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Want To Be A Marijuana Budtender? Here’s How To Do It

Don Goldberg
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Want To Be A Marijuana Budtender? Here’s How To Do It

Want to be a Seattle budtender? It’s a growing business, you get to meet interesting folks, it’s not going to be outsourced, and, let’s see… free weed, right? Not so fast. I took a sobering look at your job prospects and spoke with some folks in the know around Seattle to get the lowdown on the high life of a budtender.

The Qualifications

Pot shops are looking for personality and passion for the product, and if you’ve got experience in customer service, either in retail, managing people, or even food service, that helps.

Kalie Sandstrom in human resources at Lux in Ballard looks at diversity, not just in tats, piercings, and hair color but in race, gender, and life experience. It takes a village, so to speak. A budtender may even have a criminal background, so long as he/she can get along with people.

Overeducation isn’t a detriment but neither is it a prerequisite. In your interview you’ll be asked about your experience with the product and how you use it. Don’t worry about needing to pee in a cup.

You don’t need to be an expert, but passion pays off. Jay Berger at Pot Stop in Fremont says that “you have to love people.” It’s easier to teach budtenders about cannabis than how to get along with people. “The job is very educational,” he said. “You can’t not learn on the job.”

The Education

Like others, Jay came from the medical side to the recreational side. Pot Stop started back in 2010 as SMMA (Seattle Medical Marijuana Association) and still is authorized to sell to medical patients. If you’d like to be a budtender on the medical side, you’ll need a bit more education: a 20-hour online course. Then you’ll have consultant certification.

Your folks might have bragging rights knowing the fruit of their loins is certified, but should stop referring to you as a “budding doctor.” Still, it’s a career with a future. If you stick with it, you can move up quickly. Jay sees this is as the start of the “green rush.” Dani from Queen Anne Cannabis Co. left a gig at Old Navy (unlike Popeye, she had a different kind of spinach in her pipe), answering an ad on Craigslist, and two years later she’s gone from budtender to buyer and inventory manager.

For more of this story, please click on this link to Everygrey. 

Sign up for The Evergrey newsletter and links here.

Don Goldberg is a member of The Evergrey Writing Group. He’s written jokes for the Emmys, satire for Jerry Springer, help screens for Microsoft, web pages for HP, The History of Rock and Roll for radio, church bulletins, documentaries for Children and other work for hire he’s not as proud of. No matter how hard he tries to be serious, he finds the humor in it because he revels in the absurdity of it all. He has lived all over the United States but settled in Seattle 26 years ago because, as he puts it, there was no other place left. He lives with his wife, Gail, and his daughter, Maya (until she moves out of the house), and is currently working on an irreverent spiritual sendup novel and a companion cookbook about a rebellious teenager and her family.

Key Senate Committee OKs Marijuana For Veterans

Terry Hacienda
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Key Senate Committee OKs Marijuana For Veterans

Those who have served our country seeking to treat their ailments with medical marijuana received good news this week when an influential Senate committee voted to green light marijuana for veterans.

By a 24-7 margin, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved the Veterans Equal Access amendment, which would allow doctors in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to recommend cannabis in states where it is legal.

Currently, V.A. doctors are not allowed to provide the paperwork necessary to complete a medical cannabis recommendation, even in the 29 states where medical marijuana programs exist. Veterans are forced to seek the advice of private physicians.

According to Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT), the measure’s lead sponsor, the amendment “simply allows the V.A. patients in states with medical marijuana programs to discuss that option with their V.A. doctor of physician.”

Two of the nation’s largest and most influential veterans’ groups — the American Legion and AMVETS — have urged the federal government to allow access to medical marijuana.

Veterans are increasingly turning to medical cannabis as an alternative to opioids and other pharmaceutical medications to treat conditions like chronic pain and post-traumatic stress. An estimated 8,000 veteran commit suicide a year — 22 a day.

The American Legion, which represents more than 2 million members, sent a letter to President Trump urging him to help them make a change to the policy.

“The American Legion respectfully requests a meeting with President Trump as soon as possible and looks forward to partnering with this administration in the fight against narcotics addiction and reducing the veteran suicide rate from the tragic loss of 20 warriors per day, to zero,” the letter reads.

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), a co-sponsor of the Senate amendment, says it is about time to do something. “We often talk about how our soldiers stand up for us, and we need to stand up for them,” Merkley said.

Study Finds Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Deter Crime

MJ News Network
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Study Finds Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Deter Crime

The forced closure of medical marijuana dispensaries is associated with an uptick in crime, according to data published in the Journal of Urban Economics.

University of Southern California researchers assessed the impact of dispensary closures on crime rates in the city of Los Angeles. Investigators analyzed crime data in the days immediately prior to and then immediately after the city ordered several hundred operators to be closed.

Researchers identified an immediate increase in criminal activity – particularly property crime, larceny, and auto break ins – in the areas where dispensary operations were forced to close as compared to crime rates in those neighborhoods where marijuana retailers remained open for business. “[W]e find no evidence that closures decreased crime,” they reported. “Instead, we find a significant relative increase in crime around closed dispensaries.”

“Open dispensaries provide over $30,000 per year in social benefit in terms of larcenies prevented,” authors concluded.

From the study:

Jurisdictions that sanction medical or, more recently, recreational marijuana use often allow retail sales at dispensaries. Dispensaries are controversial as many believe they contribute to local crime. To assess this claim, we analyze the short-term mass closing of hundreds of medical marijuana dispensaries in Los Angeles. Contrary to popular wisdom, we find an immediate increase in crime around dispensaries ordered to close relative to those allowed to remain open. The increase is specific to the type of crime most plausibly deterred by bystanders, and is correlated with neighborhood walkability. We find a similar pattern of results for temporary restaurant closures due to health code violations. A likely common mechanism is that “eyes upon the street” deter some types of crime.

The findings are consistent with those of prior studies determining that dispensary operations are not associated with ‘spillover effects’ in local communities, such as increased teen marijuana use or an uptick in property crimes.

Maybe Woody Harrelson Still Uses Marijuana After All

Brendan Bures
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Maybe Woody Harrelson Still Uses Marijuana After All

Earlier this year, Woody Harrelson made headlines for quitting smoking marijuana. The revelation came as a shocker, considering Harrelson’s long-standing presence as a cannabis advocate and enthusiast. He tried to apply for a dispensary license in Hawaii, though he was eventually denied.

He came out in a Vulture interview, stating, “I actually stopped smoking pot almost a year ago.” The notion was later confirmed in The Hollywood Reporter this month, when Harrelson once again stated his having quit in an effort to tone down from his party animal days.

But when he appeared on Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show, the actor’s tone changed. When prompted by Colbert again about quitting smoking, Harrelson said, “I don’t smoke any less [the crowd cheered]. I did, I quit smoking…this morning. I’ll pick it up after this. No, I actually did quit.”

Following Harrelson losing his train of thought near the end of the interview, Colbert jokingly brought up weed once again. “So you don’t smoke weed anymore?”

“You don’t have to smoke a brownie, dude. You know what I’m saying?” Harrelson responded.

He sounded half-teasing when he said it, so who knows? It could just be a friendly quip between Colbert and Harrelson. Or perhaps Harrelson found a different way to consume his cannabis outside smoking. All we can do is speculate.

How A Vegas Pastry Chef Keeps Her Marijuana Edibles Fresh

Jillian Peterson
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How A Vegas Pastry Chef Keeps Her Marijuana Edibles Fresh

When your job is to make baked goods, the last thing you want is for them to go stale. Same with marijuana edibles. How do you keep your infused cakes, cookies and other treats from drying out before they’re sold?

Kimberly Valdez is the pastry chef at MB Steak at the Hard Rock in Vegas, and also oversees the edibles at Acres Cannabis. She’s found a way to keep the integrity of her baked goods. “It’s a challenge,” she tells Food & Wine. “You need to create a good pastry while maintaining a note of marijuana.”

Since it takes five days for edibles to get the “green light” for retail sale, she has figured out that the best way to keep her pastries fresh in the interim is to add the cannabis to the icings, frosting, and ganaches, which keep well for a longer period of time when refrigerated or frozen. By not infusing the actually pastries themselves, they can be made day-of, ensuring their freshness upon purchase.

“I want the pastries to be the vessels while glaze and frosting and ganache serve as the carriers for cannabis,” says Valdez, who will be diving into more sophisticated desserts this month. She’ll be turning out haute chocolate domes filled with infused peanut butter, blackout cake with a THC white-cream center, and lemon cake with cream cheese frosting made with canna-butter.

Valdez, who admits she’s gotten accidentally stoned while taste-testing her creations, says she takes a lot of pride in the pastry program at Acres and that “I know people who use marijuana medically and now they don’t have to gnaw on nasty edibles. They can enjoy cookies and donuts that are freshly baked. That makes me happy.”

Blacks And Latinos Comprise 85% Of Marijuana Arrests In NYC

Drug Policy Alliance
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Blacks And Latinos Comprise 85% Of Marijuana Arrests In NYC

A new report released today by the Marijuana Arrests Research Project, commissioned by the Drug Policy Alliance, shows that marijuana possession arrests under Mayor de Blasio continue to be marked by extremely high racial disparities, as was the case under the Bloomberg and Giuliani administrations.

The report, Unjust and Unconstitutional: 60,000 Jim Crow Marijuana Arrests in Mayor de Blasio’s New York, shows that despite a change in mayoral administrations and police commissioners, the NYPD continues to make large numbers of unjust and racially-targeted marijuana arrests. The report is based on data from the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services.

Despite Mayor de Blasio’s campaign promise to end racially-biased policing, in 2016 marijuana possession was New York City’s fourth most commonly charged criminal offense. Black and Latino New Yorkers continue to comprise 85 percent of the more than 60,000 people arrested for low-level marijuana possession on Mayor de Blasio’s watch. Most people arrested are young Blacks and Latinos – even though studies consistently show young whites use marijuana at higher rates.

“President Obama, Governor Cuomo, former Mayor Ed Koch and candidate Bill de Blasio all strongly criticized the NYPD’s racist marijuana possession arrests,” said report author and Queens College professor Harry Levine. “Yet the most progressive mayor in the modern history of New York is unable to stop them? Really?”

Key Finding Include The Following:

  • In the first three years of the de Blasio administration, the NYPD made over 60,000 criminal arrests for the lowest-level marijuana possession offense, an average of 20,000 marijuana arrests a year.
  • The NYPD’s marijuana arrests under de Blasio suffer from the same overwhelming racial disparities as under Bloomberg – about 86% of the arrests for marijuana possession are of Blacks and Latinos.
  • As in previous years, in 2016 and in the first four months of 2017, 81% of the people arrested for marijuana were age 16 to 34, 58% were 16 to 25 and 27% were age 16 to 20.
  • Residents of New York City’s public housing developments constitute the single largest group of people arrested. In 2016, NYPD housing police made 21% of the city’s total of 18,121 arrests for marijuana possession and 92% of those arrested were Blacks and Latinos.
  • Of New York City’s 76 neighborhood police precincts, 37 neighborhoods have a majority of Black and Latino residents. They have about half the city’s population but provide 66% of the marijuana possession arrests and 92% of the people arrested are Blacks and Latinos.
  • Police in New York also target neighborhoods in midtown and lower Manhattan with active nightlife. Although pedestrians in those areas are predominately white, police arrest Blacks and Latinos at very high rates.
  • In 2016, in Greenwich Village, 69% of the people arrested for marijuana possession were Blacks and Latinos. In Chelsea, 77% were Blacks and Latinos. In Soho-Tribeca-Wall St. 73% were Blacks and Latinos. In tourist-heavy Little Italy and Chinatown, 66% of the people arrested for marijuana possession were Blacks and Latinos.
  • In 2016, police enforcement targeted people of color, especially Blacks, everywhere in New York City. In Manhattan, Blacks are 13% of the residents but 45% of the people arrested for marijuana possession. In Queens, Blacks are 18% of the residents but 49% of the people arrested for marijuana. And in Staten Island, Blacks are 10% of the residents but 49% of the people arrested for marijuana possession.
  • The rates of NYPD arrests for marijuana possession per 100,000 of the population are extremely skewed. In Queens, police arrest Blacks at seven times the rate of whites. In Manhattan they arrest Blacks at 10 times the rate of whites. And in Staten Island the NYPD arrests Blacks at 15 times the rate of whites.

The report demonstrates how police precincts throughout the city have different enforcement policies and practices when it comes to lowest level marijuana arrests by comparing the rates in different neighborhoods. For example, the Upper East Side, covered by Precinct 19, is the second most populous precinct in the city, with over 200,000 residents. It has one of the highest family incomes, and is 80 percent white.

In 2016 only 14 out of the 18,121 marijuana arrests were made in this precinct—four Blacks, three Latinos and seven whites—resulting in an arrest rate of 6 per 100,000 residents.  Just 20 blocks north of the Upper East Side is East Harlem (El Barrio) covered by Precinct 25. Eighty-eight percent of this neighborhood’s residents are Black or Latino. In 2016, the officers in this precinct made 492 of the lowest level marijuana possession arrests, yielding an arrest rate of 1,038 per hundred thousand, the second highest in the city.

The report also compares the predominantly white Upper West Side with its 51 arrests in 2016 (41 of them Blacks and Latinos) with the predominantly Black and Latino West Harlem with its 677 arrests.

The report concludes that the only way to end these racially discriminatory arrests is by stopping them entirely: “We strongly recommend that police and district attorneys in the five boroughs of New York City immediately cease arresting, charging and prosecuting anyone for violation of New York State Criminal Law section 221.10, part 1.”

Efforts to end the marijuana arrest crusade in New York continue to build. In Albany, where reform proposals have been debated for years, Senator Liz Krueger and Assemblymember Crystal Peoples-Stokes introduced the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act (MRTA), a bill that would establish a legal market for marijuana in New York. The bill would effectively end marijuana prohibition in New York State – and address the persistent, unwarranted racial disparities associated with the practice – and create a system to tax and regulate marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol for adults over the age of 21.

The MRTA is supported by the Start SMART NY campaign – Sensible Marijuana Access through Regulated Trade – which is comprised of organizations and advocates dedicated to criminal justice reform, civil rights, public health, and community-based organizing.

“Prohibition has played a significant role in devastating low-income communities of color through racially biased enforcement and has often come with steep collateral consequences. We believe it’s time for a new approach and that approach shouldn’t involve criminalizing New York’s most vulnerable populations,” said Alyssa Aguilera, Co-Executive Director of VOCAL-NY.

Money Shots: 4 Great Whiskeys To Celebrate A Raise

Margarett Waterbury
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Money Shots: 4 Great Whiskeys To Celebrate A Raise

Congratulations! You finally got that raise you’ve been angling for. Or maybe you crushed those quarterly targets, or successfully shipped a new product, or finally put the finishing touches on that project for the client from Hell. You’ve got some money to spend, you’re ready to celebrate, and the fancy part of the whiskey store beckons. Here’s what we think you should be buying, hot shot.

Springbank 18

One of just three remaining Campbelltown distilleries, Springbank is famous for making malts of uncommon character. Their 10-year-old entry-level official bottling is nothing to sneeze at, with a huge range of farmy, phenolic, and briny flavors, but if you’re celebrating an accomplishment, it’s time to move up the food chain.

Springbank describes the 18-year-old as “full of authority,” an apt phrase for such a commanding whisky, replete with ripe fruit, strange must, and maritime pastures.

Michter’s 10-Year-Old Single Barrel Bourbon

Michter’s might be the new kid on the block when it comes to Kentucky bourbon, but they know what they’re doing. Each year, they release a 10-year-old single barrel bourbon that’s tricky to track down, but totally worth the hunt. Sweet, balanced, and full of buttery flavor, this is the kind of whiskey you’ll want to drink all day long.

Anything from Samaroli

Silvano Samaroli, the great Italian iconoclast of the independent bottling world, passed away earlier this year, but his brand lives on.

Eccentric and pioneering, Silvano began seeking out exceptional Scottish single malts in the middle of the 20th century, a time when blends dominated the global market. He thought nothing of personally selecting barrels from the Macallan, Springbank, or Benriach, then decanting them into his own casks for more—sometimes much more—aging.

Sacrilege? Not to Silvano. His releases are strange, wonderful, gorgeously packaged, and tough to get your hands on—but a real trophy if you can find one.

Lock Stock & Barrel Straight Rye

Like WhistlePig, but ready to branch out? Lock Stock & Barrel Straight Rye from Cooper Spirits Company is your answer. It’s one of those Canadian flavoring rye bottlings: 16 years old, 100% pot-distilled rye, likely sourced from Alberta Distillery (the first release was), and so densely packed with flavor it’s almost solid in the glass. And as a bonus, the bottle is very stylish—to be expected from the same people who brought you the now iconic St. Germain.

This article originally appeared on The Whiskey Wash.

Scary Summer: This Mega Super Soaker Can Kill You

Brendan Bures
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Scary Summer: This Mega Super Soaker Can Kill You

Your favorite childhood toys have their limitations. A Nerf gun can only shoot so many darts and you can only accessorize Barbie with what comes in the packaging. Perhaps you have the imagination to build these toys bigger and better, but you don’t yet have the tools.

Fortunately for us, former NASA engineer Mark Rober has the tools. And he decided it’s time to upgrade everyone’s favorite outdoor summertime toy: the Super Soaker.

These kind of upgrade aren’t exactly new for Rober being the tinkerer he is. He also built a mega Nerf gun last summer. But this time Rober teamed with his building buddy Bob Clagett to construct the world’s largest Super Soaker from scratch. Rober also chatted with the original creator of the Super Soaker to learn more about how and why the device works.

Rober’s mega Super Soaker can be outfitted with different spigots to produce different high-powered water streams. One has a smaller mouth and can be used to cut through watermelons and glass and another produces a high-powered velocity to smash cups and fruits. But of course the fun is in soaking other people and this giant toy doesn’t disappoint.

Gossip: Milo Yiannopoulos Busted Lying About Book Sales; Michael Phelps Once Weighed 235 Pounds

Naughty Gossip
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Gossip: Milo Yiannopoulos Busted Lying About Book Sales; Michael Phelps Once Weighed 235 Pounds

The Guardian reports:

Rightwing controversialist Milo Yiannopoulos has branded reported low sales of his new book “fake news” after official figures revealed the writer has failed to rock the book charts on either side of the Atlantic, despite his claims to the contrary.

According to Nielsen Bookscan, which monitors book sales through almost all outlets, including Amazon, the former Breitbart technology editor has sold only 18,268 copies of his book in the US and 152 in the UK since its launch on 4 July.

The figure is far below the 100,000 copies, including pre-orders, that his PR team claimed had sold through Amazon alone on the day of the book’s launch.

Though ebook sales are excluded from the charts, Andre Breedt, managing director of Nielsen Book Research, said: “As our sales include Amazon sales it is unlikely to be higher.”

Michael Phelps Once Weighed 235 Pounds

On Taking Time Off:

“During the first couple months, I kind of took off. I raced at about 195, 200 (lbs) at the Olympic games—that was my fighting weight. I’m anywhere between 210 and 215. I was kind of lazy the first couple months and wanted to just enjoy retirement, and live life a little bit. Recently, I’ve started to realize that health and wellness are very large parts of my life, and it helps me be more productive. For me, it is eating a little better, a little different than I was in the past. I’m not burning as many calories as I did in the pool.”

He Fanboys Over The Rock:

“I saw a workout that [Dwayne] “The Rock” [Johnson] did to get ready for Hercules. Honestly, I did it, and it kicked my ass. It destroyed me—absolutely destroyed me. I’m in the process, now, of building my own gym, and looking for a space to rent, and kind of have my own escape, almost, really, like what The Rock does.”

What His Rock Cave Will Look Like:

“What It’s basically a private little place that, when I do go to the gym and I want to work out, I can. I’d rather go in and get my work done that I need to, and kind of not, potentially, be bothered in between a set of squats, or somebody wants to take a photo. I don’t mind taking photos, but when I’m there, I want to lift, and I want to get my job done. I do have goals for myself. That’s how I’ve been able to reach the success that I’ve had, and, for me, I would like to get around 210 and stay around 210, but I don’t want to be as lean as I was last year. I mean, I was at 4.5% body fat last year, and that’s so low.”

His Low-Point:

“After 2012, I went from 185lbs to 235, with really doing nothing. I, basically, just got out of shape and didn’t really care. Then, that led me to not being in a very happy place, and leading me to a dark place. I know what that feels like, and it’s something I never want to happen again. It’s that challenge and that motivation to always keep me going, on certain things. It’s just fun. For me, life is a lot more fun and enjoyable now, than, really, it ever has been. I think part of that is me coming back, and finishing my career in 2016 in Rio, like I did.”

He’s Still Competitive:

“We took a teacher-run hill (spin) class where we’d try and keep certain RPMs. There were 20 people in the room, and it was fun. It was myself, my wife, Nicole, my training partner, Allison Schmitt, and a buddy of mine, Grant, who’s been visiting from Australia for a couple of months. We were basically just trying to compete to see who could get the highest score, and, out of the 10 people, we were top four. I guess the competitiveness is still there, when we’re fighting to beat each other.”
[From Men’s Fitness]

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You Can Now Officially Learn ‘GoT’ High Valyrian

Brendan Bures
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You Can Now Officially Learn ‘GoT’ High Valyrian

Duolingo is a popular app many use to learn languages from around the world. Soon that will include a language not from this world, as Duolingo will soon teach High Valyrian from the HBO series “Game of Thrones.”

The language has existed in Duolingo’s incubator for the past several months but has now received a release date of July 16, 2017. Right in time for those who’d like to beef up their High Valyrian knowledge with the show’s Season 7 premiere. This update to the language’s release date was accompanied by a message from language specialist David J. Peterson, which read, “Valyrio Māzis.” A Redditor translated this cryptic message to “Valyrian is coming.”

Daenerys Targaryen is the only character on the show we hear use this exact dialect on the show. This is because she is one of the last living Targaryens, descendants from Old Valyria. Other characters, however, use informal, regional dialects of the language.

“Valar Morghulis” (“All men must die”) and “Valar Dohaeris” (“All men must serve”). Peterson constructed the entire Valyrian language around these two keys phrases from George RR Martin’s A Song Of Ice And Fire series. He also constructed the Dothraki language used on the show. He spoke about the process at the first Con of Thrones this month, and admitted that fans will usually tweet him corrections about the Dothraki and Valyrian used on the show.

Though there are Valyrian language dictionaries online, this is the first time an official course will be taught on the language. You could also take a $30 Living Language course to learn Dothraki, if you prefer the nomadic lifestyle. Either way, there’s options to learning a dead language. I mean, it’s either these or Latin. You decide which is more useful.

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