Ok so now I've smoked a Raw Lean Cone (yep bumping the brand in an obvious way) from Blue God ground in a kick ass grinder... taken out of my stash box (see where I'm going here?)... We've been working on some pretty cool shit. And it's finally starting to come together. Been really short on sleep and even shorter on time.
I don't know any of you on a personal level at all. My fault. Arms length shit. Here's why. When I started growing, people were going to prison for life stretches... for 6 to 20 plants. Those ass fuckers were counting a plant as POUNDS. Like, they weighed the container, media, stem all together. So if you were in a 20 gallon nursery pot for trees, that ONE PLANT was 100 pounds or so x street value of 100 pounds and those ass fuckers (redundant but stuck in that rut for 30 years or so) would declare they busted a MAJOR grow house with a street value of 1000 pounds x 1000 dollars. The reality is that back then if a plant tossed 4 ounces dry, we were pissing ourselves... that is until hydro came on the scene and
General Hydroponics basically standardized the best way to grow peppers errrr tomatoes. You know how many counter conversations I had about fucking tomatoes in the 80's? God. Damn. True story. A lot of old timers can attest to the exact same thing.
Like... when you went to the Hydro Store you arrived in a fucking taxi... cause the cops had a 24/7 camera on the building, the owner told everyone about it, and... then we all started wearing baseball caps, fluffy clothes, and big ass Roy Orbison style Ray Bans... no shit. Taxi pickup? Always a different parking lot outside a busy mall somewhere. Back then you could throw a rock and hit three malls and skip the thing off of a half dozen strip malls.
Everyone was underground. We sweated when we dealt with Marc Emery because everyone knew he was such a flagrant dick about what he was doing, that it was just a matter of time before the bear got sick of being poked. And sure enough. Our Country locked his ass up. And then the other side of that sordid shit came out and omfg. This. THIS is what the pot world looked like from my perspective. Cops were playing whack a mole with people who were doing nothing more than growing righteous weed.
My mentor died a couple of years ago. And there are two whole people on the planet who know my face and the fact that I grow. It's always been that way. No matter the fact that I'm in tech... I watched Silk Road perish and was like shit balls. Nothing online will ever be safe. And so I ignored all of it. The communities. The seed banks. The fast evolving strains. And the world. literally. changed. Like... DRAMATICALLY CHANGED.
Why take advice from anyone. I've been doing this for decades. I thought my Widow, Herrer, Gold, and stuff was the pinnacle. All that was lost in a fire. I literally had to start all over again. Clone mommas... gone. Seed stock... gone. Years of everything. Gone. So I started rebuilding from nothing on a tight budget. We fought the insurance company for over a year before we saw a dime. And then someone brought back some seeds from Cali for me, put them in my hand and said... Bro. Different fucking world. Plant these.
So I did. And... the world shifted under my feet.
And they didn't play by the same rules as the stuff I lost. Not even close. A ph of 7 literally locked them up. Soil composition had changed. Everything was spiked with Miracle Grow. I was using an old bucket/res system before. Not even dirt was dirt anymore?! Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck. This was like starting alllllll over again. I was PISSED.
Like one day I have what I'm familiar with, the stock I'm used to handling, under conditions that have been the same way for 30 years with good old dutch master gold and GH coming in like clockwork from the bezos machine to.... wtf did I stash in the barn that still works. And wtf is going on with the rest of the world that these seeds don't "play by the rules"?
Well the world changed is the answer. And the old rules don't work anymore. Because we were doing it wrong. Like you can take any of my bud now and stack it against that high times pic for an old cannabis cup winners list and I'll blow it all away. That used to be the pinnacle. It's alright but by today's standards... ain't shit.
Well I've been growing yesterday's standards for so long that the bar got moved and I was completely blind to it. So this last season has been a completely rude awakening, coupled with the fact that I'm already an old rude ass anyway.
I watched a lot of friends and acquaintances devote their entire focus to pot without any hope of anything other than doing some good shit with a good plant that made them feel really good and they just wanted everyone else to feel good too. They never drove anything other than a hoopdie. They never lived in a McMansion. And they were seemingly oblivious to the fact that there was a completely different deeper level that they could live in IF they were willing to make that sacrifice and actually embrace the boogie monster... capitalism. What a waste right? Good people. Limited life perspective.
Or was it?
Because the fact of the matter is that I am making more money now than I ever have to be able to afford to live... like them (minus the hoopdie) Isn't that another kick in the ass? LOL! What NEVER fucking escapes me is the irony dishes that life serves. It look losing everything to understand what is really important.
And then when we had this once in a lifetime opportunity to literally throw a dart at the map we considered it long and hard. We debated, researched, drew from personal experiences and those bucket list items that sometimes seem like they are good but are better left in the bucket. I mean we've lived in awesome freaking compounds (Keys, Jamaica, New Orleans), big homes, on the water, country, city, beach. Make it spend it.
But at the end of all of this, none of that shit was important. What was important was the silence required to appreciate that life really doesn't have to be loud, glamorous, or convenient to be interesting. And most importantly for me anyway is that I was able to find great elegance in simplicity.
The good weed? I literally want to grow it all that's worth the time to plant. For me, this is the world I get to step into; a refuge from the virtual world I make a living in. This grounds me, if that makes any sense.
And as far as my abrasive nature? I created the Cataract Jack brand for a reason. Because he's a cranky old fucker with the best of intentions. He's the cartoon me.
Man I cussed a lot in this one. I better add some emojis to let everyone know I'm not pissed, sarcastic (well 100% anyway), or yelling. And yeah dudes and dudettes I'm going to attempt to be a smartass with emojis too. Sorry not sorry. It's the way I'm wired. Just know I have... the best of intentions. Always.