Woe is me!

Being on sabbatical is certainly wonderful. My health has improved, I sleep through the night, my weight is down and heartburn a thing of the past. The cash flow problem I faced only a week ago has vanished thanks to unemployment coming in. My partner is happy with my new outlook on life, my summer has become an endless weekend and lunchtime is anytime I damn well want it to be.

My only great sadness is that I am back to living a life that is very much 1990's, "Just Say No",prohibition-style. How can this be, for a man who vowed when he left library land that the only way forward was into the work world of cannabis? Well, let me tell you, just because you live in a mota friendly state doesn’t mean your future employers want marijuana in your bloodstream. I am finding out the hard way that applying for jobs outside of the cannabis industry means reading the fine print.

I have worked in the government sector for years. The last time I had to have my pee monitored was 1992. Back then I was tentatively offered a job up in Everett, Washington, the condition for work being that I had to pass a pee test. Living in Southern Oregon at that time meant running with a wide variety of types, including ex-loggers, environmentalists, river rafters, artists, storytellers, puppeteers, magicians, rockers and, natch, dope smokers. And while I thought the world of the local brews and happily went far afield to drink their nifty pinot noirs it was the weed that kept me jumping around from place to place, pal to pal. It was somewhere out there but man, you had to be from someplace else other than California to make the case that you were a friend in need, not just a friend, indeed.

I took that long drive back up to the Puget Sound to pee in their cup, but the strain was in not remembering when I had smoked last. Came home wondering about the job, wondering where I was going to come up with the cash to replace the muffler that fell of the Bug back up near Tacoma. In the end all was well and I got the job, got the job that put me in direct contact with shrooms from another world and, once again, put me in a state where mota was still hard to find.

Jet forward twenty-five years and now almost everywhere I go on the West Coast is mota legal or can be gotten with a medical card. Those days of worrying about marijuana being a concern for work in the information sector were just plain old gone. I moved to Colorado and had a grand old time while I worked here, as it was a tincture paradise during the week and a full buffet of cannabis treats each and every weekend.

Except for now. Who would have known that time off from work would equate to time away from weed? I had this idea that, after my daily search for employment on the net at the library, after my daily round of housecleaning, after a bit of lunch, I could find my way down to the complex pool, sit under the sun, be cool in the pool, lit on some strain or another that I was just dying to try, to write up about, to sample, scientific style, just to let you know the safety and efficacy of it all. I was going to do it all for YOU, and now, selfishly, the minions of Sessions are nipping at my heels, telling me NO, NO, NO, no mota for you! Go find a job, go get stressed and have a real reason to get lit!

Sigh.

Yep, I love my sabbatical. I feel rested, I watch movies less that I did when I was working, I am taking all sort of field trips with my loving partner and I am truly beginning to see the virtues of having moved here to CO. And I am buying dope like a fiend. My stash trunk runneth over. Never had a wanted to secure a job as badly as I do right now. My mota awaits and so does my extended servitude in the land of work.

Ah, hell, worker bees and smokers unite!

Salud!

Misadventures in the mota trade

Okay, nothing good ever comes easy. I know that what I was doing for a buck, shilling information in the public sector, was going to haunt me. I never thought, though, that being well paid professional with a degree would be such an impediment to this quest of mine. All I want to do is be part of this “green rush” I keep reading about. The biggest complication? So do a few other million or more people.

Cannabis is popular here in Colorado. It’s generating an incredible amount of sales, a butt load of tax revenues, a wealth of innovation and a fantastic boost to the warehouse rental market in Denver and Pueblo. But it is also bringing in a ton of folks from just about everywhere, folks with incredible dossiers full of marijuana growing and selling experience, folks who have worked dispensaries and the only thing holding them back from jumping into the industry is Colorado state ID.

Well, I have that ID. I have 25 years of professional service. I have forty years of transport, warehouse, data entry and customer service under my belt. I know about my strains, read the marijuana trade papers daily, keep up with the news, tour the state to see what is happening in other regional dispensaries and do my best to make sure that I am presentable and ready to interview at a moment’s notice. And, let it be known, I make sure that I read my Indeed feed every morning to see what kinds of cannabis work is out there in this lovely state of CO. I know how hard it is to get in. Everyone tells me so. I now can say that I have been there.

Well, it’s been interesting, that’s for sure, all this genuflecting before the altar of the mota job. I have had two interviews. I did get one good bite. I have gotten nods of approval for wanting to join in from budtenders that I have gotten to know. And I have even been given a chance to write about this cool stuff with an online site. Let me tell you all about it:

My favorite moment in this slog has been my interview with Connor. Right away I absolutely loved his sincerity and forthrightness. I applied to be his Director of Education for a start-up he was working on. We were to go around to fairs and festivals and, with the aid of a tent and able bodied assistants, were going to educate folks about the science, health and culture of cannabis. He was charged up, all right. He had been looking for cash, working the cannabis trade shows, building cred with venture capitalists, all that. We met at work site that sponsored folks who just needed a place to work in. For us it was a lobby space, folks passing by wondering what the hell we were all about . 

It was a great, intense two hours, sitting face to face, talking the good talk about marijuana, it’s history and its benefits. When it came down to particulars, like pay, like benefits, well, that’s when the floor fell out from underneath me. The pay would possible come the latter part of summer. Benefits, well, who can talk benefits when you have just have funds enough on hand to operate maybe two more weeks? Thanks, Connor, all the same. It sounded great to be considered to join in with your merry band of marijuana educators, but I really wanted some cash flow to go along with that cloud of cannabis smoke we were blowing around there for a bit.

Then there was the interview I had for the number one rated dispensary in the state. Thank you, Infinite Wellness, for making that interview opportunity seem like the best lead I had been given in a long time. It came out of the blue. I dropped off an unsolicited resume and cover letter on the Friday before a holiday weekend and two days later I was given a call by the operations manager. “Would you like to come in a talk about this two day a week position we have open?” Goodness, sure, a foot in the door! Certainly! 

Well, the interview went well, so much so that I had a second one lined up at the end of the week. That was where the fun stopped and the interview process went weird. It went from a handshake with the security chief to working behind the desk for two hours, checking id’s at one of the busiest dispensaries in town. No training, just a jump in there and do it. Well, later on I was told it was just an “audition”, whatever in the hell that meant. I was told when I left that they would review the tapes of the experience I just had. Seven cameras worth of video feed tells a lot about a guy, his nervousness and the importance of doing the job right. Put the fear of god in me knowing that if I fucked up they could shut the place down. No pressure, none at all.

Lately there was the cannabis courier job that seemed like a good thing on paper but I couldn’t find anything about the company online. Got an email late Sunday night to see if I was interested, and hey, by the way, could you tell what kind of vehicle you drive? Well, apparently my wee little Fit was not what they were looking for. Call us if you get a Suburban or an Escalade.

But I have not stopped looking. I drop off or submit at least one or two apps a day to warehouse, driver or data jobs I see on Indeed. I dropped off an app at my favorite little dispensary here in town but lost my cover letter in weirdness of the library printer set up. No biggie. I am sure that an insider will get that position, too.

I do feel a bit of the sexist thing going on here, though. Some of the places I have applied to just want gals behind the counter. I never equated budtending with bartending before, but there it is. Proximity to the university might have a hand in that.

Oh, well. Now, let’s see if that online site likes my writing enough to let me freelance with them. I made a cut-off of sorts, submitted a writing sample last week. Would be nice to get that six cents a word thing, see a check come in for something I love to do for free.

This Green Rush is a lot like the Gold Rush of old. An awful lot of folks lost their shirts in that one. Put everything they had into getting across the continent, grubbing a stake, panning the earth and then, after the last bean in the pot went down the gullet, decided to pack it all up and go back home again.

Funny thing is I have two interviews next week with libraries. Is my pursuit of a job in the cannabis trade at a wrap?

Naw, I just like to interview, apparently. Onward and upward. There’s a mota job out there waiting for me somewhere. Or so I sez, sez I.

Salud!

It's all about choice!

What does today’s cannabis market have in common with cars, tennis shoes and candy bars? Choice.

As consumers we value selection, innovation and quality.  No matter if you are a cannabis connoisseur, on canna-holiday or are new to the scene there is no better time than now to be a patient or a customer in the great Colorado marijuana marketplace. Gone are the days when the weed of choice was seedy schwag from down the lane. These days recreational and medical cannabis consumers have access to a staggering array of flower, oils, tinctures, waxes, rosins, savories and more to choose from. It is a veritable sweets store for the over 21 set and day by day it only seems to get better.

With a bit of schooling a trip to today’s modern dispensary can be like a run to the supermarket. Go online and study up before you go, learn what you can about strains, edibles and extracts, make a list of products you would like to try out and remember, ask questions, your local budtender is there to help you.

These days there many ways to play with your cannabis. With the wild array of flower at your disposalyou can roll a joint, light up a pipe or fire up a bong, all good and time honored ways to get your buzz on. Vaporizers have helped to make inhaling dry weed safer, cleaner and healthier. And edibles have certainly come a long way from the ubiquitous brownie. Now there are a multitude of drinks, cookies and other consumables out there to help you access your THC in portioned, reliable ways.

And yet the Colorado cannabis flower market has seen a change in revenues. According to Marijuana Business Daily from the first quarter of 2015 to the 1^st quarter of 2016, we experienced an 11 percent rise in sales while concentrates bumped up 125 percent. Did flower suddenly fall out of favor here in the Mile High State? No, what we are seeing is a change in how consumers are choosing to deliver and savor their highs.

It is the continued rise of quality and choice of cannabis concentrates that makes being a pot consumer so exciting right now. Are you new to weed and want something light, discreet and adventurous to explore? Try out a micro dose sipper pen. Need something chic that will also deliver a big dose of pleasure? Today’s e-cigarette cartridge technology might be right for you. Are you a veteran of the cannabis scene and want to take in an evening of heavy hitting cannabis joy? Well, grab a dag rig, the thrills of waxes, shatter and resins await.

Thanks to smarter technologies like CO2 and solventless extraction cannabis concentrates continues to be safer, more economical and purer than ever before. Not only are the THC and CBD contents of these products significantly higher than flower but these new methods of production are delivering ever more enriched terpene profiles as well. What we are seeing is a return to taste, to the flavors of the herb that we experienced in flower form.

Today’s discriminating cannabis shopper prefers products that are natural, well made and cutting edge. We like products that help us lead smarter and healthier lives. These changing tastes help us get a bigger bang for our buck, too. Flower prices are going down, which means a better selection of new genetics at old school prices. New production techniques mean cleaner extracts with higher concentrations of THC. Good times for everyone all the way around.

Choice. It is what cannabis is all about!

Salud!