Moved list to it’s own site – now calling it The Medical Marijuana Lists - All further updates to the MMJ Strains list will be done there…

Jan 4, 2009: Started working on the MMJ Strains List today…

• Added the main page for The Medical Marijuana Lists.
• Typed in the list so far, almost 80 different strains…
• Worked out the wording for the individual strain pages with tabbed info sub-pages…
• Added first 3 strain : Afghani Hash Plant, Afghani Kush and AK-47 – I’m working alphabetical down my list, but I’m backdating the posts to the date of the photographs.
• Started uploading various galleries of photos.
• Played around with a bunch of templates, trying out different looks… trying to find something I like to build on and modify.

Lot’s of work to do on this project, but it’s started.

Why Do I Need This Sign In 2008?

I’m sorry if you have already seen this photo from Monday’s rally in Los Angeles where over 350 patients, providers, volunteers and supporters peacefully protested the DEA’s persecution of Moro Bay clinic owner Charles C. Lynch, but I had to post it today.

[To find out more about our DEA's misguided prosecution of a person providing medicine to sick and dieing patients - legal patients in the State of California - visit Friends of Charles C. Lynch.]

Today two medical marijuana dispensaries were raided by the DEA here in Long Beach, California. Long Beach Holistic and HHA, both on 4th Street, had patients report on the DEA raid on WeedTracker.com – an online service for medical marijuana patients.

Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to gather any more information about these raids, or to find out if these raids were connected to the raid in Laguna Beach. I do know that neither of these dispensaries were among the ones that attended the rally on Monday, so any thought of payback would seem to be unfounded at this point.

What I do know is that it is time for the DEA to step back and respect the will of the voters here in California. I can not think of another issue that has drawn this kind of jackboot response from the Feds, and such blatant disrespect of states rights.

Federal courts have ruled recently in California’s favor concerning the feds need to respect our laws and sovereignty. Members of Congress have sent strong letters to the DEA concerning this trampling of medical marijuana patients and their providers. Why doesn’t the DEA listen? Are they a rouge agency that thinks it’s beyond the law? I hope not, but all evidence points that way.

For all I know we’ll find out about some shady business practice or lack of proper business license as the reason for the raid, but it’s the DEA actions that have impeded the ability of people to be as thorough as businesses should be… Just look at Charles C. Lynch’s case. He did everything by the book – as legal as a legal business can be in California. He was a recognized business person in his Moro Bay community. Yet now he’s looking at 100 years in prison if the Feds have their way.

This is not the way to run a law-abiding nation. If the leaders won’t follow the laws, or seek to circumvent them because of their personal dislike of a law, do you think the citizens will keep respecting the law?

The silver lining – Obama has said he would stop this kind of trampling of states right – and he’s up in the polls with 27 days to go…

Enjoy…

[Show as slideshow]

Yes, that’s right – FREE Support MMJ Buttons from Jon, onehumanbeing.

Own a small piece of The MMJ Project – own a souvenir of this moment in time in the MMJ movement…

How to get a button: Send a SASE (self-addressed-stamped-envelope) to:

Jon, onehumanbeing

3350 East 7^th Street #336

Long Beach, CA 90804

…and I’ll drop one of the 750 or so MMJ buttons I have left from the first printing of 2000 (first printing – 4:20pm on 11-7-2007) into that SASE and send it on back to you. Get ‘em before they’re gone…

Mailing List: I WILL NOT be collecting addresses from mail sent in for this offer in the interest of protecting peoples privacy…

Only if you would like to be on the onehumanbeing mailing list, print out this page, fill out the info below, and send it along with your SASE…

Name:

Address:

City:

State:

Zip Code:

email address:

Offer good while supplies last. No purchase necessary. Please allow 3 – 4 weeks for delivery. Only letters or packages with a SASE will receive a FREE button. One button per SASE. No other offer, product or promises are suggested, offered or implied by this giveaway. All images © onehumanbeing.com

When I first started going to MMJ Dispensaries here in Long Beach I found it to be a very confusing situation – instead of just getting some “pot” from a dealer I now had 20 varieties with names I had never heard of – GDP, OG Kush, AK-47, Trainwreck, Shiskaberry… I mean, I just want some herb to get me through this depression – I’m not buying a bottle of wine or something. Everything looked and smelled great – now I’m confused, overwhelmed by choices, and feeling rushed…

I tried asking the folks behind the counter, but they were mostly dispensing buds and not health advice. Since then I’ve become fascinated by the different strains and varieties and how they differ from batch to batch, grower to grower, and which strains work best for me.

Medical Marijuana jars at local dispensary – Long Beach, CA – June, 2008

As part of The MMJ Project I’m including a working model of a menu from a MMJ dispensary here in Long Beach, California. Thanks to the fine people at CCLB – CannaCollective Long Beach for allowing me access to their jars of herb for photos and for providing samples for reviews.

For a while (we’ll see how much time this takes away from other projects) I’ll be documenting the changes in menu selection with photos and informal, subjective reviews of MMJ I have the pleasure of sampling.

I’ll be posting menus in the forum section. The actual CCLB menu is maintained on weedtracker.com and is accessible to MMJ patients.

Jon, onehumanbeing

Originally Published June 14^th, 2008

Here’s what I wrote shortly after getting the good word…

The Man On The Other Side Of The Wall

On Tuesday night, November 18^th, I got home from work, sat in my big chair, kicked back, and for the first time in my life smoked marijuana legally. Within minutes the herb was soothing the chemical hell of the mania I was enduring. I couldn’t believe it. Here I was, in my own living room, smoking pot legally. After all these years of self-medicating my disorder, finally I was legit, the doctor had given me his recommendation, no, his strong recommendation that I use medical marijuana.

I couldn’t wait to share my good news. I called some friends and shared my story of my yearlong journey with my psychiatrist and the doctor I met with today. These are people I’ve smoked marijuana with before. They know what a hassle the drug war is. Yesterday I was one of them. This morning when I woke up I was one of them. If the Federal Government takes a disliking to me, I’m still one of them. But somehow, during the course of my conversations I realized that I had been smuggled out of the country, and now I was the man living on the other side of the wall.

One of my friends said, “Wow, that’s really great for you, Jon, I wish…” and he sounded like someone wishing for the far country. It breaks my heart. I think I can imagine what it must have felt like to be smuggled out of East Berlin into West Berlin, and knowing that people just like you should be where you are. I didn’t realize when I walked into that doctor’s office on Tuesday morning, that it was actually a tunnel under the wall. I walked into that office from the East Berlin of the drug war and walked out in West Berlin. The city is still surrounded, but that is about to change. Freedom has to win. The wall will come down.

But for now, that wall is standing, looking as solid as ever, and I’m a confused immigrant trying to find my way around. How do I go about handling this situation? How do other people who use medical marijuana handle their situation? When and where can I smoke when I need to medicate? Do I now have a greater freedom of movement just like with the other prescription meds I take? It’s a strange new world to me, just a few days old.

So what’s it like on that side of the wall, you might be wondering? Well, when you grow up afraid of the secret police, the fear doesn’t go away over night. I still feel reflexively like I’m on the other side of the wall, I’m sure that will change with time. I keep turning the doctors words over in my mind “I’m strongly recommending that you use medical marijuana.” When being a criminal is the last thing you want to be, those are the best words you can hear. I’ll figure out how to do my shopping in this new city soon enough, but for this moment, I’m just smelling the air of freedom.

I know the city is surrounded, and I know they have the blockade on. But I’ve been smuggled out to live, die and pray with those that breathe the air of freedom, even if it’s just for a moment. Ich bin ein Berliner.

Originally written November 22, 2003

This work is a multi-faceted look at, and participation in, the medical marijuana movement – specifically here in Southern California – starting from my studio in Long Beach.

This work is very subjective as it documents this moment-in-time as medical marijuana is poised to either reach a tipping point and help bring an end to federal marijuana prohibition, or we’ll fall back into the senselessness of the Drug War that has ruined so many lives over the last 70 years.

My hope is that we’ll end federal marijuana prohibition – but right now I feel the need as an artist to document this moment, however it goes.

This project will involve my personal experience with medical marijuana, and I’ll be using words, photos, drawings and collages, video and other elements to try and tell my story the best I can.

This is also a public experience and interactive work and I look forward to collaborating with others over the course of this project either online, through project souvenirs, and in person.

The MMJ Project is designed to be organic in nature and I expect it to grow and change as it progresses. Like all journeys, I expect that things will not turn out like I’ve imagined or planned, but even better and more amazing – and that’s what makes it worth going, instead of just staying home with my maps, plans and daydreams.

- Jon, onehumanbeing

Originally Publish in June 2008