by anything other than Greenwich Mean Time or a stop watch.
The flight actually wasn't that bad and I am getting spoiled, this is my 2nd time back here without getting the full on digital search (hand up the Hershey Hiway). I am a convicted drug felon with a record in 2 nations soooooo...
I never got to that part of my life in my "My Life" entries so I suppose I could take some time and talk about it;
My 1st conviction was in Israel, in IDF Court (Military Court). I was assigned as a Liason to the Phalangist Office during my 1st (almost) 7 years in Southern Lebanon, when I was a teen. I had entered Active Duty just as I turned 16 and was deployed to a re-formulated Infantry Brigade, NACHAL, usually known as "Nahal" when talking to English speakers. The word Nachal is akin to the Arabic word, "Wadi," which really doesn't translate well into English. Basically, it is a dry creek bed in the desert that, during the very short tainy season is filled and even overflows with rushing water. The word for my Birgade however is an acronym for words meaning, "Young Fighting Pioneers."
It was one of the original Infantry Brigades in the nascent Haganah, the original Israeli Army but was deactivated in the late 1950s.
In June of 1982 Israel launched a massive invasion of Lebanon with the stated Objective of eliminating the PLO from lands bordering Israel since the PLO, of course, was using those lands to launch murderous attacks against Israeli civlians. Ideally we could have relied on Lebanon, the worst nation in this respect, to handle its own borders and reign in these terrorists.
Sadly, in 1969 Lebanon gave into the PLO and granted the organisation total control of its "Palestinian" Camps and a huge swath of land, in Southern Lebanon, called "PLOlandia." This abandonment of responsibility was formalised in the 1969 Ta'if Accords, signed in Saudi Arabia. Ta'if didn't sit well with every Lebanese faction and the Christians, of whom the Maronites were the most powerful, decided to do something about it.
This led to the First Lebanese Civil War in 1975 and Israeli involvement in 1977.
By 1982 we had come to a secret accord with the Maronites and the 1982 invasion was as much about this agreement as it was about neutralising the PLO's base of power in Lebanon. The 1982 invasion, "Operation Peace for Galilee" was so successful, for Israel, that within days our men were playing football (soccer) above the Presidential Palace in the hills above Beirut, having outrun their own supply lines, despite our government publicly committing itself to an incursion of less than 40km from our northern border.
The heady success of those first few days turned to abject horror when the Shi'a (Shite Muslims) who had thrown roses at us as we moved north began launching Suicide Bombings under Iranian tutelage. By the time my 16th birthday drew near, just after New Year's 1982 the honeymoon was over. On a per capita basis, in statistics relative to the US, we had more than 200,000 soldiers from Israel Killed in Action (remember our population was less than 3 milion at the time so that 1,000 Israelis in per capita terms equivocates to 200,000 US servicemen)!
This then is exactly why my brigade had been re-activated.
Imagine 200,000 American soldiers dying in 12 months? This is the war I entered officially in June of 1983, the war most Israelis see as our nation's equivalent to the American experience in Viet Nam.
Because of my speaking Arabic as a 1st Language, and my then having a promising Security Rating, I was kicked over to AMAN, Military Intel, and assigned as noted to the Phalangist (Maronite Army) Administration Building for Central Sector.
One of the fringe benefits of this deployment was that I was able to hitch rides back into Israel every other weekend for 2 days of rest and relaxation.
The Lebanon of the early 1980s was one that was a major heroin producer (Heroin #2) along with the top flight hashish that the country had been known for since the mid-1960s. Then, like now drugs in Lebanon were centered in the Beka'a Valley. Beka'a is a totally flat valley in the eastern part of the nation, near the Syrian Border. Syria itself had been a player in the heroin trade, as a processor of Turkish opium into Heroin #1, for the Corsican and Southern Italian and Sicilian producers operating in Italy and France. By the mid-1970s the Corsicans were shoved aside, along with Turkey, the major starting point for the Corsican trade.
Seeing a vaccum, some of the hashish producing clans of Beka'a turned their attention to poppy, or as in the case of some very smart producers, grew poppies for 140 days and then got in a crop of cannabis.
Israel up until that point was pretty much a nation without a real drug problem. Traditionally Jews have been users of both opium and hashish but it was seen as a vice of elderly men, or at worst something inbibed in 3 times a year (Jewish male adults are commanded to get high 3 times a year on certain holidays).
1983 changed Israel forever. Along with the equivalent of 200,000 soldiers dying, men were coming home severely addicted to cheap and incredibly potent heroin. In fact, "Rapid Detox" was invented by an IDF physician to treat seriously addicted Infantrymen.
Others, like myself, became addicted through morphine after being wounded in action but the end result was the same and finally the IDF found itself having to launch a major crackdown.
When it came time for my 3rd trip back into Israel for R and R one of my mates offered me a nice paycheck if I would ferry home 4 kilos of Lebanese Red Hashish. Seeing hashish as an innocent thing in comparison to the heroin, morphine and opium everybody was into I readily agreed.
He showed me how to secrete the nearly 10 pounds of hash inside a burlap rice sack packed with coffee beans, underneath a removable armour panel on an MkI tank. The panels were bolted on, remove the bolts of a particular panel and you had a readymade compartment for getting a small load across.
If the tank I was riding on was stopped I just needed to show my AMAN ID and Orders (a written letter stating that I shouldn't be uneccessarily detained at the Border). Sounded simple enough, famous last words.
So, on the day in question I was very confident...until we entered the Inspection Lane and I saw, for the 1st time, MPs with German Shepard dogs inspecting under every vehicle, even tanks.
About an hour and half later we pulled up and as we idled one MP inspected our papers, IDs and belongings in what was a new crackdown on contraband being shipped south (mostly souveneirs like weapons but also artifacts, bulk purchases in black market trade, etc).
As the dog bounced up and down by the armoured panel I felt naseous but it was if it were taking place in slow motion...
I will finish in my next entry...
Today I wept for someone I had never met. I only knew her mind as she presented it online. I loved her. I did not know that until now.
Soul Calibur IV has such fresh music. I mean the beats are just so dope. I want to remix this -- no wait -- I don't. I want someone else to do the work and remix this. I'm lazy and my remix would be the musical equivalent of having one's ears gang-raped by a pack of alpacas.
An alpaca pack.
An alpaca pack.
Today is Thursday, July 9, 2010 and it is now 650PM here in Quezon City, Luzon, Philippines.
Recap: 2 entries ago I began talking about drugs in the Philippines and when I got to the late 1960s, in the 1st entry, I meandered into a detailed rant about the differences between forms of heroin. The last entry dealt with these differences.
This Entry: In the late 1960s there was roughly 10 kgs of Heroin#3 being sold in Metro Manila each month, not that much all things considered, though a hell of a lot more than now (because now there is none, nada, zilch and zero).
The 1st lab operators were Ethnic Chinese, "Tsinoy," or "Chinoy" as Filipino-Chinese are known. Most Westerners see "Chinese" as a monolithic group, all being basically the same as the others. Not so, at all.
At first, the labs were operated by ethnic Fukkinese, the largest Chinese group in the country. Then, in 1965 an ethnic Chiu Chiu, a man named Lim Seng, branched out from his resturants and printing company and opened his own lab as well.
The Chiu Chiu have dominated the SE Asian heroin trade since the end of WWII. While certain ethnicities like the Fukkinese dominate certain nations as the most influential or largest Chinese ethnicity (outside of drugs, just in terms of population), the Chiu Chiu have dominated smuggling throught the SE Asian Chinese Diaspora (overseas Chinese Communities) since at least the late 19th Century CE/AD. After the WWII Era it was only natural then that the Chiu Chiu would gravitate to the heroin trade.
First, as smugglers and couriers and later as actual distributors the Chiu Chiu managed to carve out a very profitable niche for themselves. Lim Seng gained financial backing from fellow Chiu Chiu and began obtaining Heroin#1 (finished morphine hcl.) from Chiu Chiu distributors in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia, and later directly from the Thai groups that acted as middlemen between Burmese Ethnic Chinese manufacturers (ethnic Kokang and KMT Nationalists who quickly intermarried and became the backbone of the Burmese heroin trade) and Malaysian #3 manufacturers and distributors.
After ramping up production Lim Seng flooded the local market, driving down the price of a "papelito"(little paper, the name for a retail uniy of heroin consisting of 30 to 40mg of Heroin#3 ) until it was selling for the Philippine equivalent of US20 Cents. This quickly sunk his competitors leaving Lem Seng the only show in town, in fact the only retail distributor in all of the Philippines.
Smoking was the dominant route of administration by far, but Seng was looking to move beyond the 10kg he was averaging a month. Realising that he needed to manufacture Heroin#4 if he hoped to truly make big money, because that was the type in big demand throughout the West, he shopped for some Chiu Chiu chemists, finally hiring a man from Kowloon, in Hong Kong.
Though Hong Kong was likewise dominated by #3, local producers had begun making #4 for export, and had been slowly building a local market as well for the more expensive white powder. The presence of this new local market left a surplus of trained heroin chemists, and so Lim Seng began manufacturing #4, and distributing it to the US.
By 1970 he was distributing 1 tonne of Heroin#4 annually, with the US pegging his product at 10% of the entire US marketshare, and virtually all non-Mexican Heroin west of the Mississippi River.
By 1971 the Philippines was in social and political upheaval. Dictator Ferdinand Marcos was facing a huge amount of political unrest centered in the capitol, especially in Manila's universities. Looking for ways to deal with this growing threat he was without patience for other social problems, drug addiiction being one of the most pressing problems.
Trying to shore up crumbling public support he came out hard against crime and illegal drugs warning his underlings to put a stop to the local distribution. Seng was warned by his protectors in government to either stop producing local product or else move his base of operations to a quiet corner of the nation.
Arrogantly Seng refused and by September, 1972 found himself sitting with a gun to his head as the new anti-narcotics unit of the "PC" (Philippine Constalbury), "CANU" (Constalbury Anti- Narcotics Unit) searched his printing shoppe. Stupidly, Seng had secreted a large #4 lab on the premises allowing the investigators to catch Seng red handed with 50kg of heroin.
Taken to Fort Bonifacio, the HQ of the PC, he was sentenced by a 7 man Military Tribunal to Life in prison, after bribing at least 1 of the military officers on the Tribunal. Chief Commanding Officer of the PC and future President of the Philippines, Fidel Ramos was livid, as he saw the arrogance of Seng as a challenge on many levels.
About a week later PC officers "discovered" a very well detailed escape plan in Seng's prison cell. Lobbying Marcos for a rescinding of the Life sentence, Ramos got his wish when Seng was re-sentenced to death.
Just after New Year, 1973 Seng was shown on live TV joking and guffawing as his handlers released him from his cell and escorted him to Fort Bonifacio's Parade Ground. The camera shown Seng as he face became absolutely radiant, apprently thinking that his backers had finally worked out a "deal," certainly they had been given enough of his cash to do so.
As he was pushed towards what appeared to be a telephone pole his smile turned to horror. It wasn't until he had been tied to the pole that he began actually struggling, and as the blindfold was affixed viewers could see a look of abject terror on Seng's face, a look that remained as the rifles fired.
As Seng bled to death on the ground the country was transfixed. The execution had a lasting impact on the Philippines but for the addicts of Manila it was business as usual, for a short while anyway. 90 days later those US 20 Cent papelitos had increased in cost to almost US 3 Dollars. By 1974 the papelitos were gone along with the country's domestic heroin trade.
By 1980 Marcos had outlawed even prescription opiates and opioids except for 2, nabulphine hcl.and butorphanol tartrate. The 2 substances were considered by American authorities to have absolutely no abuse potential. In fact, nabulphine was until the new millenium and Tramadol, the only opiate/opioid to never have been "Schedualed."
By 1986 Marcos was overthrown but nothing changed in terms of opiates/opioids...until West African organisations began taking advantage of Filipino naievete on the subject.
Unlike virtually every other SE Asian Nation the Philippines harboured no paranoia about the substance and so it was easy getting in and out of the country without invasive searches. Additionally, and most importantly, the US felt that since no trade took place inside the country travellers from the Philippines were not worth scrutinising (this was long before the country became a methamphetamine centre).
By 1990 the vacation was over, when a joint American DEA and Philippine PDEA sting against heroin dealers turned up an uncomfortable reality.. The sting ended up with the 2 Filipino dealers shot to death at close range, under curious circumstances. The case became even more controversial when an investigation found that the 2 "dealers" were in reality high ranking AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) officers.
To be continued...
(Edited for spelling)
Recap: 2 entries ago I began talking about drugs in the Philippines and when I got to the late 1960s, in the 1st entry, I meandered into a detailed rant about the differences between forms of heroin. The last entry dealt with these differences.
This Entry: In the late 1960s there was roughly 10 kgs of Heroin#3 being sold in Metro Manila each month, not that much all things considered, though a hell of a lot more than now (because now there is none, nada, zilch and zero).
The 1st lab operators were Ethnic Chinese, "Tsinoy," or "Chinoy" as Filipino-Chinese are known. Most Westerners see "Chinese" as a monolithic group, all being basically the same as the others. Not so, at all.
At first, the labs were operated by ethnic Fukkinese, the largest Chinese group in the country. Then, in 1965 an ethnic Chiu Chiu, a man named Lim Seng, branched out from his resturants and printing company and opened his own lab as well.
The Chiu Chiu have dominated the SE Asian heroin trade since the end of WWII. While certain ethnicities like the Fukkinese dominate certain nations as the most influential or largest Chinese ethnicity (outside of drugs, just in terms of population), the Chiu Chiu have dominated smuggling throught the SE Asian Chinese Diaspora (overseas Chinese Communities) since at least the late 19th Century CE/AD. After the WWII Era it was only natural then that the Chiu Chiu would gravitate to the heroin trade.
First, as smugglers and couriers and later as actual distributors the Chiu Chiu managed to carve out a very profitable niche for themselves. Lim Seng gained financial backing from fellow Chiu Chiu and began obtaining Heroin#1 (finished morphine hcl.) from Chiu Chiu distributors in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia, and later directly from the Thai groups that acted as middlemen between Burmese Ethnic Chinese manufacturers (ethnic Kokang and KMT Nationalists who quickly intermarried and became the backbone of the Burmese heroin trade) and Malaysian #3 manufacturers and distributors.
After ramping up production Lim Seng flooded the local market, driving down the price of a "papelito"(little paper, the name for a retail uniy of heroin consisting of 30 to 40mg of Heroin#3 ) until it was selling for the Philippine equivalent of US20 Cents. This quickly sunk his competitors leaving Lem Seng the only show in town, in fact the only retail distributor in all of the Philippines.
Smoking was the dominant route of administration by far, but Seng was looking to move beyond the 10kg he was averaging a month. Realising that he needed to manufacture Heroin#4 if he hoped to truly make big money, because that was the type in big demand throughout the West, he shopped for some Chiu Chiu chemists, finally hiring a man from Kowloon, in Hong Kong.
Though Hong Kong was likewise dominated by #3, local producers had begun making #4 for export, and had been slowly building a local market as well for the more expensive white powder. The presence of this new local market left a surplus of trained heroin chemists, and so Lim Seng began manufacturing #4, and distributing it to the US.
By 1970 he was distributing 1 tonne of Heroin#4 annually, with the US pegging his product at 10% of the entire US marketshare, and virtually all non-Mexican Heroin west of the Mississippi River.
By 1971 the Philippines was in social and political upheaval. Dictator Ferdinand Marcos was facing a huge amount of political unrest centered in the capitol, especially in Manila's universities. Looking for ways to deal with this growing threat he was without patience for other social problems, drug addiiction being one of the most pressing problems.
Trying to shore up crumbling public support he came out hard against crime and illegal drugs warning his underlings to put a stop to the local distribution. Seng was warned by his protectors in government to either stop producing local product or else move his base of operations to a quiet corner of the nation.
Arrogantly Seng refused and by September, 1972 found himself sitting with a gun to his head as the new anti-narcotics unit of the "PC" (Philippine Constalbury), "CANU" (Constalbury Anti- Narcotics Unit) searched his printing shoppe. Stupidly, Seng had secreted a large #4 lab on the premises allowing the investigators to catch Seng red handed with 50kg of heroin.
Taken to Fort Bonifacio, the HQ of the PC, he was sentenced by a 7 man Military Tribunal to Life in prison, after bribing at least 1 of the military officers on the Tribunal. Chief Commanding Officer of the PC and future President of the Philippines, Fidel Ramos was livid, as he saw the arrogance of Seng as a challenge on many levels.
About a week later PC officers "discovered" a very well detailed escape plan in Seng's prison cell. Lobbying Marcos for a rescinding of the Life sentence, Ramos got his wish when Seng was re-sentenced to death.
Just after New Year, 1973 Seng was shown on live TV joking and guffawing as his handlers released him from his cell and escorted him to Fort Bonifacio's Parade Ground. The camera shown Seng as he face became absolutely radiant, apprently thinking that his backers had finally worked out a "deal," certainly they had been given enough of his cash to do so.
As he was pushed towards what appeared to be a telephone pole his smile turned to horror. It wasn't until he had been tied to the pole that he began actually struggling, and as the blindfold was affixed viewers could see a look of abject terror on Seng's face, a look that remained as the rifles fired.
As Seng bled to death on the ground the country was transfixed. The execution had a lasting impact on the Philippines but for the addicts of Manila it was business as usual, for a short while anyway. 90 days later those US 20 Cent papelitos had increased in cost to almost US 3 Dollars. By 1974 the papelitos were gone along with the country's domestic heroin trade.
By 1980 Marcos had outlawed even prescription opiates and opioids except for 2, nabulphine hcl.and butorphanol tartrate. The 2 substances were considered by American authorities to have absolutely no abuse potential. In fact, nabulphine was until the new millenium and Tramadol, the only opiate/opioid to never have been "Schedualed."
By 1986 Marcos was overthrown but nothing changed in terms of opiates/opioids...until West African organisations began taking advantage of Filipino naievete on the subject.
Unlike virtually every other SE Asian Nation the Philippines harboured no paranoia about the substance and so it was easy getting in and out of the country without invasive searches. Additionally, and most importantly, the US felt that since no trade took place inside the country travellers from the Philippines were not worth scrutinising (this was long before the country became a methamphetamine centre).
By 1990 the vacation was over, when a joint American DEA and Philippine PDEA sting against heroin dealers turned up an uncomfortable reality.. The sting ended up with the 2 Filipino dealers shot to death at close range, under curious circumstances. The case became even more controversial when an investigation found that the 2 "dealers" were in reality high ranking AFP (Armed Forces of the Philippines) officers.
To be continued...
(Edited for spelling)
there's a break in the stars where pipe dreams make way for the realities we can only brace ourselves for. among the hidden pleas of nightly calling i found your eyes transfixed on hopes in hues of indigo, clinging to fragments of simultaneous laughter and rolling down the long slope of each other. another point in coincidence that adheres to heavy planning, half chance but still all the wonders of the world.
i heard you alive in the trees with smiles that could reach for me and knowledge about tents and hand oils. with the night and the rain and the all encompassing deliverance of what my hand can feel in yours.
your taste left on the finger tips of daily happenings is more than agreeable. bountiful leavings of memory sweetly thought of in cool blankets. your things and my things. our things together.
i heard you alive in the trees with smiles that could reach for me and knowledge about tents and hand oils. with the night and the rain and the all encompassing deliverance of what my hand can feel in yours.
your taste left on the finger tips of daily happenings is more than agreeable. bountiful leavings of memory sweetly thought of in cool blankets. your things and my things. our things together.
Sitting here, smoking a spliff, stoned already from a tramadom/10mg Diazipams and a couple of lines of speed base..with plenty of strong coffee to keep me going for some time! - well awhile at least lol
This all worked out better than planned..as totally sad as it is to do, my first thought in the morning before getting out of bed is to mentally take drug inventory, and what i have in the house to use as 'breakfast'..this morning inventory was fairly sad and disheartening lol, i had some pill and some smoke left, but its the feeling i always get when its time to dry out and sober up for a bit. I know that a lot of people, especially those older than myself keep telling me to 'choke out' from smoking for awhile, and that when i do light up a spliff again it will knock me on my ass lol.. and i do believe them and know how that all works..but its the choking out bit i just cant seem to get through lol. and no i dont need professional assistance lol (unless that med assistance comes with a free and signed perscription pad
)
Anyhow, what at first impression was going to be a day of mainly being sobery i managed alright lol
My partner loves to take speed base, but doesnt smoke weed due to severely algergic reactions from it, and takes some perscription pills for fun, but hasnt ever been in the world i grew up in.. my father i smoked weed together for years when i started smoking and told him..it was a good thing to me as i got to know him as a person himself as well as a friend and not always parently, but still a positive and very strong, knowledgable influence imo..Where a my partners family were very prim proper and stuck up their own asses pretty much, amazingly mine escaped their bullshit head fucking. but he didnt do the drug society system that i started in at a fairly young age..so its nearly like being from two seperate planets at times lol..i swear. which, yeah, certainly keeps things......interestinng at least lol..
I will warn anyone that may have any random interest in going through my beginner blogs and any that i will do in the future..may be somewhat ranty/rambly and even times wholey unconnected so i am apologizing for this now in case but i will do my best to catch the issues before posting!
Would love to hear from others on their daily drug life elements, do you plan days around them or do you take them during normal work situations or whatever you may do work wise
curiosity indeed kill the cat
This all worked out better than planned..as totally sad as it is to do, my first thought in the morning before getting out of bed is to mentally take drug inventory, and what i have in the house to use as 'breakfast'..this morning inventory was fairly sad and disheartening lol, i had some pill and some smoke left, but its the feeling i always get when its time to dry out and sober up for a bit. I know that a lot of people, especially those older than myself keep telling me to 'choke out' from smoking for awhile, and that when i do light up a spliff again it will knock me on my ass lol.. and i do believe them and know how that all works..but its the choking out bit i just cant seem to get through lol. and no i dont need professional assistance lol (unless that med assistance comes with a free and signed perscription pad
)Anyhow, what at first impression was going to be a day of mainly being sobery i managed alright lol
My partner loves to take speed base, but doesnt smoke weed due to severely algergic reactions from it, and takes some perscription pills for fun, but hasnt ever been in the world i grew up in.. my father i smoked weed together for years when i started smoking and told him..it was a good thing to me as i got to know him as a person himself as well as a friend and not always parently, but still a positive and very strong, knowledgable influence imo..Where a my partners family were very prim proper and stuck up their own asses pretty much, amazingly mine escaped their bullshit head fucking. but he didnt do the drug society system that i started in at a fairly young age..so its nearly like being from two seperate planets at times lol..i swear. which, yeah, certainly keeps things......interestinng at least lol..
I will warn anyone that may have any random interest in going through my beginner blogs and any that i will do in the future..may be somewhat ranty/rambly and even times wholey unconnected so i am apologizing for this now in case but i will do my best to catch the issues before posting!
Would love to hear from others on their daily drug life elements, do you plan days around them or do you take them during normal work situations or whatever you may do work wise
curiosity indeed kill the cat
Today, whilst staring at the mirror at my pasty gormy eyed face it kinda hit me that I should probs take it a bit slower with all the drugs and drink and shit. I really need to learn how to do things in moderation and space things out a bit.
Also my vision has kind of fucked for the last few days and I constantly have really bad headaches. I've got a black shadow in my left eye and it's really been bothering me as everywhere I look, it's right there in the center of my vision. I really hope it's not the result of me being dumb a couple days ago and bombing some RC's. Or maybe from my lack of sleep and not eating much? I don't know I just hope it goes away soon.
to do list-
eat healthier, excerise more, sort out sleeping pattern, cut back on drugs/ drink, revise for resits, do c/w, sort out a car, get a job!, pay overdue rent, sort out that police/ court shit..
Also my vision has kind of fucked for the last few days and I constantly have really bad headaches. I've got a black shadow in my left eye and it's really been bothering me as everywhere I look, it's right there in the center of my vision. I really hope it's not the result of me being dumb a couple days ago and bombing some RC's. Or maybe from my lack of sleep and not eating much? I don't know I just hope it goes away soon.
to do list-
eat healthier, excerise more, sort out sleeping pattern, cut back on drugs/ drink, revise for resits, do c/w, sort out a car, get a job!, pay overdue rent, sort out that police/ court shit..
"I asked for some ope, he thougth I said 'dope' adn pulled out a bag of shwag."
A few nights ago, I squirted some liquid from a partially dissolved piece of "tar heroin" up my nose to see if it would do anything and not kill me. It didnt' burn. I waited a few minutes. Nothing. I squirted the rest of the water up my nose, tilted my head back, waited a few minutes, flushed the rest of the undissolved chunk down the toilet, and threw the nasty blackened spoon down the garbage shoot so my gf wouldn't find it. She doesnt' know about my very occaisonal heroin or cocaine use. For me, heroin or another opiate 3 or 4 times per year, cocaine once every year or so on my birthday or something... That pattern has worked out great for 10 years or so now. The other stuff: marijuana, psychedelics, coffee, alcohol are the only things she approves of. After a little while, I think I felt a little bit of a rush, but it was getting late so I went to bed, read for a few minutes, then went to sleep. My gf had alerady gone to bed and fallen asleep.
I woke early this morning (the other morning by now) around sunrise. A_'s (my gf) bedroom faces East, and its large windows open over Downtown, the Financial District, and across the Bay and to the hills above Oakland and Berkeley. The first morning light through these windows always wakes me. As I got out of bed I noticed that my ankles were raw and bleeding from ragged fingernail-shaped scratches. After a moment I remembered them itching very badly during the night. Maybe this was due to the chunk of fake tar heroin I had dissolved in water and insufflated last night. Maybe it was really impure or maybe I prepared it the wrong way, but whatever was wrong with it, there still might have been enough heroin in it to do someting subtle. Come to think of it, I did get a little bit of a rush and felt warm before I went to sleep last night. A_ noticed my wounds when I put some shea butter lotion on them. She scolded me like a small child for scratching myself bloody.
One of the problems I have when sharing a room with someone is that their thoughts intrude into my own headspace during the night. This I know is a purely subjective experience. It happens when I'm very relaxed and my mind is empty of thought, but it only happens in the presence of others. Overnight train rides or flights are the worst. Sharing a tent is bad too. It's a horrible cacophany of voices, songs, music blasting in my head. The sound sources are directional, and I can tell the people around me are emitting the "sounds." ---The sounds come from the people near me.
When it happens, it keeps me from resting properly. I can force myself fully awake and find my surroundings to be dead silent. But relax again and the noise comes back. And drugs exacerbate my sensitivity to this intrusion. So, the last few hours of last (the night of the tar) night were difficult. I was very relaxed, not asleep but not awake, just somewhere in between. Some of this time, A_ wasn't dreaming. In an in-between dream, but still deep sleep cycle, she was cycling or looping through a certain sequence of repetitive thoughts over and over for what seemed hours. Not a proper dream and not conscious thought, just her sleeping brain processing information fromt he day before. Kind of like the brain venting off the previous day's stress. I think most peopel do it. Mostly, the thoughts were emotionally charged with worry. She was looping on about how she was afraid I was going to leave her. This thought and others followed the worry theme of her sleep-thoughts. It upset me greatly. She has never told me about these worries before. Maybe I should ask her what's why she feels this way.
A few nights ago, I squirted some liquid from a partially dissolved piece of "tar heroin" up my nose to see if it would do anything and not kill me. It didnt' burn. I waited a few minutes. Nothing. I squirted the rest of the water up my nose, tilted my head back, waited a few minutes, flushed the rest of the undissolved chunk down the toilet, and threw the nasty blackened spoon down the garbage shoot so my gf wouldn't find it. She doesnt' know about my very occaisonal heroin or cocaine use. For me, heroin or another opiate 3 or 4 times per year, cocaine once every year or so on my birthday or something... That pattern has worked out great for 10 years or so now. The other stuff: marijuana, psychedelics, coffee, alcohol are the only things she approves of. After a little while, I think I felt a little bit of a rush, but it was getting late so I went to bed, read for a few minutes, then went to sleep. My gf had alerady gone to bed and fallen asleep.
I woke early this morning (the other morning by now) around sunrise. A_'s (my gf) bedroom faces East, and its large windows open over Downtown, the Financial District, and across the Bay and to the hills above Oakland and Berkeley. The first morning light through these windows always wakes me. As I got out of bed I noticed that my ankles were raw and bleeding from ragged fingernail-shaped scratches. After a moment I remembered them itching very badly during the night. Maybe this was due to the chunk of fake tar heroin I had dissolved in water and insufflated last night. Maybe it was really impure or maybe I prepared it the wrong way, but whatever was wrong with it, there still might have been enough heroin in it to do someting subtle. Come to think of it, I did get a little bit of a rush and felt warm before I went to sleep last night. A_ noticed my wounds when I put some shea butter lotion on them. She scolded me like a small child for scratching myself bloody.
One of the problems I have when sharing a room with someone is that their thoughts intrude into my own headspace during the night. This I know is a purely subjective experience. It happens when I'm very relaxed and my mind is empty of thought, but it only happens in the presence of others. Overnight train rides or flights are the worst. Sharing a tent is bad too. It's a horrible cacophany of voices, songs, music blasting in my head. The sound sources are directional, and I can tell the people around me are emitting the "sounds." ---The sounds come from the people near me.
When it happens, it keeps me from resting properly. I can force myself fully awake and find my surroundings to be dead silent. But relax again and the noise comes back. And drugs exacerbate my sensitivity to this intrusion. So, the last few hours of last (the night of the tar) night were difficult. I was very relaxed, not asleep but not awake, just somewhere in between. Some of this time, A_ wasn't dreaming. In an in-between dream, but still deep sleep cycle, she was cycling or looping through a certain sequence of repetitive thoughts over and over for what seemed hours. Not a proper dream and not conscious thought, just her sleeping brain processing information fromt he day before. Kind of like the brain venting off the previous day's stress. I think most peopel do it. Mostly, the thoughts were emotionally charged with worry. She was looping on about how she was afraid I was going to leave her. This thought and others followed the worry theme of her sleep-thoughts. It upset me greatly. She has never told me about these worries before. Maybe I should ask her what's why she feels this way.
http://www.redroom.com/video/%E2%80%9Cdinosauria-we%E2%80%9D-charles-bukowski
Dinosauria, We
by Charles Bukowski
Born like this
Into this
As the chalk faces smile
As Mrs. Death laughs
As the elevators break
As political landscapes dissolve
As the supermarket bag boy holds a college degree
As the oily fish spit out their oily prey
As the sun is masked
We are
Born like this
Into this
Into these carefully mad wars
Into the sight of broken factory windows of emptiness
Into bars where people no longer speak to each other
Into fist fights that end as shootings and knifings
Born into this
Into hospitals which are so expensive that it's cheaper to die
Into lawyers who charge so much it's cheaper to plead guilty
Into a country where the jails are full and the madhouses closed
Into a place where the masses elevate fools into rich heroes
Born into this
Walking and living through this
Dying because of this
Muted because of this
Castrated
Debauched
Disinherited
Because of this
Fooled by this
Used by this
Pissed on by this
Made crazy and sick by this
Made violent
Made inhuman
By this
The heart is blackened
The fingers reach for the throat
The gun
The knife
The bomb
The fingers reach toward an unresponsive god
The fingers reach for the bottle
The pill
The powder
We are born into this sorrowful deadliness
We are born into a government 60 years in debt
That soon will be unable to even pay the interest on that debt
And the banks will burn
Money will be useless
There will be open and unpunished murder in the streets
It will be guns and roving mobs
Land will be useless
Food will become a diminishing return
Nuclear power will be taken over by the many
Explosions will continually shake the earth
Radiated robot men will stalk each other
The rich and the chosen will watch from space platforms
Dante's Inferno will be made to look like a children's playground
The sun will not be seen and it will always be night
Trees will die
All vegetation will die
Radiated men will eat the flesh of radiated men
The sea will be poisoned
The lakes and rivers will vanish
Rain will be the new gold
The rotting bodies of men and animals will stink in the dark wind
The last few survivors will be overtaken by new and hideous diseases
And the space platforms will be destroyed by attrition
The petering out of supplies
The natural effect of general decay
And there will be the most beautiful silence never heard
Born out of that.
The sun still hidden there
Awaiting the next chapter.
My gf and I are bouncing between Portland Ore and San Fran Cal for the foreseeable future until one of us finds a permanent job in either city. We currently each have temporary jobs whose duration is unspecified. She still has her apartment in SF. And there is a neighbor with a wifi router designated "sexygirl69" who has been generously donating internet access to her neighbors, including me...
Now that it's summer, it's easy to take time off work to travel. I'm tryign to think of some place to go for a 4 day weekend. Maybe backpacking. The Sierra Club in the Bay Area is very active in backpacking, hiking, peak-bagging, etc. Maybe I will try to hook up with them (the under 40 crowd, not the usual geriatrics who limp along unbelievably slowly and make a 3 hour hike take 12 hours) and
A few days ago, I noticed that my Teva sandals (bought 10 years ago) had started to delaminate -- the sole of the left sandal was starting to peel off. So yesterday, I glued it back on with silicone sealant and let it cure overnight. I'm wearign them again today and they are staying together. so far so good.
Yesterday, I went down to the waterfront and bought what I thought was tar heroin (I know, never buy drugs on the street. The current experience only confirms this.). The guy selling it broke it off a larger piece he was keeping in a black plastic bag. When I tried to dissolve it, it was hard and chunky and only partially dissolved in a bit of water in a spoon when heated. It had a strong vinegar smell that was almost floral. I've never seen tar before --- I was pretty sure by now that I had been ripped off, but still, I squirted some of it up my nose to see if it would do anything and not kill me.
Now that it's summer, it's easy to take time off work to travel. I'm tryign to think of some place to go for a 4 day weekend. Maybe backpacking. The Sierra Club in the Bay Area is very active in backpacking, hiking, peak-bagging, etc. Maybe I will try to hook up with them (the under 40 crowd, not the usual geriatrics who limp along unbelievably slowly and make a 3 hour hike take 12 hours) and
A few days ago, I noticed that my Teva sandals (bought 10 years ago) had started to delaminate -- the sole of the left sandal was starting to peel off. So yesterday, I glued it back on with silicone sealant and let it cure overnight. I'm wearign them again today and they are staying together. so far so good.
Yesterday, I went down to the waterfront and bought what I thought was tar heroin (I know, never buy drugs on the street. The current experience only confirms this.). The guy selling it broke it off a larger piece he was keeping in a black plastic bag. When I tried to dissolve it, it was hard and chunky and only partially dissolved in a bit of water in a spoon when heated. It had a strong vinegar smell that was almost floral. I've never seen tar before --- I was pretty sure by now that I had been ripped off, but still, I squirted some of it up my nose to see if it would do anything and not kill me.
This journal entry is a long rant, and it is probably offensive and misogynistic. For this reason, I am putting it in NSFW tags.
So, I was standing in the electronics aisle looking for video consoles and game disks or cartridges for various incarnations of Atari, Nintendo, Playstation, XBox, etc. Suddenly, there was a commotion at the other end of the aisle. I looked -- Some monstrous creature was soundlessly gliding toward me. Startled and frightened shoppers frantically scrambled out of its way leaving a clear a path before it. I had been examining a fine Leica lens photo developer aparatus ($25) and nearly dropped it when I saw it. My eyes must have nearly bugged out of my head with fright. I am ashamed of my reaction. This is the only time in my life that I was actually shocked by the appearance of another human being. Though to be fair to myself, it still hadn't registered in my mind that she was in fact a human. It took a long crazy moment for me to start to realize what I was seeing. During this long moment, all kinds of thoughts ran through my head. My response was visceral, like fight or flight panic. Some nightmare entity, a shuggoth out of Lovecraft I first thought, out of a bad trip had somehow gotten into Good Will and now bore down on me. Or maybe I was about to be run down by a piece of heavy machinery, like a fork lift, that some madman on a homicidal rampage just hijacked or even a robot running amok. Or soemthing from a horror movie. I stared, frozen like the proverbial deer caught in headlights, at the oncoming danger.
Slowly, what I saw started to make sense. She was piloting some kind of tricked out gurney. This gurney was enormous, being very wide and reinforced with extra support posts and heavy wheels -- In hindsight, these modifications must have been necessary for the contraption to bear such a large mass. Her weight must have been near 1/2 ton and far too heavy for ordinary human legs (Or a wheel chair or even a power chair) to support. The gurney had been rigged with a motor and joy stick to control it. Mounted on the back were several gas cylinders with a network of tubes and wires coming out of them. One of them was most likely an oxygen tank since it fed a breathing tube that was wedged under her nose. I still hadn't recovered from my shock and all of this must have happened in a couple of seconds, but it seems much longer. The oncoming vehicle had pillows, and pink blankets draped everything, pilot and gurney included. blankets. In an opening in one of her blankets, I noticed a bare arm that was carrot orange in color and swollen to more than 1 foot in thickness. I glanced at her face. Also carrot orange, the distended folds of flesh were covered with boils and pustules that had first given me the impression of erupting with myriads of eyes. She (still not quite sure on the gender) was attended by a skinny boy or man, himself a contrasting oddity beside her with his extreme thinness and gangly-ness (120 pounds, 6' or so, 20-40 years old, no idea how old really). Picture the scene from the David Lynch's 1980s Dune movie. Baron Harkonen (she was much fatter). attended by his catamite. Horrible boils, carrot-colored skin, breathing apparatus, levitating machine for moving around, she had it all. The man/boy would grab various kitchen appliances off the shelves when she pointed at them and hold them close to her squinting face so she could see them better. How could having yet more ways to prepare food help her? Anyway, they interacted liek they could be a couple. Some men are into that.
I eventually broke free of the fascination and "hid" in another part of the store that was buffered within a tight maze of heavy furniture. She went up and down several more of the wide aisles, always sweeping them clear of other shoppers. A little later, I noticed her cut to the front of a long checkout line. Not waiting your turn in a long queue is considered extremely rude in the US, but nobody said anything when she did it. Actually, the entire line of peopel sort of fell apart and moved away as she approached, so I'm not 100% sure what happened there- if she did it on purpose or not, but she did steer for the head of the line.
NSFW:
Late in the cool, sunny afternoon the other day, I was shopping at the second-hand store "Good Will." Good Will is a nation-wide retail thrift store chain taht uses its revenue to provide employment, training, and other services to those who need it. I play video games as a hobby, and one genre of games I'm interested is old TV-set console games. GoodWill sells these games taht cost several hundred dollars a few years ago for $5-$10 today.It was a terrible, indescribable thing vaster than any subway train—a shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly self-luminous, and with myriads of temporary eyes forming and un-forming as pustules of greenish light all over the tunnel-filling front that bore down upon us, crushing the frantic penguins and slithering over the glistening floor that it and its kind had swept so evilly free of all litter.
— H. P. Lovecraft, At The Mountains of Madness
So, I was standing in the electronics aisle looking for video consoles and game disks or cartridges for various incarnations of Atari, Nintendo, Playstation, XBox, etc. Suddenly, there was a commotion at the other end of the aisle. I looked -- Some monstrous creature was soundlessly gliding toward me. Startled and frightened shoppers frantically scrambled out of its way leaving a clear a path before it. I had been examining a fine Leica lens photo developer aparatus ($25) and nearly dropped it when I saw it. My eyes must have nearly bugged out of my head with fright. I am ashamed of my reaction. This is the only time in my life that I was actually shocked by the appearance of another human being. Though to be fair to myself, it still hadn't registered in my mind that she was in fact a human. It took a long crazy moment for me to start to realize what I was seeing. During this long moment, all kinds of thoughts ran through my head. My response was visceral, like fight or flight panic. Some nightmare entity, a shuggoth out of Lovecraft I first thought, out of a bad trip had somehow gotten into Good Will and now bore down on me. Or maybe I was about to be run down by a piece of heavy machinery, like a fork lift, that some madman on a homicidal rampage just hijacked or even a robot running amok. Or soemthing from a horror movie. I stared, frozen like the proverbial deer caught in headlights, at the oncoming danger.
Slowly, what I saw started to make sense. She was piloting some kind of tricked out gurney. This gurney was enormous, being very wide and reinforced with extra support posts and heavy wheels -- In hindsight, these modifications must have been necessary for the contraption to bear such a large mass. Her weight must have been near 1/2 ton and far too heavy for ordinary human legs (Or a wheel chair or even a power chair) to support. The gurney had been rigged with a motor and joy stick to control it. Mounted on the back were several gas cylinders with a network of tubes and wires coming out of them. One of them was most likely an oxygen tank since it fed a breathing tube that was wedged under her nose. I still hadn't recovered from my shock and all of this must have happened in a couple of seconds, but it seems much longer. The oncoming vehicle had pillows, and pink blankets draped everything, pilot and gurney included. blankets. In an opening in one of her blankets, I noticed a bare arm that was carrot orange in color and swollen to more than 1 foot in thickness. I glanced at her face. Also carrot orange, the distended folds of flesh were covered with boils and pustules that had first given me the impression of erupting with myriads of eyes. She (still not quite sure on the gender) was attended by a skinny boy or man, himself a contrasting oddity beside her with his extreme thinness and gangly-ness (120 pounds, 6' or so, 20-40 years old, no idea how old really). Picture the scene from the David Lynch's 1980s Dune movie. Baron Harkonen (she was much fatter). attended by his catamite. Horrible boils, carrot-colored skin, breathing apparatus, levitating machine for moving around, she had it all. The man/boy would grab various kitchen appliances off the shelves when she pointed at them and hold them close to her squinting face so she could see them better. How could having yet more ways to prepare food help her? Anyway, they interacted liek they could be a couple. Some men are into that.
I eventually broke free of the fascination and "hid" in another part of the store that was buffered within a tight maze of heavy furniture. She went up and down several more of the wide aisles, always sweeping them clear of other shoppers. A little later, I noticed her cut to the front of a long checkout line. Not waiting your turn in a long queue is considered extremely rude in the US, but nobody said anything when she did it. Actually, the entire line of peopel sort of fell apart and moved away as she approached, so I'm not 100% sure what happened there- if she did it on purpose or not, but she did steer for the head of the line.
Today is Tuesday, July 27, 2010 and it is now 853PM here in Makati, Luzon, Philippines.
Recap: I was talking about expats here in the Philippines, and about the Japanese kidnapping victim from Sulu.
This entry: One of the important facets of my life, naturally, is my 26 year addiction to opiates and opioids. What is the difference between the 2? An "opiate" is a substance wholly or mostly manufactured from opium alkaloids. An "opioid" is a substance, synthetic OR natural, that closely mimics the physiological mechanics of an opiate.
There is a suprising amount of ignorance on this issue, even among pharmacologists, and if you can imagine. Morphine, the creme de la creme of opiates, is sometimes misindentified as an "opioid" simply because it is chemically extracted from opium. Very often "opioids," oxymorphone for example,an analogue of morphine, is listed as an "opiate" because of a structure similar to morphine.
Opium, as most people know, is the sap of the poppy. There are 3 forms of poppy that produce opium with discernible alakloidal content (enough alakloids to notice), but only 2 that are worth talking about. Most people ignorantly believe only 1 form, Papaver Somiferum, can produce the sap.
Papaver Setigerum, a shorter plant can produce it just as well but the alakloids are roughly half as much as you would find in the average uncultivated Somniferum. The 3rd variety has a discernible amount but roughly trace level which means that unless you are hugely into botany, it won't matter, hence I will ignore it.
The Philippines is a strange nation. OK, THAT is well established, but I mean in terms of opiates/opioids and "drugs" in general.
We are in SE Asia, but far enough from Mainland Asia so that there are real differences in the drug scene.
Up until the 1970s the country was like the rest of the region, albeit in much smaller quantities. Opium was prevalent anywhere "Sangleys" (Chinese) lived. Until the early 20th Century the government liscenced opium dens and opium shoppes, but only ethnic Chinese were ever liscenced consumers.
The Spanish, who ruled this country until 1898 basically took the same live and let live attitude that other colonial powers did. One found opium shoppes all over the continent and they still exist in India. Singapore, extremely anal about drugs now, had them until the 1960s, as did Malaysia, etc.
America took over the Philippines several months after Spain abandoned it. At first it was business as usual. America after all sold heroin through the Sears Catalogue in infant elixirs and cocaine was in soda pop.
Then came the American Temperance movement, which long before it turned its rabid attentions to alcohol was fixated upon cocaine and opiates (there were no opioids then).
The Harrison Act in 1914 basically shut down the legal trade in the US (it required heavy taxation though substances were still legal per se). By the early 1920s physicians could no longer freely prescribe heroin and cocaine for addiction maintenance, despite most addicts still being white, middle class and female.
It was the Temprance Movement that changed American perceptions, painting opiates and cocaine as substances that unleashed the animal instincts in non-whites. Pamphlets had "Steppin" and "Fetchit" type characters in blackface taking a hit of cocaine and turning into crazed jungle killers. The racial connotations preyed upon American ignorance and helped turn the tide against what was really an issue for white middle class America.
At this point America began clamping down in the Philippines, closing many of the liscened shoppes and dens and pushing it into the underground, where it became a hugely profitable enterprise that spawned all sorts of related crime (sound familiar?).
From then until WWII Manila at least, had a thriving underground scene, mostly in morphine hypodermic tablets, uncoloured water soluble 1/4 grain tablets for injection, and loose phamaceutically pure cocaine.
The War came and of course everything became scarce. The main source of opiates at that point was the Shanghai and Tsientsien combinations in Eastern China. These syndicates were Triad controlled (Chinese organised crime) and manufactured morphine and heroin tablets in professional labs, tabletting them in licit factories.
The Japanese first invaded Eastern China, colour that trade extinct. The Philippines saw its supply quickly dry up, with any existing stocks depelted by the time Pearl Harbor took place and shut down most of the trans-Pacific trade (colour cocaine extinct as well).
After WWII things never returned to pre-war levels but by the 1960s there was a small but solid heroin scene in Metro Manila. It expanded so rapidly in the late 1960s that there were at least 3 medium scale heroin labs in the city, all competing for local business, selling Heroin #3.
The heroin numbering system is an invention of the American DEA, another facet of American ignorance.
There are 4 numbered types:
#1: Finished Morphine.
As we see, it is not even heroin, ergo extremely ignorant. It was included in the system because it was, at the time the system was devised in 1971, a separate commodity in the manufacturing food chain.
The term "Finished" refers to it being highly pure morphine hcl.and not the usual impure freebase often utilised in illicit heroin labs.
Producers in SE Asia'a Golden Triangle (Burma, Thailand and Laos) manufactured #1 as a commodity, as something they traded at a price higher than the usual morphine, because of the ease in manufacturing heroin when using #1.
Pressed into 700 gramme blocks imprinted with brand names, it was sold to labs as far afield as Hong Kong. #1 fell off the radar in the late 1990s and until 2005 was only being made in 1 small lab in Burma and only being sold in 1 small area of the Malaysian bush just south of Pattani. Since then there hasn't been any sighted, though that isn't neccessarily the end of it. Still, my money is on "extinct."
#2: Heroin Freebase.
Freebase in this case 1st being a salt that is reverted back to a freebase for ease in the final manufacture.
In the very early 1980s, with a huge shift in West Asian manufacturing from Turkey/Syria into Lebanon, and from Pakistan into Afghanistan manufacturers began selling Freebase as an end product to consumers, as opposed to a separate commodity in the chain of manufacture, as was the case with Heroin#1.
Until this point, heroin smoking in Europe, which began in the Netherlands with Heroin #3 from Hong Kong and Thailand was a very localised phenomenon. Most other European product was Heroin#4, purely for injection.
Today Europe is almost entirely taken with Heroin #2, though it is also used for injection with a catalyst of citric or absorbic acid to adjust the pH.
#3: Heroin hcl. Specifically prepared for smoking at POM (Point of Manufacture). After manufacture, unpurified heroin hcl, is mixed with an admixture of caffeine, strychnine,quinine, flavourings (vanillin, rosewater) and colourings (red, grey, pearl white). It is then moistned over a steam bath and forced through a mold to produce uniform pellet sized granules.
Heroin, to be smoked effectively must have a melting point (m.p.) closely in synch with its vapourisation point (v.p.). In other words, the point at which the heroin melts must be close to the point in which it starts to vapourise.
In its natural state heroin hcl. will melt long before it vapourises. In other words, it disappears before you can even inhale it.
A way to avoid this is to add a substance that will bring those 2 points into a close alignment so that the majority of the heroin will vapourise before dissolving.
That is where the caffeine comes into play. Caffeine has a higher m.p., and by adding up to 40% by weight and mixing all of the powders optimally you are able to stall the melting sufficiently, so that you can enjoy enough of the vapour.
The flavourings, strychnine and quinine relate to the East China trade in the early 20th Century. The labs used to use these agents to give the heroin tablets, which were made for smoking, a noticeably chemical taste. Opium, for a long time, had been mixed with powderised aspirin to optimise burning. This admixture of asprin and latex produced a noticeable odor when burned, one addicts associated with a quality experience.
The manufacturers of heroin tablets had a suprisingly difficult time building product cachet, people didn't want to forgo opium, which offered extreme ritualisation, the preperation of latex and asprin, getting it ready for smoking with repeated heatings and molding with needles and finger tips, the laying of head and even the way in which the pipe was cradled were all part of the experience.
The heroin manufacturers wanted to re-create some of that and so they attempted to pattern their product in that fashion. Crumbling a tablet into a cigarette just didn't hold the same experience, but IF they could cheaply reproduce the taste, they had a chance.
Strychnine isn't harmful in trace amounts, quinine was OK in moderate dosages and so it was a 90:10 quinine:strychine mix, with the vanillin,etc. added as perfume, just as opium sometimes had it added as well. The colouring was a form of branding, like a trademark. #3 also carried this practice as well.
Heroin #3 disappeared from all but a tiny area in Kuala Lampur and Perang in Malaysia in the mid 1990s. By the turn of the millenium the form was extinct.
#4: Heroin hcl. Specifically prepared for injection at POM.
The technical definition is extremely pure and de-colourised but by virtue of the end point being injection, latex based varieties like "Mexican Tar" and "Homebaked" are also, technically, #4.
Continued...
(Edited for spelling)
Recap: I was talking about expats here in the Philippines, and about the Japanese kidnapping victim from Sulu.
This entry: One of the important facets of my life, naturally, is my 26 year addiction to opiates and opioids. What is the difference between the 2? An "opiate" is a substance wholly or mostly manufactured from opium alkaloids. An "opioid" is a substance, synthetic OR natural, that closely mimics the physiological mechanics of an opiate.
There is a suprising amount of ignorance on this issue, even among pharmacologists, and if you can imagine. Morphine, the creme de la creme of opiates, is sometimes misindentified as an "opioid" simply because it is chemically extracted from opium. Very often "opioids," oxymorphone for example,an analogue of morphine, is listed as an "opiate" because of a structure similar to morphine.
Opium, as most people know, is the sap of the poppy. There are 3 forms of poppy that produce opium with discernible alakloidal content (enough alakloids to notice), but only 2 that are worth talking about. Most people ignorantly believe only 1 form, Papaver Somiferum, can produce the sap.
Papaver Setigerum, a shorter plant can produce it just as well but the alakloids are roughly half as much as you would find in the average uncultivated Somniferum. The 3rd variety has a discernible amount but roughly trace level which means that unless you are hugely into botany, it won't matter, hence I will ignore it.
The Philippines is a strange nation. OK, THAT is well established, but I mean in terms of opiates/opioids and "drugs" in general.
We are in SE Asia, but far enough from Mainland Asia so that there are real differences in the drug scene.
Up until the 1970s the country was like the rest of the region, albeit in much smaller quantities. Opium was prevalent anywhere "Sangleys" (Chinese) lived. Until the early 20th Century the government liscenced opium dens and opium shoppes, but only ethnic Chinese were ever liscenced consumers.
The Spanish, who ruled this country until 1898 basically took the same live and let live attitude that other colonial powers did. One found opium shoppes all over the continent and they still exist in India. Singapore, extremely anal about drugs now, had them until the 1960s, as did Malaysia, etc.
America took over the Philippines several months after Spain abandoned it. At first it was business as usual. America after all sold heroin through the Sears Catalogue in infant elixirs and cocaine was in soda pop.
Then came the American Temperance movement, which long before it turned its rabid attentions to alcohol was fixated upon cocaine and opiates (there were no opioids then).
The Harrison Act in 1914 basically shut down the legal trade in the US (it required heavy taxation though substances were still legal per se). By the early 1920s physicians could no longer freely prescribe heroin and cocaine for addiction maintenance, despite most addicts still being white, middle class and female.
It was the Temprance Movement that changed American perceptions, painting opiates and cocaine as substances that unleashed the animal instincts in non-whites. Pamphlets had "Steppin" and "Fetchit" type characters in blackface taking a hit of cocaine and turning into crazed jungle killers. The racial connotations preyed upon American ignorance and helped turn the tide against what was really an issue for white middle class America.
At this point America began clamping down in the Philippines, closing many of the liscened shoppes and dens and pushing it into the underground, where it became a hugely profitable enterprise that spawned all sorts of related crime (sound familiar?).
From then until WWII Manila at least, had a thriving underground scene, mostly in morphine hypodermic tablets, uncoloured water soluble 1/4 grain tablets for injection, and loose phamaceutically pure cocaine.
The War came and of course everything became scarce. The main source of opiates at that point was the Shanghai and Tsientsien combinations in Eastern China. These syndicates were Triad controlled (Chinese organised crime) and manufactured morphine and heroin tablets in professional labs, tabletting them in licit factories.
The Japanese first invaded Eastern China, colour that trade extinct. The Philippines saw its supply quickly dry up, with any existing stocks depelted by the time Pearl Harbor took place and shut down most of the trans-Pacific trade (colour cocaine extinct as well).
After WWII things never returned to pre-war levels but by the 1960s there was a small but solid heroin scene in Metro Manila. It expanded so rapidly in the late 1960s that there were at least 3 medium scale heroin labs in the city, all competing for local business, selling Heroin #3.
The heroin numbering system is an invention of the American DEA, another facet of American ignorance.
There are 4 numbered types:
#1: Finished Morphine.
As we see, it is not even heroin, ergo extremely ignorant. It was included in the system because it was, at the time the system was devised in 1971, a separate commodity in the manufacturing food chain.
The term "Finished" refers to it being highly pure morphine hcl.and not the usual impure freebase often utilised in illicit heroin labs.
Producers in SE Asia'a Golden Triangle (Burma, Thailand and Laos) manufactured #1 as a commodity, as something they traded at a price higher than the usual morphine, because of the ease in manufacturing heroin when using #1.
Pressed into 700 gramme blocks imprinted with brand names, it was sold to labs as far afield as Hong Kong. #1 fell off the radar in the late 1990s and until 2005 was only being made in 1 small lab in Burma and only being sold in 1 small area of the Malaysian bush just south of Pattani. Since then there hasn't been any sighted, though that isn't neccessarily the end of it. Still, my money is on "extinct."
#2: Heroin Freebase.
Freebase in this case 1st being a salt that is reverted back to a freebase for ease in the final manufacture.
In the very early 1980s, with a huge shift in West Asian manufacturing from Turkey/Syria into Lebanon, and from Pakistan into Afghanistan manufacturers began selling Freebase as an end product to consumers, as opposed to a separate commodity in the chain of manufacture, as was the case with Heroin#1.
Until this point, heroin smoking in Europe, which began in the Netherlands with Heroin #3 from Hong Kong and Thailand was a very localised phenomenon. Most other European product was Heroin#4, purely for injection.
Today Europe is almost entirely taken with Heroin #2, though it is also used for injection with a catalyst of citric or absorbic acid to adjust the pH.
#3: Heroin hcl. Specifically prepared for smoking at POM (Point of Manufacture). After manufacture, unpurified heroin hcl, is mixed with an admixture of caffeine, strychnine,quinine, flavourings (vanillin, rosewater) and colourings (red, grey, pearl white). It is then moistned over a steam bath and forced through a mold to produce uniform pellet sized granules.
Heroin, to be smoked effectively must have a melting point (m.p.) closely in synch with its vapourisation point (v.p.). In other words, the point at which the heroin melts must be close to the point in which it starts to vapourise.
In its natural state heroin hcl. will melt long before it vapourises. In other words, it disappears before you can even inhale it.
A way to avoid this is to add a substance that will bring those 2 points into a close alignment so that the majority of the heroin will vapourise before dissolving.
That is where the caffeine comes into play. Caffeine has a higher m.p., and by adding up to 40% by weight and mixing all of the powders optimally you are able to stall the melting sufficiently, so that you can enjoy enough of the vapour.
The flavourings, strychnine and quinine relate to the East China trade in the early 20th Century. The labs used to use these agents to give the heroin tablets, which were made for smoking, a noticeably chemical taste. Opium, for a long time, had been mixed with powderised aspirin to optimise burning. This admixture of asprin and latex produced a noticeable odor when burned, one addicts associated with a quality experience.
The manufacturers of heroin tablets had a suprisingly difficult time building product cachet, people didn't want to forgo opium, which offered extreme ritualisation, the preperation of latex and asprin, getting it ready for smoking with repeated heatings and molding with needles and finger tips, the laying of head and even the way in which the pipe was cradled were all part of the experience.
The heroin manufacturers wanted to re-create some of that and so they attempted to pattern their product in that fashion. Crumbling a tablet into a cigarette just didn't hold the same experience, but IF they could cheaply reproduce the taste, they had a chance.
Strychnine isn't harmful in trace amounts, quinine was OK in moderate dosages and so it was a 90:10 quinine:strychine mix, with the vanillin,etc. added as perfume, just as opium sometimes had it added as well. The colouring was a form of branding, like a trademark. #3 also carried this practice as well.
Heroin #3 disappeared from all but a tiny area in Kuala Lampur and Perang in Malaysia in the mid 1990s. By the turn of the millenium the form was extinct.
#4: Heroin hcl. Specifically prepared for injection at POM.
The technical definition is extremely pure and de-colourised but by virtue of the end point being injection, latex based varieties like "Mexican Tar" and "Homebaked" are also, technically, #4.
Continued...
(Edited for spelling)
My case manager at the drug service, who's a qualified clinical psychologist, thinks there's something else happening alongside my Borderline Personality Disorder. He suggested from his "observations" that I may have some traits of Anti-Social Personality Disorder, and he asked me what I thought of that. I said "Yeah probably... that's what 3 years of methamphetamine abuse and a lifetime of discrimination by society tends to do to you." I think he's probably right though. I hate authority, I don't confom to social norms, I'm impulsive and don't plan ahead, I'm often irritable and aggressive, and I can't stand people who I don't "click" with. I have nothing but contempt for the mainstream - the sheeple.
I am moving to another city tomorrow, leaving Toronto for a city where I know will be good for my son and i.
yeah thats right, terry and i are no more and for good reason. well a good MANY reasons. that i shall not list but those who need to know do. none of which involve stupidity on my part. unless dreaming of kicking one in the nuts counts as stupid? nahhh lol.
i leave at 6am, yay fun ! ....not lol
good news is that i am finally only 2Lbs off my goal weight. I am now 110Lbs and I should be 112Lbs which isn't bad but its been a long journey getting here. People don't understand how hard it is to gain weight when you have a high motabulism.
I caught a sinus cold which is very minor at the moment just last night / this morning. I hope I feel better in the morning, but really who cares at least i'll be happier !!
Won't be online much in the next month, which sucks but hey, what needs to be done needs to be done and it outweighs the want to converse with friends online.
I am still alive here, but have things to do.
I will be on Facebook more than anything else. Feel free to contact me there.
yeah thats right, terry and i are no more and for good reason. well a good MANY reasons. that i shall not list but those who need to know do. none of which involve stupidity on my part. unless dreaming of kicking one in the nuts counts as stupid? nahhh lol.
i leave at 6am, yay fun ! ....not lol
good news is that i am finally only 2Lbs off my goal weight. I am now 110Lbs and I should be 112Lbs which isn't bad but its been a long journey getting here. People don't understand how hard it is to gain weight when you have a high motabulism.
I caught a sinus cold which is very minor at the moment just last night / this morning. I hope I feel better in the morning, but really who cares at least i'll be happier !!
Won't be online much in the next month, which sucks but hey, what needs to be done needs to be done and it outweighs the want to converse with friends online.
I am still alive here, but have things to do.
I will be on Facebook more than anything else. Feel free to contact me there.
At first my friends and I were just socialites frolicking around NYC, selling bags of weed, going to bars. We were riding together in the back of pickup trucks. Two friends in particular stood out in this dream. One is from long ago and another is recent yet fading away, as I continue to isolate myself in the waking hours.
But I woke up. Like so many dreams, this one was cut short in a way. When I jumped back into my slumber, I was still in a big city but this time it was like I was in a movie, a BIG doomsday one about aliens coming to destroy the planet as long as we humans were pieces of shit to it and eachother.
My super-powers must've been amplified by their (the aliens') tinkering and I could fly sort of and cause explosions and all kinds of cool shit. Every so often a bridge would give out and carloads of people screaming would fall into a river. I ran and flew around, seeking the conference of other people in these difficult times. They were wowed by my super powers, commenting, "you could save us."
This is another dream in a set (all in a row of 5 days now) of "empowering" dreams I've been having. In one way or another, I was UN-limited physically in dreaming. Not typical for me, I think on it during the day while going at normal daytime chores and activities, trying to rationalize the subconscious. To no avail, not that I really ever get to explain dreams in my own context, I end up empty-handed and wondering.
It was one of the most "fun" dreams I've ever had though. Yet I can't pinpoint anything inherently enjoyable about it as it fades from memory as the hours press on. I wish I could jump back into that fantasy and fly around for a few more hours but the sun is too high and I've got too many promises to keep today.![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")
Just a quick thought, maybe i'm struggling to feel empowered now that I'm unemployed and these dreams are stabs at redemption or something similar. I rarely edit blogs.
But I woke up. Like so many dreams, this one was cut short in a way. When I jumped back into my slumber, I was still in a big city but this time it was like I was in a movie, a BIG doomsday one about aliens coming to destroy the planet as long as we humans were pieces of shit to it and eachother.
My super-powers must've been amplified by their (the aliens') tinkering and I could fly sort of and cause explosions and all kinds of cool shit. Every so often a bridge would give out and carloads of people screaming would fall into a river. I ran and flew around, seeking the conference of other people in these difficult times. They were wowed by my super powers, commenting, "you could save us."
This is another dream in a set (all in a row of 5 days now) of "empowering" dreams I've been having. In one way or another, I was UN-limited physically in dreaming. Not typical for me, I think on it during the day while going at normal daytime chores and activities, trying to rationalize the subconscious. To no avail, not that I really ever get to explain dreams in my own context, I end up empty-handed and wondering.
It was one of the most "fun" dreams I've ever had though. Yet I can't pinpoint anything inherently enjoyable about it as it fades from memory as the hours press on. I wish I could jump back into that fantasy and fly around for a few more hours but the sun is too high and I've got too many promises to keep today.
Just a quick thought, maybe i'm struggling to feel empowered now that I'm unemployed and these dreams are stabs at redemption or something similar. I rarely edit blogs.
This is going to be a bit of a ranty type blog for now as there have been a few things in my life to work through and it seems to be going nowhere at all..i met my partner 12+ years ago now, i was 16-17 at the time, and he was then in his late 20s..i remember explaining to him at the start of the relationship, that given my age when we met, i could not promise him who i would become as i grew up. He knew of my drug use, but i am pretty sure that he thought of it only as a phase i was going through, and that eventually i would 'grow up' and stop using and CONform! which is by far one of the most ridiculous possibilities i have ever heard lol.. so the years go by, i remain using various substances, some of them heavier than before that..amazingly he also began using a few things, painkillers mainly and he loved snorting speed..but, he is of a personality where even though he enjoys these things, he truly doesnt give a fuck if he runs out, and can even have a box of favourite pills in the house for weeks without touching them! so that i just cant bring myself to understand. and in turn he doesnt understand why i cant (and wont) just set the pills and weed that i love aside and 'clean up' a bit..not possible.
So, now at 28 he seems quite aggrivated at what/who i have become, both in the use of mind altering substances and my extreme sexual prefferences, none of which, he can actually embrace or even wish to take in at all. I do respect his decision to be more sober than not..but he cant seem to respect my decision to continue using..and i really am getting to breaking point of blind anger. not good! I understand his concerns and his reasons for staying mentally in control of himself and everything.. but he just doesnt seem to be able to just..let go.. unwind and have fun..yet i remember clear a time years ago when he would do exactly that. But he also has changed, and i no longer can imagine a future with him in it. not like i so easily could do when we first met eachother in life. Now, i am starting to feel trapped, helpless within the situation to a certain extent..as we have a child involved, things have to be done more smoothly for the sake of that child..but its seriously getting to the point where its like a devout catholic living with a devout Pagan or Athiest, not all that possible. We have made it through many difficult times over the 12 years, and managed a long distance relationship with 3,500 miles between us, and a multitude of other life issues from that point on, i just dont think this time its going to be easy, if at all possible, to work through this as the issues i have with him are ones that are part of his true being and personality, and the things he wants me to change are part of my built-in real self.. I just dont understand why most of the world thinks that after on has a child, they are meant to completely conform and become betty freaking crocker. not going to happen! i am not a normal parent by any means, but hes 8 now and growing up very well despite my not having given up my true inner self to appease family and 'loved ones' around me..Its shown me that being part of a minority instead of the majority herds is a constantly uphill battle in many ways..sometimes it even seems to easier to just give in. but it isnt in me to do so that fuck!
Ok, will end here, just needed to get this out of my system in hopes it helps as a sort of catalyst
So, now at 28 he seems quite aggrivated at what/who i have become, both in the use of mind altering substances and my extreme sexual prefferences, none of which, he can actually embrace or even wish to take in at all. I do respect his decision to be more sober than not..but he cant seem to respect my decision to continue using..and i really am getting to breaking point of blind anger. not good! I understand his concerns and his reasons for staying mentally in control of himself and everything.. but he just doesnt seem to be able to just..let go.. unwind and have fun..yet i remember clear a time years ago when he would do exactly that. But he also has changed, and i no longer can imagine a future with him in it. not like i so easily could do when we first met eachother in life. Now, i am starting to feel trapped, helpless within the situation to a certain extent..as we have a child involved, things have to be done more smoothly for the sake of that child..but its seriously getting to the point where its like a devout catholic living with a devout Pagan or Athiest, not all that possible. We have made it through many difficult times over the 12 years, and managed a long distance relationship with 3,500 miles between us, and a multitude of other life issues from that point on, i just dont think this time its going to be easy, if at all possible, to work through this as the issues i have with him are ones that are part of his true being and personality, and the things he wants me to change are part of my built-in real self.. I just dont understand why most of the world thinks that after on has a child, they are meant to completely conform and become betty freaking crocker. not going to happen! i am not a normal parent by any means, but hes 8 now and growing up very well despite my not having given up my true inner self to appease family and 'loved ones' around me..Its shown me that being part of a minority instead of the majority herds is a constantly uphill battle in many ways..sometimes it even seems to easier to just give in. but it isnt in me to do so that fuck!
Ok, will end here, just needed to get this out of my system in hopes it helps as a sort of catalyst
I forgot I posted in here before . . I just wanted to note this rough conversation . .
July 28 at 4:08pm
---start idea---- This maker Faire is kinda interesting and the fact that Ford got it to come to Detrioit . . . I mean what computer show goes to Detroit? I watched the Discovery Channel a year ago on the New ford Factory and how it has Grass on the roof and all this other crazy automated shit . . I think this Maker Fair coming to Detroit is highly influenced by this factory, , ,
I guess of course I didnt may attention to where is was at @ The Henry, Ford Sat Sun
but look at all the people there. . . . Singer?? Thats apolstry, Autodesk Kauffman, Subaru Att WIFI ---- DUUUUUDE what did I tell you ATT signal in the car that communicated with the IBM Paten device on the traffic poles
IMAGINE it
-----start story------
I can tell you already what they are doing with this
Putting fucking att towers across the country on utility polls . . . Not to mention ATT has most all US Government contracts for telcommunications. Imagine,We are at a military facility working as secrete IT peeps. . . . "locate Sir Sunny Bono!" says Rick Sir Ricardo military General. On the screen we watch, within seconds we see 4 separate screens fly up showing Location of his car, Location of his Phone (registered to his credentials collected), location of his wife or legal registered other, and Garage webcam which is connected to home security threw att wifi internet.
As the general is scanning the info on the screen. He pulls up a UID screen in front of him which looks to be the view of the dotmatrix display (8bit - led b&w) the vehicle controls. The Gerneral then chanted out "SPEED?". One of the little people responded with "158 MPH sir @ Tire heat at 210 degree Farahnhigh SIR!". We look at each other wondering what the General will do.
The General lifts his hand and starts tapping away at the UID Field and soon the screens showed the Car coming to a slow stop for he has instructed the cars gear to be put in nutural (N) and has disabled the starter in the car. (so he cant try to restart the car) We laugh in simple smiles . . deep down we created the system. . 5 minutes later the little people chant out that Sunny Bono has failed the GE blood test (see little blood test is new at this point because it is too easy to have facke fingerprints and blood detection is instant of multiple if not all substances and tells us if he is vaccinated or not) but we found weed in his system smoked within 2 hours. "And he is in custudy SIR).
We just caught a Un-regulated CLoan! yeah 2017 - Moses
-----End story - Example
------ continued IDEA
This allows lets say control if you speed or run a red light. . .not to mention entertainment. . .instant weather and traffic updates. . . and worse Ads like every mile it changes . .
using geo location it could be a local sponsored dinner on mile 56
and even better if kids see it in the back in the van they will chant till the end
WTF
July 28 at 4:08pm
---start idea---- This maker Faire is kinda interesting and the fact that Ford got it to come to Detrioit . . . I mean what computer show goes to Detroit? I watched the Discovery Channel a year ago on the New ford Factory and how it has Grass on the roof and all this other crazy automated shit . . I think this Maker Fair coming to Detroit is highly influenced by this factory, , ,
I guess of course I didnt may attention to where is was at @ The Henry, Ford Sat Sun
but look at all the people there. . . . Singer?? Thats apolstry, Autodesk Kauffman, Subaru Att WIFI ---- DUUUUUDE what did I tell you ATT signal in the car that communicated with the IBM Paten device on the traffic poles
IMAGINE it
-----start story------
I can tell you already what they are doing with this
Putting fucking att towers across the country on utility polls . . . Not to mention ATT has most all US Government contracts for telcommunications. Imagine,We are at a military facility working as secrete IT peeps. . . . "locate Sir Sunny Bono!" says Rick Sir Ricardo military General. On the screen we watch, within seconds we see 4 separate screens fly up showing Location of his car, Location of his Phone (registered to his credentials collected), location of his wife or legal registered other, and Garage webcam which is connected to home security threw att wifi internet.
As the general is scanning the info on the screen. He pulls up a UID screen in front of him which looks to be the view of the dotmatrix display (8bit - led b&w) the vehicle controls. The Gerneral then chanted out "SPEED?". One of the little people responded with "158 MPH sir @ Tire heat at 210 degree Farahnhigh SIR!". We look at each other wondering what the General will do.
The General lifts his hand and starts tapping away at the UID Field and soon the screens showed the Car coming to a slow stop for he has instructed the cars gear to be put in nutural (N) and has disabled the starter in the car. (so he cant try to restart the car) We laugh in simple smiles . . deep down we created the system. . 5 minutes later the little people chant out that Sunny Bono has failed the GE blood test (see little blood test is new at this point because it is too easy to have facke fingerprints and blood detection is instant of multiple if not all substances and tells us if he is vaccinated or not) but we found weed in his system smoked within 2 hours. "And he is in custudy SIR).
We just caught a Un-regulated CLoan! yeah 2017 - Moses
-----End story - Example
------ continued IDEA
This allows lets say control if you speed or run a red light. . .not to mention entertainment. . .instant weather and traffic updates. . . and worse Ads like every mile it changes . .
using geo location it could be a local sponsored dinner on mile 56
and even better if kids see it in the back in the van they will chant till the end
WTF
For the first time in my life as an adult, I am unemployed. I officially qualified for unemployment from the state bureau. I am one of the millions they bitch about every day on Fox News. My "day job" no longer exists for me.
Of course it's hard to sever ties completely with those you spent so much of your day-time with for about two years. I'm still coming in after hours, consulting for cash. Paint is a hard business, on both sides. I only shifted across this line really. I probably shouldn't write this, but I'm not really unemployed. Oh, I feel so dangerous after typing that. Though not published yet, I know that having a job while drawing unemployment is both illegal and the american dream. Anyway, enough paranoia for one post.
Today is better than yesterday. My thoughts aren't so compartmentalized in my brain, unable to come together into a cohesive unit. Yesterday, probably just another full day of denial about my suffering as a possible mental case and subsequent-self-medication and the constant withdrawal associated with it, was awful. I wasn't hungry. I was exhausted yet couldn't sleep.
I'm on the nod again. Oxycodone. I don't know what I'm doing.
Now to what I really want to write down: my dream. This is a recurring dream I've been having since I was "fired." Here goes...
I always enter the dream walking down a street I'm pretty familiar with, but like all dreams not really. In my head it's the street that two of my dealers (one weed so not all negative) live on but not. It's a little different. It's a neighborhood street. There are always people in their front yards talking, grilling out, doing family things together. With me is always my friend Derrick. It's always him for some reason and I haven't even spoken to the guy in something like two years.
About a mile down this road on the left is a smallish ranch style house where I go every time. In it lives a black family: husband, wife, two sons and a daughter. When the dreams began, I was to be babysitting the kids. This never happens, however.
Mainly, there is always a conflict between the father of this family and myself. There is something about this man that is pure EVIL. I can't figure out why I'm dealing with this dream. In fact, last night, I literally fought him. He's the actor from Madea's Family Reunion who hits his wife and bla bla.
I broke his arm last night, in a jiu-jitsu style arm bar. VERY strange feeling to wake up to. What I remember so strongly is the surprise he felt as I physically dominated him. Usually when I'm in a fight in a dream, I can't hit anyone or succeed in fighting. But as I felt his elbow snap along my knee, you could sense how shocked at my strength this man was.
After this, I exit the house and find Derrick and we begin to drag very heavy things (car batteries, etc.) back up the street towards the main thoroughfare. We're walking and running, to save our lives it feels like, and eventually we end up @ the street that enters/exits my old high school.
This area is full of black people driving cars, leaving that school. And all I can keep saying is, "I hate that nigger. I'm gonna kill that nigger." THen someone would notice me and make a hateful face and i'd just mention, "oh, not you. it's somebody else."
that's pretty much it for last night. I'm getting a headache from staring that the screen.
Of course it's hard to sever ties completely with those you spent so much of your day-time with for about two years. I'm still coming in after hours, consulting for cash. Paint is a hard business, on both sides. I only shifted across this line really. I probably shouldn't write this, but I'm not really unemployed. Oh, I feel so dangerous after typing that. Though not published yet, I know that having a job while drawing unemployment is both illegal and the american dream. Anyway, enough paranoia for one post.
Today is better than yesterday. My thoughts aren't so compartmentalized in my brain, unable to come together into a cohesive unit. Yesterday, probably just another full day of denial about my suffering as a possible mental case and subsequent-self-medication and the constant withdrawal associated with it, was awful. I wasn't hungry. I was exhausted yet couldn't sleep.
I'm on the nod again. Oxycodone. I don't know what I'm doing.
Now to what I really want to write down: my dream. This is a recurring dream I've been having since I was "fired." Here goes...
I always enter the dream walking down a street I'm pretty familiar with, but like all dreams not really. In my head it's the street that two of my dealers (one weed so not all negative) live on but not. It's a little different. It's a neighborhood street. There are always people in their front yards talking, grilling out, doing family things together. With me is always my friend Derrick. It's always him for some reason and I haven't even spoken to the guy in something like two years.
About a mile down this road on the left is a smallish ranch style house where I go every time. In it lives a black family: husband, wife, two sons and a daughter. When the dreams began, I was to be babysitting the kids. This never happens, however.
Mainly, there is always a conflict between the father of this family and myself. There is something about this man that is pure EVIL. I can't figure out why I'm dealing with this dream. In fact, last night, I literally fought him. He's the actor from Madea's Family Reunion who hits his wife and bla bla.
I broke his arm last night, in a jiu-jitsu style arm bar. VERY strange feeling to wake up to. What I remember so strongly is the surprise he felt as I physically dominated him. Usually when I'm in a fight in a dream, I can't hit anyone or succeed in fighting. But as I felt his elbow snap along my knee, you could sense how shocked at my strength this man was.
After this, I exit the house and find Derrick and we begin to drag very heavy things (car batteries, etc.) back up the street towards the main thoroughfare. We're walking and running, to save our lives it feels like, and eventually we end up @ the street that enters/exits my old high school.
This area is full of black people driving cars, leaving that school. And all I can keep saying is, "I hate that nigger. I'm gonna kill that nigger." THen someone would notice me and make a hateful face and i'd just mention, "oh, not you. it's somebody else."
that's pretty much it for last night. I'm getting a headache from staring that the screen.
I saw a question by this guy on the net somewhere. He gave very little information, merely said he was discontent & had no idea why. Could others on line offer insight or provide any possible solutions? There were 3 responses, I was #4. I laugh at myself often because others manage to make their answers 80-90% shorter than mine. Once I start writing, I have a thought process that goes into questions, theories, or perspectives gathered as a direct result of personal experience as filtered through my perceptions & influencing what the solutions/reasons may or may not be. In my case, even if I posess insight & self honesty in some instances, 98% of my shortcomings are applying lessons learned. On the other hand, I may be way off base. I'm interested to know other people's perspectives as to the guys question, which is:
Mr X: "I am very discontent with life & have no idea why. Can someone help me? Why do I feel this way?"
TJ: "The answer to your question requires self Q&A & evaluation which requires serious self honesty. Life is never perfect, & some people experience physical and/or emotional pain of endless varieties & intensities, ranging from the blatant obvious (for example a parent feels torn up seeing his/her child suffer horrible pain from some debilitating & fatal disease & there's not a damn thing he can do other than "be there" for his child.) There are also subtle types of unhappiness like a CEO that has annual 800,000 k income with all the trappings that go with it, respect, 5 Mercedes, 4 Corvettes. a Lexus that are all in tip top shape & of course a mansion in Bel Air, a yaght, a beach house in Malibu. He has $30,000 double breasted suites, a ranch with his own private race track where he & his high society friends can bet on horses just for fun. He knows
powerful & influencial people in all walks of life, has a trophy wife 15 yrs younger, kids with genius IQ's with more degrees/letters after their names than alphabet soup. He's not in show biz, but if one of his son's friends wants a part in a movie, he can call someone who knows the producer of the movie, & bingo the kid gets the part. It's the kind of life he has no business complaining or whining about. Yet, this dude for whatever reason is unhappy & realizes this one day, never knowing why. Sure, he's got a high maintainance career that probably demands 98% of his time, & if or when it doesn't, there's always some frivolous, mundane "responsibilities" that come up. Maybe his $100,000/yr mistress creates some sort of drama demanding he must get in his private jet at once & fly to
their getaway to one of his islands he owns, or maybe one of Tony Soprano's cousin's kids is on the lam from this psycho Ralph before Tony killed him for letting his horse Pieomy burn to death for Ralph'a act of arson for the insurance money. Although constantly busy, Mr. CEO doesn't know why he is unhappy & if he was honest with himself, he would know he really doesn't want to know because he's afraid a self examination would mean asking questions he doesn't want to ask, much less getting answers he may not like. From an objective stranger, acquaintaince, or even psychologist's point of view that observed & could read between the lines, perhaps he/she might point out to Mr. CEO that he has no real friends. They are all about ego, pride, greed, - shallow at best or simply associates, but no real emotional, mental, or spiritual depth. There's no meaningful connections with his barbie doll wife &
mistress, his kids don't really know him, & what if he lost his status, his career, & became penniless? Would even one out of all the family & "friends" or people he knows give a rat's ass? Would anyone stick by & offer support even if it's inconvenient or would his trophy women, kids, coworkers, & associates he always labeled as friends drop him like a bad habit & maybe even kick him to the curb showing cool indifference? He may never have to find out because some people are lucky enough not to have life sling mudslides & tornados that turn life upside down. If that's the case, then he either starts investigating himself by asking tough questions & risk the pain of unpleasant answers---or hide behind his house of cards insolated by denial that nothing is wrong. He lies to himself by discounting his troubled soul & telling himself that he will always have everything & that life will always be easy. If he applies self honesty--or not, initially, the source of discontent is usually not wanting to ask
uncomfortable questions, or an unwillingness to take appropriate action necessary to do something about the fact that he has superficial things the ego demands, but is spiritually starving, What feeds the spirit? Caring for & loving others, sharing pain to cut other's pain in half & karma is adjusted so others cut YOUR pain in half, but joy shared is joy multiplied. Mrs. CEO can tell Mr. CEO she loves him, but saying is one thing & SHOWING is another. His wife is dressed to the 9's & looks like she stepped out of Vogue magazine, is the "right" woman to have on his arm for the public show & to smile at his parties because that's whats expected & what she's paid for. It's the reason she has the right to drop a few grand for a pair of shoes at overpriced upper crust creme de la creme reserved for the privledged.
Is Mr. CEO willing to ask himself assorted questions as to the troubled state of discontent & willing to hear what he doesn't want to hear? Perhaps he is & perhaps he does realize he is shallow, his life he built is shallow, so he makes changes & all is well emotionally for a while. Then there's the 3rd kind of obstacle that prevents contenment as I see it, & that is being pissed off at others that are a pain in the ass (an ex wife or husband you're forced to deal with because the courts demand joint custody of the children 4 example) so you carry a spiteful hatred & dis the opposite sex being miserable--refusing to
accept the fact that like it or not, your ex is a fly in your ointment, remaining an angry, spiteful person, instead of accepting the fact that the ex is going to be a part of your life, make peace with it, then make peace with yourself by more constructive ways like going for a 3 mile jog to help burn off the physical effects of angry energy, then taking the pains of researching & finding proper counsel for legal matters--- & whatever positive means of emotional/spiritual support from family, God, nature, or weekly group nerd gatherings at coffee shops, music, comedians....ect.
Oh yeah books. Books can be very valuable when you have no clue wtf to do, so research may help point you in the right direction? Or you can fester. Although easier said than done, even when forced to accept & deal with crappy things life hands out, quality of life is better with acceptance (if it's out of your power to do anything it) but festering makes it worse. That's what I've observed about human nature anyway.
Mr X: "I am very discontent with life & have no idea why. Can someone help me? Why do I feel this way?"
TJ: "The answer to your question requires self Q&A & evaluation which requires serious self honesty. Life is never perfect, & some people experience physical and/or emotional pain of endless varieties & intensities, ranging from the blatant obvious (for example a parent feels torn up seeing his/her child suffer horrible pain from some debilitating & fatal disease & there's not a damn thing he can do other than "be there" for his child.) There are also subtle types of unhappiness like a CEO that has annual 800,000 k income with all the trappings that go with it, respect, 5 Mercedes, 4 Corvettes. a Lexus that are all in tip top shape & of course a mansion in Bel Air, a yaght, a beach house in Malibu. He has $30,000 double breasted suites, a ranch with his own private race track where he & his high society friends can bet on horses just for fun. He knows
powerful & influencial people in all walks of life, has a trophy wife 15 yrs younger, kids with genius IQ's with more degrees/letters after their names than alphabet soup. He's not in show biz, but if one of his son's friends wants a part in a movie, he can call someone who knows the producer of the movie, & bingo the kid gets the part. It's the kind of life he has no business complaining or whining about. Yet, this dude for whatever reason is unhappy & realizes this one day, never knowing why. Sure, he's got a high maintainance career that probably demands 98% of his time, & if or when it doesn't, there's always some frivolous, mundane "responsibilities" that come up. Maybe his $100,000/yr mistress creates some sort of drama demanding he must get in his private jet at once & fly to
their getaway to one of his islands he owns, or maybe one of Tony Soprano's cousin's kids is on the lam from this psycho Ralph before Tony killed him for letting his horse Pieomy burn to death for Ralph'a act of arson for the insurance money. Although constantly busy, Mr. CEO doesn't know why he is unhappy & if he was honest with himself, he would know he really doesn't want to know because he's afraid a self examination would mean asking questions he doesn't want to ask, much less getting answers he may not like. From an objective stranger, acquaintaince, or even psychologist's point of view that observed & could read between the lines, perhaps he/she might point out to Mr. CEO that he has no real friends. They are all about ego, pride, greed, - shallow at best or simply associates, but no real emotional, mental, or spiritual depth. There's no meaningful connections with his barbie doll wife &
mistress, his kids don't really know him, & what if he lost his status, his career, & became penniless? Would even one out of all the family & "friends" or people he knows give a rat's ass? Would anyone stick by & offer support even if it's inconvenient or would his trophy women, kids, coworkers, & associates he always labeled as friends drop him like a bad habit & maybe even kick him to the curb showing cool indifference? He may never have to find out because some people are lucky enough not to have life sling mudslides & tornados that turn life upside down. If that's the case, then he either starts investigating himself by asking tough questions & risk the pain of unpleasant answers---or hide behind his house of cards insolated by denial that nothing is wrong. He lies to himself by discounting his troubled soul & telling himself that he will always have everything & that life will always be easy. If he applies self honesty--or not, initially, the source of discontent is usually not wanting to ask
uncomfortable questions, or an unwillingness to take appropriate action necessary to do something about the fact that he has superficial things the ego demands, but is spiritually starving, What feeds the spirit? Caring for & loving others, sharing pain to cut other's pain in half & karma is adjusted so others cut YOUR pain in half, but joy shared is joy multiplied. Mrs. CEO can tell Mr. CEO she loves him, but saying is one thing & SHOWING is another. His wife is dressed to the 9's & looks like she stepped out of Vogue magazine, is the "right" woman to have on his arm for the public show & to smile at his parties because that's whats expected & what she's paid for. It's the reason she has the right to drop a few grand for a pair of shoes at overpriced upper crust creme de la creme reserved for the privledged.
Is Mr. CEO willing to ask himself assorted questions as to the troubled state of discontent & willing to hear what he doesn't want to hear? Perhaps he is & perhaps he does realize he is shallow, his life he built is shallow, so he makes changes & all is well emotionally for a while. Then there's the 3rd kind of obstacle that prevents contenment as I see it, & that is being pissed off at others that are a pain in the ass (an ex wife or husband you're forced to deal with because the courts demand joint custody of the children 4 example) so you carry a spiteful hatred & dis the opposite sex being miserable--refusing to
accept the fact that like it or not, your ex is a fly in your ointment, remaining an angry, spiteful person, instead of accepting the fact that the ex is going to be a part of your life, make peace with it, then make peace with yourself by more constructive ways like going for a 3 mile jog to help burn off the physical effects of angry energy, then taking the pains of researching & finding proper counsel for legal matters--- & whatever positive means of emotional/spiritual support from family, God, nature, or weekly group nerd gatherings at coffee shops, music, comedians....ect.
Oh yeah books. Books can be very valuable when you have no clue wtf to do, so research may help point you in the right direction? Or you can fester. Although easier said than done, even when forced to accept & deal with crappy things life hands out, quality of life is better with acceptance (if it's out of your power to do anything it) but festering makes it worse. That's what I've observed about human nature anyway.
Okay so my first and last trip so far all started with a friend. You know that friend that you feel comfortable with doing this because you've known them for a long time?? Well we were at my grandma's house and we deicde to roll. It was winter and freezing outside and after we take it, we go outside and take a walk, the walk turned into a run and then we hugged in the middle of the street for some reason and then ran into my cusin. We go back to my grandma's and sat around then I say "Dude try making carpet angels, it's fun." We did that and I have never felt as good as than when we rolled. After that we watched Paranormal Activty and got scared then when my cousin left I yelled to him " I love you!!" and "Your the best cousin ever!!" Don't ask why. I had to keep asking him when I could drink something (my friend.) Then when he said I could I chugged a glass of water. And when we first started the roll I thought I was going to die, I forgot why. I forgot what else happend but I will never forget what I remember. The funnest/ stupidest thing I have ever done. But I would do it again.
Sometimes I just don't know who I am
Days change, things change, I change
Each day I wake up I can never be sure
how things will go
I am all over the place
One day I am who I want to be
next day she is who she wants to be
it never is the same
Days change, things change, I change
Each day I wake up I can never be sure
how things will go
I am all over the place
One day I am who I want to be
next day she is who she wants to be
it never is the same
Today is Saturday, July 24, 2010 and it is now 1233AM here in Makati, Luzon, Philippines.
Recap: I was sitting in Butuan Airport on Mindanao waiting to fly back here.
This Entry: My flight actually took off on time which is very rare here, all the more so with one of the world's worst airlines, Cebu Pacific, doing the flying. Even if the airline was punctual, and granted very few ever are, something very cheesy about them trying to sell you trinkets like pens and memo pads along with a can of soda for what amounts, literally, to a day's wage for a working man here.
All that is academic when it comes to their customer service finesse. It is truly maddening and I am someone who flew in the Eastern Bloc in the 80s!
Here in Makati, part of Metro Manila, we have 2 airports, 1 for International, 1 for Domestic. Cebu Pacific has a large counter in the Domestic which is actually 2 buildings, a small terminal and 1 for the counters. If you are flying OUT of the capitol you go to the counter for check-in. Not a problem one would imagine. I am a person who is anal about punctuality. When I have a flight I arrive at a terminal roughly 8 hours before check-in even begins. Cebu-Pacific proves that my habit is intelligent.
For a 10AM Departure, the ticket counter, neigh, the entire building opens at 830AM. At 915 or so, the clerks stop their bullshitting and man their 2 PC terminals. By this time there are literally at least 200 people crowing a 12 meter counter, waving ticket recipts, screaming in a cacophany of languages (including dialects there are well over 100 spoken on 7,107 islands here). You should see the dumbfounded Westerners waiting patiently, imagining a line somehow exists.
Me? I am Israeli hahaha. I push through loudly and menacingly hissing, "Excuse Me" with my gameface on full. I have always gotten through.
Still, that means nothing becayse when I get there I am dealing with absolutely fried clerks. "Sir, this ticket is invalid. Your passport says 'Rachamim Ra'anan Ben Ami' but your ticket says, 'Rachamim Raanan Ben-Ami'."
Rachamim: "Yes love, my language doesn't use Latin letters like English."
ClerkCondescendingly) "Sir, it doesn't have Latin, it is English."
R: "Yes, but English uses Latin letters."
C: "(Disdainfully) Sir, I am an edicated woman. I have a Bachelor's Degree and I know very well the difference between Latin and English!"
*As all this is transpiring the cacophany grows louder, people are pushing harder, this is SE Asia and pickpockets DO operate and above all my plane is set to lift off in 20 minutes!*
Rachamim: "Ma'am, look, is there a Supervisor whom I might speak to?"
Clerk: "Yes sir. He is in our Cebu office, his phone number is...and you may call on Monday because on weekends he is off."
R: "Aaaah...."
*I then palm a 5 US bill, and palming it hold out my hand and offer to "pay the penalty" and tell her not to worry about the receipt.
All works out. People say the Philippines is the most corrupt nation in SE Asia but I can assure you that THAT honour belongs to Cambodia, hands down. When you cross from Thailan, into the country at Poi Pet they actually have professionally made signs on the wall of the Immigration lean-to (actually a lean-to), that tell you that the costs of visas are 10 US higher than they actually are.
I love to read travel websites and see kids talking bullshit about how they forced the officer (only 1 there) to provide the visa at its actual cost (20 for Tourist, 25 for Business though I heard they might have raised them). I smile reading them knowing they are full of shit.
Oh, you CAN argue it down to the correct price but when you get that cute little blue stamp atop the paper visa they glue in on a whole fucken page, it will be the incorrect stamp, bet your bottom Dollar.
Imagine, time to depart, you go back over land and get there with 2 hours before the lean to's combination lock goes back on, and the border will be closed for the next 2 days to celebrate the King's (pick the nation, Cambodia OR Thailand) hemorroid crawling back up his arse or some non-sensical event. You arrive on your snazzy tourist bus. You walk the kilometer through all the fucken hyper-aggresive touts, hauling your 30 pounds of uneccessary shit and that same officer , for the first time in a week cracks a smile. He nods to his 3 touts, the civlians working for the local syndacite, who "help" tourists to fill in the simple applications, included in the extra 10US "fee." They look at you sternly and say, "Solly, diss stamp not good, no-no."
Backpacker: "Well mate, what do I do?"
Tout:"You muss go back Pnohm Penh, get stamp."
BP: "Wait! You gave me the wrong stamp, why do I have to go back?"
T: "Law, you muss go, NOW!"
Ahhhhh, so go ahead smart fuck, save your tenner, brag about it at "Happy Pizza" or the patio at "#9" and then deal with it in fucken Poi Pet, the most depressing city in the region, for about 5 days.
Getting the stamp is possible in PP before heading back, IF you are smart, and it will only cost you 75US, and the 4 US back and forth on the back of a moped to Immigration on Russian Blvd by the airport.
The way I look at it? Yes, 10 IS 5 days pay to a lot of folks there so it DOES represent a nice sum BUT, its being smeared over dozens of hands. That officer pays touts, he pays supervisors, organised crime figures and so on. He is not banking very much of it, maybe half a Dollar per? And what does the 10 represent to you? In PP you pay 3 to 15 US a night for your digs, 5 a day for food, so think rationally, it factors in fine.
Especially when you buy a gramme of solid white #4, uncut for about 5 US per!
Dumb tourists...
Anyway, airports suck, no doubt. I got back to Makati, jumped in a trike out on the street, and came back here. Jackie wanted to come over but I begged off.
Thinking of moving her to a slightly nicer home, men are bothering her there she says. A nice subdivision not to far from where she is, in Barangay Tandag Sora. The new house is 4,000 Pesos a month, currently Im paying 2800 (1000 = about 18 US) so its not really going to mater to me, let her be safe.
Went to Chabad House here, just opened a couple of months ago in Salcedo Village, the district next to mine in Makati. The 1 Jewish Community in this country is crammed into Salcedo. Chabad is a Hebrew acronym that isn't capitalised for some reason, means, "Knowledge, Wisdom, Understanding" and is a programme of the Lubavitcher Chassidim (Hassidic). They try to provide a religious observant environment for Jews abroad and sometimes are the only source for Jewish food in a region (they have it flown in). I go for the food, I dig Ashkenazi food (what they call "Deli" in the US). They also have Mizrachi food, the food we eat in Israel because of so many IDF on walkabout (the gap year after 3 years mandatory service all Jewish men in Israel go through).
Recap: I was sitting in Butuan Airport on Mindanao waiting to fly back here.
This Entry: My flight actually took off on time which is very rare here, all the more so with one of the world's worst airlines, Cebu Pacific, doing the flying. Even if the airline was punctual, and granted very few ever are, something very cheesy about them trying to sell you trinkets like pens and memo pads along with a can of soda for what amounts, literally, to a day's wage for a working man here.
All that is academic when it comes to their customer service finesse. It is truly maddening and I am someone who flew in the Eastern Bloc in the 80s!
Here in Makati, part of Metro Manila, we have 2 airports, 1 for International, 1 for Domestic. Cebu Pacific has a large counter in the Domestic which is actually 2 buildings, a small terminal and 1 for the counters. If you are flying OUT of the capitol you go to the counter for check-in. Not a problem one would imagine. I am a person who is anal about punctuality. When I have a flight I arrive at a terminal roughly 8 hours before check-in even begins. Cebu-Pacific proves that my habit is intelligent.
For a 10AM Departure, the ticket counter, neigh, the entire building opens at 830AM. At 915 or so, the clerks stop their bullshitting and man their 2 PC terminals. By this time there are literally at least 200 people crowing a 12 meter counter, waving ticket recipts, screaming in a cacophany of languages (including dialects there are well over 100 spoken on 7,107 islands here). You should see the dumbfounded Westerners waiting patiently, imagining a line somehow exists.
Me? I am Israeli hahaha. I push through loudly and menacingly hissing, "Excuse Me" with my gameface on full. I have always gotten through.
Still, that means nothing becayse when I get there I am dealing with absolutely fried clerks. "Sir, this ticket is invalid. Your passport says 'Rachamim Ra'anan Ben Ami' but your ticket says, 'Rachamim Raanan Ben-Ami'."
Rachamim: "Yes love, my language doesn't use Latin letters like English."
Clerk
Condescendingly) "Sir, it doesn't have Latin, it is English."R: "Yes, but English uses Latin letters."
C: "(Disdainfully) Sir, I am an edicated woman. I have a Bachelor's Degree and I know very well the difference between Latin and English!"
*As all this is transpiring the cacophany grows louder, people are pushing harder, this is SE Asia and pickpockets DO operate and above all my plane is set to lift off in 20 minutes!*
Rachamim: "Ma'am, look, is there a Supervisor whom I might speak to?"
Clerk: "Yes sir. He is in our Cebu office, his phone number is...and you may call on Monday because on weekends he is off."
R: "Aaaah...."
*I then palm a 5 US bill, and palming it hold out my hand and offer to "pay the penalty" and tell her not to worry about the receipt.
All works out. People say the Philippines is the most corrupt nation in SE Asia but I can assure you that THAT honour belongs to Cambodia, hands down. When you cross from Thailan, into the country at Poi Pet they actually have professionally made signs on the wall of the Immigration lean-to (actually a lean-to), that tell you that the costs of visas are 10 US higher than they actually are.
I love to read travel websites and see kids talking bullshit about how they forced the officer (only 1 there) to provide the visa at its actual cost (20 for Tourist, 25 for Business though I heard they might have raised them). I smile reading them knowing they are full of shit.
Oh, you CAN argue it down to the correct price but when you get that cute little blue stamp atop the paper visa they glue in on a whole fucken page, it will be the incorrect stamp, bet your bottom Dollar.
Imagine, time to depart, you go back over land and get there with 2 hours before the lean to's combination lock goes back on, and the border will be closed for the next 2 days to celebrate the King's (pick the nation, Cambodia OR Thailand) hemorroid crawling back up his arse or some non-sensical event. You arrive on your snazzy tourist bus. You walk the kilometer through all the fucken hyper-aggresive touts, hauling your 30 pounds of uneccessary shit and that same officer , for the first time in a week cracks a smile. He nods to his 3 touts, the civlians working for the local syndacite, who "help" tourists to fill in the simple applications, included in the extra 10US "fee." They look at you sternly and say, "Solly, diss stamp not good, no-no."
Backpacker: "Well mate, what do I do?"
Tout:"You muss go back Pnohm Penh, get stamp."
BP: "Wait! You gave me the wrong stamp, why do I have to go back?"
T: "Law, you muss go, NOW!"
Ahhhhh, so go ahead smart fuck, save your tenner, brag about it at "Happy Pizza" or the patio at "#9" and then deal with it in fucken Poi Pet, the most depressing city in the region, for about 5 days.
Getting the stamp is possible in PP before heading back, IF you are smart, and it will only cost you 75US, and the 4 US back and forth on the back of a moped to Immigration on Russian Blvd by the airport.
The way I look at it? Yes, 10 IS 5 days pay to a lot of folks there so it DOES represent a nice sum BUT, its being smeared over dozens of hands. That officer pays touts, he pays supervisors, organised crime figures and so on. He is not banking very much of it, maybe half a Dollar per? And what does the 10 represent to you? In PP you pay 3 to 15 US a night for your digs, 5 a day for food, so think rationally, it factors in fine.
Especially when you buy a gramme of solid white #4, uncut for about 5 US per!
Dumb tourists...
Anyway, airports suck, no doubt. I got back to Makati, jumped in a trike out on the street, and came back here. Jackie wanted to come over but I begged off.
Thinking of moving her to a slightly nicer home, men are bothering her there she says. A nice subdivision not to far from where she is, in Barangay Tandag Sora. The new house is 4,000 Pesos a month, currently Im paying 2800 (1000 = about 18 US) so its not really going to mater to me, let her be safe.
Went to Chabad House here, just opened a couple of months ago in Salcedo Village, the district next to mine in Makati. The 1 Jewish Community in this country is crammed into Salcedo. Chabad is a Hebrew acronym that isn't capitalised for some reason, means, "Knowledge, Wisdom, Understanding" and is a programme of the Lubavitcher Chassidim (Hassidic). They try to provide a religious observant environment for Jews abroad and sometimes are the only source for Jewish food in a region (they have it flown in). I go for the food, I dig Ashkenazi food (what they call "Deli" in the US). They also have Mizrachi food, the food we eat in Israel because of so many IDF on walkabout (the gap year after 3 years mandatory service all Jewish men in Israel go through).
Today is Wednesday, July 28, 2010 and it is now 621AM here in Makati, Luzon, Philippines.
Recap: I had been discussing the Philippine Dope Scene, then meandered into a pedantic explanation of the Heroin Numbering System, another true blue American invention.
This Entry: "Mexican Tar Heroin" is usually considered as a class onto itself despite its technically meeting the threshold for #4 Heroin, heroin hcl.
Most people, including, amazingly, many forensic chemists, believe that Tar is manufactured by acetylysing opium. It is not, but before I explain THAT fallacy, I ought to explain acetylysation;
Heroin is merely a vehicle for the delivery of morphine. Most people do not realise this, but heroin, diacetylmorphine, is inactive in the human body! Once heroin is ingested, within 90 seconds your body has converted it to 6-MAM, a substance I will discuss, and then even more quickly to morphine, the substance you actually feel.
How does morphine become heroin? By adding water, a glacial acetic acid and heating, in reflux, the sugars in morphine actetylyse, creating diacetylmorphine, heroin. This change in structure increase lipid solubility so that the substance is able to cross the BBB (Blood to Brain Barrier) 3 times more efficiently than unacetylated morphine. In other words, making morphine into heroin allows morphine to do its job 3 times better than it would untouched.
When morphine crosses the BBB it almost immediately reverts to morphine, so, heroin simply serves as a more efficient way to get the morphine where it needs to go, this is why, most of the time, you are tested for morphine when tested for heroin in your system, etc. You can sometimes be tested for the afore mentioned 6-MAM which is ONLY found after the consumption of heroin, but 6-MAM is out of your body, entirely, within 20 hours of conversion from heroin.
So THAT is acetylysation, and that is why morphine goes through acetylysation.
The belief that Tar is acetylated opium seems like it makes good common sense. After all, heroin IS made from opium, and both have the same black latex appearance and consistency.
The problem though is that it does not make common sense at all. Opium averages a morphine content of 10%, and the highest recorded content in history was a sample with 23%, and that was only one time. So, if opium is used, and is converted directly into heroin, the highest purity Tar Heroin could ever have would be 23% with the vast majority being 10% pure. Tar IS an impure form but still clocks purities in the 80th percentile from time to time.
How can you make 80% pure heroin directly from opium? How does 10% morphine turn into 80% heroin? It can't, and it won't, ever.
The key to Tar is the acetylation process and agent, as well as the omission of 2 of the 4 manufacturing steps.
Step I) With the normal process you take opium and separate morphine from it, then crystallise it, all very crudely. When making Heroin #1 (which as we discussed earlier is not even heroin at all but rather morphine hcl) the extraction is done meticulously, but that is very rare.
Step II) You convert morphine freebase (or hcl in the case of Heroin #1) into heroin acetate, a crude salt.
Step III) Heroin acetate is converted to Heroin freebase, Heroin #2.
Step IV) Heroin freebase is converted to the hydrochloric salt.
Ideally the salt will be purified via 1 or 2 methods (decolourisation via activated charcoal and filtration and/or ether and alcohol treatments) but in today's world,sadly, it often isn't.
With Tar, morphine freebase is extracted from opium. THEN this freebase is acetylysed. Steps II and III are left by the wayside. The acetylysation process though is the real key.
Though any GAA (glacial acetic acid) will acetylyse morphine, using different acids will produce different characters in the finished product. Ideally AA (acetic anhydride is used), but Tar almost always utilises AC (acetyl chloride). While this produces a particular character, I will first look at 2 other aspects that result from this abbreviated process;
Acetylysation is done in reflux. "Reflux," in short, is a tightly controlled environment where mositure and oxegyn are not allowed in and out at will. Not being actual labs, and usually not actually chemists themselves, manufacturers utilise a crude reflux apparattus. Taking a large cooking pot, the powderised morphine freebase (or hcl.), water and GAA is combined. A rubber gasket is lain over the top, and then the lid. To firmly create a seal a c-clamp is used and tightened all the way.
With Tar, AC is used in place of AA, and no gasket or c-clamp are used so that reflux isn't achieved. Additionaly, time isn't optimised so that full acetylysation doesn't take place. While most morphine IS converted to heroin, the less than optimal acetylation produces marked metabolite characterisation. In short, the extra-crude process used in Mexico causes the heroin to have predictable amounts of 6-MAM and another metabolite, 3-MAM (both of which I will discuss shortly).
Substances ingested metabolise, they change in a reaction with the human body. With drugs, sometimes these new substances, or "metabolites," are "active," meaning that they have a marked reaction on body and/or mind...or else they are "inactive," having no discernible effect.
One active metabolite specific to heroin, 6-Monoacetylmorphine (6-MAM), is actually more powerful than heroin. Heroin, as I stated, is merely a delivery vehicle for morphine itself. Heroin is worthless as a drug itself because the acetylation which allows much greater pentration of the Blood to Brain Barrier also prevents the diacetylmorphine (heroin) from getting hold of the relevant binder. This is why everything you, or someone else feels when using heroin is related to the morphine carried with THAT heroin.
This failure to bind cannot be mitigated but let us imagine there was a way. We would still have a 2nd insurmountable hurdle to deal with in that heroin's half life is a mere 90 seconds. "Half Life" is the avg.time it takes a substance to leave a human body.
Ergo, if heroin's half life is 90 seconds, heroin is gone within 3 minutes of consuming it.
6-MAM, as I said specific to heroin (not found in morphine, duh), is created naturally in degradation, and itself degrades very quickly as well. Other than that natural degradation creating it, it is also created via a process called "Hydrolysis." Hydrolysis takes place when a substance, susceptible to the dynamic, comes into contact with moisture...Conversely, if acetylysation takes place without benefit of reflux the requsite moisture is burned off/evaporates. This will give you less 6-MAM than heroin produced in reflux.
This leaves Tar with an anabnormally low percentage of 6-MAM, always.
On the other hand, Tar will always have abnormally high 3-MAM content. This is due from insufficient acetylysation. The use os acetyl chloride, insufficient time and temperature prevents a total conversion of morphine to diacetylmorphine (heroin).
Reflux also plays a part here but by adjusting time and temprature upwards the deficiencies caused by acetyl chloride can be overcome. Sadly, Mexican producers just do not get the point. By now the process is so well entrenched that I suspect Tar is here to stay, unfortunately.
"Homebake" is produced sans reflux, with different GAAs but the only REAL difference there is that O-demethylation is sometimes used to net morphine from a codeine precursor.
In addition, when Dicodin used to be used as a precursor the end product would be red or pink tar, but those rare times that Homebake still appears one sees only brown and black tar, since Dicodin is extinct.
I will continue...
(Edited for spelling)
Recap: I had been discussing the Philippine Dope Scene, then meandered into a pedantic explanation of the Heroin Numbering System, another true blue American invention.
This Entry: "Mexican Tar Heroin" is usually considered as a class onto itself despite its technically meeting the threshold for #4 Heroin, heroin hcl.
Most people, including, amazingly, many forensic chemists, believe that Tar is manufactured by acetylysing opium. It is not, but before I explain THAT fallacy, I ought to explain acetylysation;
Heroin is merely a vehicle for the delivery of morphine. Most people do not realise this, but heroin, diacetylmorphine, is inactive in the human body! Once heroin is ingested, within 90 seconds your body has converted it to 6-MAM, a substance I will discuss, and then even more quickly to morphine, the substance you actually feel.
How does morphine become heroin? By adding water, a glacial acetic acid and heating, in reflux, the sugars in morphine actetylyse, creating diacetylmorphine, heroin. This change in structure increase lipid solubility so that the substance is able to cross the BBB (Blood to Brain Barrier) 3 times more efficiently than unacetylated morphine. In other words, making morphine into heroin allows morphine to do its job 3 times better than it would untouched.
When morphine crosses the BBB it almost immediately reverts to morphine, so, heroin simply serves as a more efficient way to get the morphine where it needs to go, this is why, most of the time, you are tested for morphine when tested for heroin in your system, etc. You can sometimes be tested for the afore mentioned 6-MAM which is ONLY found after the consumption of heroin, but 6-MAM is out of your body, entirely, within 20 hours of conversion from heroin.
So THAT is acetylysation, and that is why morphine goes through acetylysation.
The belief that Tar is acetylated opium seems like it makes good common sense. After all, heroin IS made from opium, and both have the same black latex appearance and consistency.
The problem though is that it does not make common sense at all. Opium averages a morphine content of 10%, and the highest recorded content in history was a sample with 23%, and that was only one time. So, if opium is used, and is converted directly into heroin, the highest purity Tar Heroin could ever have would be 23% with the vast majority being 10% pure. Tar IS an impure form but still clocks purities in the 80th percentile from time to time.
How can you make 80% pure heroin directly from opium? How does 10% morphine turn into 80% heroin? It can't, and it won't, ever.
The key to Tar is the acetylation process and agent, as well as the omission of 2 of the 4 manufacturing steps.
Step I) With the normal process you take opium and separate morphine from it, then crystallise it, all very crudely. When making Heroin #1 (which as we discussed earlier is not even heroin at all but rather morphine hcl) the extraction is done meticulously, but that is very rare.
Step II) You convert morphine freebase (or hcl in the case of Heroin #1) into heroin acetate, a crude salt.
Step III) Heroin acetate is converted to Heroin freebase, Heroin #2.
Step IV) Heroin freebase is converted to the hydrochloric salt.
Ideally the salt will be purified via 1 or 2 methods (decolourisation via activated charcoal and filtration and/or ether and alcohol treatments) but in today's world,sadly, it often isn't.
With Tar, morphine freebase is extracted from opium. THEN this freebase is acetylysed. Steps II and III are left by the wayside. The acetylysation process though is the real key.
Though any GAA (glacial acetic acid) will acetylyse morphine, using different acids will produce different characters in the finished product. Ideally AA (acetic anhydride is used), but Tar almost always utilises AC (acetyl chloride). While this produces a particular character, I will first look at 2 other aspects that result from this abbreviated process;
Acetylysation is done in reflux. "Reflux," in short, is a tightly controlled environment where mositure and oxegyn are not allowed in and out at will. Not being actual labs, and usually not actually chemists themselves, manufacturers utilise a crude reflux apparattus. Taking a large cooking pot, the powderised morphine freebase (or hcl.), water and GAA is combined. A rubber gasket is lain over the top, and then the lid. To firmly create a seal a c-clamp is used and tightened all the way.
With Tar, AC is used in place of AA, and no gasket or c-clamp are used so that reflux isn't achieved. Additionaly, time isn't optimised so that full acetylysation doesn't take place. While most morphine IS converted to heroin, the less than optimal acetylation produces marked metabolite characterisation. In short, the extra-crude process used in Mexico causes the heroin to have predictable amounts of 6-MAM and another metabolite, 3-MAM (both of which I will discuss shortly).
Substances ingested metabolise, they change in a reaction with the human body. With drugs, sometimes these new substances, or "metabolites," are "active," meaning that they have a marked reaction on body and/or mind...or else they are "inactive," having no discernible effect.
One active metabolite specific to heroin, 6-Monoacetylmorphine (6-MAM), is actually more powerful than heroin. Heroin, as I stated, is merely a delivery vehicle for morphine itself. Heroin is worthless as a drug itself because the acetylation which allows much greater pentration of the Blood to Brain Barrier also prevents the diacetylmorphine (heroin) from getting hold of the relevant binder. This is why everything you, or someone else feels when using heroin is related to the morphine carried with THAT heroin.
This failure to bind cannot be mitigated but let us imagine there was a way. We would still have a 2nd insurmountable hurdle to deal with in that heroin's half life is a mere 90 seconds. "Half Life" is the avg.time it takes a substance to leave a human body.
Ergo, if heroin's half life is 90 seconds, heroin is gone within 3 minutes of consuming it.
6-MAM, as I said specific to heroin (not found in morphine, duh), is created naturally in degradation, and itself degrades very quickly as well. Other than that natural degradation creating it, it is also created via a process called "Hydrolysis." Hydrolysis takes place when a substance, susceptible to the dynamic, comes into contact with moisture...Conversely, if acetylysation takes place without benefit of reflux the requsite moisture is burned off/evaporates. This will give you less 6-MAM than heroin produced in reflux.
This leaves Tar with an anabnormally low percentage of 6-MAM, always.
On the other hand, Tar will always have abnormally high 3-MAM content. This is due from insufficient acetylysation. The use os acetyl chloride, insufficient time and temperature prevents a total conversion of morphine to diacetylmorphine (heroin).
Reflux also plays a part here but by adjusting time and temprature upwards the deficiencies caused by acetyl chloride can be overcome. Sadly, Mexican producers just do not get the point. By now the process is so well entrenched that I suspect Tar is here to stay, unfortunately.
"Homebake" is produced sans reflux, with different GAAs but the only REAL difference there is that O-demethylation is sometimes used to net morphine from a codeine precursor.
In addition, when Dicodin used to be used as a precursor the end product would be red or pink tar, but those rare times that Homebake still appears one sees only brown and black tar, since Dicodin is extinct.
I will continue...
(Edited for spelling)
Yes I'm going through the very same problem you're complaining about. Granted, I've been a binge user on & off 27 years & am very much an addict BUT I always eventually returned to my baseline energy level up until mid 2008. This meant I could binge on meth & 3 days after stopping I'd feel halfway human & in 3 wks fine without drugs (ADD symptoms aside off meth.) It's the same with my Rx pills I've been taking on & off many years. During a daily heavy use for 1, 2 yrs+ it took a while several months before I felt ok without dope.
I got clean off all drugs/alcohol Dec 2006 & stayed clean 2007 but took Tramadol in 2008 for a couple wks - biggest mistake of my life. I struggled for a year to get off of them, but unlike traditional meth & opiates I never did get my physical energy level back & lost the ability to experience enjoyment from doing the things I enjoyed doing clean prior to the Tramadol use & I tried 9 months to taper until finally I couldn't tolerate the suffering of being tired 24/7 no matter how much sleep a day I got or didn't get. I was tired from the second I woke up until I went to bed again.
I tried Weight Watchers, regular exercise 3 x a week, going to NA 3 x a week, telling my MD who ran a shit load of blood work totaling $600--my portion after insurance that is & she couldn't find anything wrong. Out of money to spend on tests & working at a job that does not give paid sick or vacation days, I did what I had to do to survive having to maintain a job 5-6 shifts/wk & to be awake without feeling like a depleted joyless wad fighting to keep from falling asleep on the job in spite of having slept 9 hrs before work.
My threshold for suffering had been reached knowing for a fact that although I'd have to maintain an ongoing habit, I would nevertheless be granted relief for the day. Thats been the case with me since my official relapse in March of 2009. Financially it sucks having to buy Rx & my weekly allottment of meth, but it sucks less than even the thought of feeling the way I did before meth/opiate Rx & after tramadol. I've been contemplating asking doc for a script for vyvanse to treat both chronic fatigue and ADD. I won't get high on vyvanse, as it's a much weaker drug than IV meth. Still, I'm willing to forego the IV meth in favor of legitimate, legal "treatment," but then again I'm not counting on it. For all I know I'll be perceived as a drug seeker & doc may frown on giving me vyvanse when she's already had me on my Rx for ongoing migraines. I've stuck with one Rx for pain only, as oxy, heroin, percs, methadone don't touch my pain, yet curiously enough fiorinal/codeine (my Rx) works like a charm for pain and/or cop a buzz as well as help temporarily restore my brain chemistry so I can tolerate, even enjoy merely going about activities of daily living & work.
There's a defininte difference from the days when I was suffering w/ds that sucked but eventually went away after a couple weeks or months, whereas after tramadol this crap went on continuously 9 months until I said fuck it. Enter meth & painkillers. Exit fatigue/ADD/apathy cursed existence....for a day at least. After which = another day, another dose. It's preferable to the apathetic killjoy quality as the alternative though.
I got clean off all drugs/alcohol Dec 2006 & stayed clean 2007 but took Tramadol in 2008 for a couple wks - biggest mistake of my life. I struggled for a year to get off of them, but unlike traditional meth & opiates I never did get my physical energy level back & lost the ability to experience enjoyment from doing the things I enjoyed doing clean prior to the Tramadol use & I tried 9 months to taper until finally I couldn't tolerate the suffering of being tired 24/7 no matter how much sleep a day I got or didn't get. I was tired from the second I woke up until I went to bed again.
I tried Weight Watchers, regular exercise 3 x a week, going to NA 3 x a week, telling my MD who ran a shit load of blood work totaling $600--my portion after insurance that is & she couldn't find anything wrong. Out of money to spend on tests & working at a job that does not give paid sick or vacation days, I did what I had to do to survive having to maintain a job 5-6 shifts/wk & to be awake without feeling like a depleted joyless wad fighting to keep from falling asleep on the job in spite of having slept 9 hrs before work.
My threshold for suffering had been reached knowing for a fact that although I'd have to maintain an ongoing habit, I would nevertheless be granted relief for the day. Thats been the case with me since my official relapse in March of 2009. Financially it sucks having to buy Rx & my weekly allottment of meth, but it sucks less than even the thought of feeling the way I did before meth/opiate Rx & after tramadol. I've been contemplating asking doc for a script for vyvanse to treat both chronic fatigue and ADD. I won't get high on vyvanse, as it's a much weaker drug than IV meth. Still, I'm willing to forego the IV meth in favor of legitimate, legal "treatment," but then again I'm not counting on it. For all I know I'll be perceived as a drug seeker & doc may frown on giving me vyvanse when she's already had me on my Rx for ongoing migraines. I've stuck with one Rx for pain only, as oxy, heroin, percs, methadone don't touch my pain, yet curiously enough fiorinal/codeine (my Rx) works like a charm for pain and/or cop a buzz as well as help temporarily restore my brain chemistry so I can tolerate, even enjoy merely going about activities of daily living & work.
There's a defininte difference from the days when I was suffering w/ds that sucked but eventually went away after a couple weeks or months, whereas after tramadol this crap went on continuously 9 months until I said fuck it. Enter meth & painkillers. Exit fatigue/ADD/apathy cursed existence....for a day at least. After which = another day, another dose. It's preferable to the apathetic killjoy quality as the alternative though.