72 Hour Party People

April 9, 2007 2:55 PM

"This is the shit JFK was getting jacked in his ass during the Cuban missile crisis. I shouldn't even be calling this shit 'shit,' because it's disrespectful."Following 72 hours in the lives of some high-roller meth addicts.
posted by chunking express (106 comments total)

It's an old story, but new to me, and very entertaining.
posted by chunking express at 2:55 PM on April 9, 2007

All that trouble when they could just go get an ADHD diagnosis (extremely easy) and get a prescription.
posted by telstar at 3:09 PM on April 9, 2007

yogurt, organic apple juice and frozen blackberries, strawberries and mangoes

This is exactly how I make my breakfast smoothies. Weird.
posted by phaedon at 3:10 PM on April 9, 2007

I still recall reading this when it first came out in Westword. I love my local rag.
posted by boo_radley at 3:12 PM on April 9, 2007

Ah, so this is what we had back in the early 90s.
posted by Burhanistan at 3:15 PM on April 9, 2007

Wow. I've got a horribly short attention span, when it comes to online articles. But that one just sucked me in. New to me as well.
posted by avoision at 3:16 PM on April 9, 2007

Sounds like reasonable and responsible usage by intelligent people, and I'm sure it will end well for them.
posted by freebird at 3:20 PM on April 9, 2007 [2 favorites]

Aha, Heather exclaims, her voice charged with the thrill of discovery. "The Wold Riders never dragged Aragorn over the cliff on their way to Helm's Deep. That is total fucking Hollywood bullshit! Sasha, you got it?"


WARG. WARG. WHAT THE FUCK IS A WOLD?
posted by nathancaswell at 3:21 PM on April 9, 2007

Well written, and pretty much what avoision said.
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 3:21 PM on April 9, 2007

God damn. The only thing more annoying then government drug misinformation is the crazy urban legends floating around in the minds of drug people.

I've had people tell me that "exstasy" was just coke and heroin mixed together, than mushrooms come from cow turnds and you shouldn't eat them if they are black (in fact, the dark blue marks are just brusing, like with a banana)

Shabu is just crystal meth. Some meth Colorado meth cook is molding his stuff in to "japanese deamons" and charging 10x the price, and these idiots are deluding themselves into thinking they're doing "shabu" rather then plain ole crystal meth.

How ridiculous.
posted by delmoi at 3:28 PM on April 9, 2007

"Oh, my God, you know the fucking war, right? The liberation, the occupation, whatever? And the Palestinians, right? And the Israelis and the Muslims and Hindus and all the hate and the fucking guns and the bombs and the, uh, the, uh, you know, all the children with their legs blown off by land mines in Afghanistan, right? You see what I'm saying? I mean, you all know, you've all seen like a million times that one picture of that little boy from Afghanistan, right? And he's in his little purple robe, with his little white sheepherder's hat, and his little Christmas Carol, um, what do you call it? His Tiny Tim crutches, you know, right? And he's got these, like, you know, like these little sad, brown, puppy dog, fucking abused-animal, dog-pound, take-me-home-please eyes, right? I mean, God...okay, right now, let's get online, and let's find out who he is and where he lives and, and, and, let's find out what we need to do to buy him a new leg, right now! Who's got a laptop?"

Now we know who's been posting all those wacked-out questions to Ask MetaFilter.
posted by fandango_matt at 3:29 PM on April 9, 2007 [8 favorites]

This article made me want an Otter Pop. Some good quotes from users:

"The Wold Riders never dragged Aragorn over the cliff on their way to Helm's Deep. That is total fucking Hollywood bullshit! Sasha, you got it?"

"I consider this shit an excellent use of my tax dollars," Nick says, rattling a bottle of ProVigil. "It helps keep people from going werewolf around hour 50."

"...like sticking your brain in a huge pencil sharpener and grinding it and grinding it and grinding it until everything you see and think is just super, super sharp."
posted by Area Control at 3:30 PM on April 9, 2007

Uhg. They're a drag now, and they'll be an even bigger drag when they can't stop talking about how many treatment programs they dropped out of until one of them died and they all realized they were into some very fucked up shit, and how much happier they are now that they're sober.
posted by Astro Zombie at 3:32 PM on April 9, 2007 [3 favorites]

"...like sticking your brain in a huge pencil sharpener and grinding it and grinding it and grinding it until everything you see and think is just super, super sharp."

Hey in that guy's defense, anything speedy is sort of like that.
posted by nathancaswell at 3:32 PM on April 9, 2007

I totally understood what Ike what was quoted in the article as saying about having the gene. That is exactly why I will never try Shabu.
posted by chudmonkey at 3:35 PM on April 9, 2007

Exactly, Astro. One extreme to the other, boring at both ends, and making trouble for people in the middle with some common sense.
posted by freebird at 3:40 PM on April 9, 2007

Intresting story. Dosn't sound very fun to me, but maybe I'm just getting old

(Although I'm slightly younger then the subjects of the peice)
posted by delmoi at 3:48 PM on April 9, 2007

Hah! Would love to read a follow-up piece about what these people are doing now.
posted by Afroblanco at 3:50 PM on April 9, 2007

You think every tweaker burst forth fully formed with face sores and no teeth? Takes time to fall that far.
posted by quite unimportant at 3:51 PM on April 9, 2007

Sucked me in too, but it was pretty shallow on the details. I wonder how the author was able to tag along, etc?

Good post tho, chunking express!
posted by wfrgms at 3:52 PM on April 9, 2007

Enh. Yuppies do crystal meth, call it something else to avoid stigma. Film at 11.
posted by Justinian at 3:53 PM on April 9, 2007 [3 favorites]

(Enh to the yuppies, not the post!)
posted by Justinian at 3:53 PM on April 9, 2007

I'd love to see some pictures.
posted by OmieWise at 4:13 PM on April 9, 2007

One thing I'd like to find out is what the hell happened to the big swingers' convention? Isn't that why they went to Vegas in the first place?

Also, I found this part humorous :

"Emile's in there watching porn. He's got like twenty gang-bang DVDs stacked in alphabetical order."

Fucking tweakers. I swear....
posted by Afroblanco at 4:16 PM on April 9, 2007

Shabu is just crystal meth. Some meth Colorado meth cook is molding his stuff in to "japanese deamons" and charging 10x the price, and these idiots are deluding themselves into thinking they're doing "shabu" rather then plain ole crystal meth.

How ridiculous.

Shabu sounds like "Ice" to me, pure crystal. There is a huge difference in the purity level of this stuff and your average street meth. While the active ingredient is the same, the concentration of it in "Ice" or "Shabu" makes it practically a different substance and worthy of a different designation.
posted by Roach at 4:18 PM on April 9, 2007

Meth: It's not just for the white-trash crowd.

Aww, cute. You can be white trash and still have Swedish designer tables. White trash is a state of mind, man.
posted by mckenney at 4:23 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

Desoxyn, while legal, is not easy to obtain. Many pharmacies do not carry it.

All I've learned from this is actual drug use is much more tame and really shows the mediocrity people live in. I want sensationalism.
posted by geoff. at 4:28 PM on April 9, 2007

And here I thought Stephen Glass couldn't find any more work.

"They are hard, plastic, sticky, omnipresent evidence that something very strange and very wicked went down in this place."

Wicked? Very wicked? Let's see...they catalogued the discrepancies between the book and film verion of The Two Towers, re-enacted the Kasparov vs Deep Blue chess match, ate Otter Pops, bullshitted for hours, flew to Vegas and played roulette, and listened to music.

Yeah, wicked. Very wicked. Uh-huh.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 4:32 PM on April 9, 2007 [5 favorites]

Like opium, Shabu is relatively exotic in the United States

Wait, wait. You can still get opium?
posted by Saydur at 4:34 PM on April 9, 2007

Saydur - yea, I knew a guy who smoked opium a few years ago. We couldn't believe it either.
posted by djb at 4:37 PM on April 9, 2007

You have to skulk around outside Tool concerts to get opium nowadays.
posted by nathancaswell at 4:41 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

delmoi writes "Shabu is just crystal meth. Some meth Colorado meth cook is molding his stuff in to 'japanese deamons' and charging 10x the price, and these idiots are deluding themselves into thinking they're doing 'shabu' rather then plain ole crystal meth. "

It's like portabello mushrooms for the daring and stupid.
posted by Bugbread at 4:44 PM on April 9, 2007 [5 favorites]

So nice they named it twice. (It's not what you think.)
posted by scratch at 4:45 PM on April 9, 2007

Wait, wait. You can still get opium?

yep
posted by agentofselection at 4:48 PM on April 9, 2007

... chain-munching Otter Pops and Net-surfing, for more than four uninterrupted hours ...

Who needs drugs for that? It's called "working from home".
posted by Dillenger69 at 4:48 PM on April 9, 2007 [10 favorites]

Roach writes "There is a huge difference in the purity level of this stuff and your average street meth. While the active ingredient is the same, the concentration of it in 'Ice' or 'Shabu' makes it practically a different substance and worthy of a different designation."

Well, if substance A is pure crystal meth, and substance B is crystal meth cut with other stuff, wouldn't it make more sense to call substance A "crystal meth" and substance B something else, instead of calling substance A something else and substance B "crystal meth"?

You know those CDs that have video contents on them in addition to music? They're called "enhanced CDs", or something like that. We don't go calling them "CDs" and then coming up with a special new word for regular CDs with just music on them.
posted by Bugbread at 4:48 PM on April 9, 2007

also
posted by agentofselection at 4:49 PM on April 9, 2007

Dillenger69 writes "Who needs drugs for that? It's called 'working from home'."

Heck, replace "otter pops" with "coffee", and it's called "working a slow night shift at my job". I never knew network monitoring qualified as "utterly wicked".
posted by Bugbread at 4:49 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

What I want to know is, how did the writer manage to stay up that long too, let alone take notes the whole time?
posted by gottabefunky at 4:50 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

Incidentally, I had some Modafinil shipped from the UK in 2001 when I first heard about it. I tried various dosages but never noticed the anti-sleepiness effect.

Not that that means anything because my sleep is really fucked up normally and the drug's effect on me may be idiosyncratic. My sleeping pattern is never regular, it skews all around the clock; I frequently sleep up to 20 hours at a time yet also frequently stay awake up to 40 or so hours at a time. And I have zero dream latency. Why I wanted something to keep me awake, I have no idea. I don't recall what my reasoning was. Well, actually, curiosity. I was also using GHB as a sleep aid (well, actually, GBL). At the time, this was all legal. Um, well, not actually having a prescription for the Modafinil wasn't kosher, but still.

It's sort of weird how meth has come back into fashion and has remained so popular as long as it has. In 1983, the year after I graduated from high school, I lived in Dallas very near the center of the then very-new-and-trendy meth trade (and shortly after that, MDMA). It really messed people up. My friend and I were involved with a girl from our hometown who was a meth addict and worked as a stripper. I didn't see much of the scene, but my friend did. It was insanity. 10% in a good way, 90% in a bad. Trending toward worse over time.

Anyway, by the late 80s it seemed like meth use had gone way down, I didn't hear about it for a long time. Then in the mid to late 90s, there it was again.

It's funny and more than a little sad that an era's drug use reflects its general vibe. In the mid-90s we had people grooving on ecstasy and prosperity and Clinton. Now we have psychos on meth and war and Dubya. Although these (supposedly real) people in this article seemed relatively harmless. Much less dangerous than drunks, anyway.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 4:54 PM on April 9, 2007 [2 favorites]

quite unimportant writes "You think every tweaker burst forth fully formed with face sores and no teeth? Takes time to fall that far."

I dunno. All the "face sore / no teeth" stuff I hear is from the States, where bathtub meth is more popular. Here in Japan, you don't really hear about those symptoms, just getting skinny, unpredictable, sunken eyes, and violent. I suspect a lot of those bad physical symptoms in the US aren't the meth but what it's cut with.
posted by Bugbread at 4:57 PM on April 9, 2007

Compelling yes, but whenever I read stories like this, I can't help but wonder exactly how the writer is able to actually do it. Was he in the thick of it for the duration, scribbling notes? Was he recording it all? Was everyone cool with a journalist floating from room to room? Nobody's ashamed or worried about details that might reveal their identity? He's the only guy in the house not high, hour after hour?

I'm not entirely convinced this is journalism.
posted by davebush at 4:57 PM on April 9, 2007 [2 favorites]

Well, if substance A is pure crystal meth, and substance B is crystal meth cut with other stuff, wouldn't it make more sense to call substance A "crystal meth" and substance B something else, instead of calling substance A something else and substance B "crystal meth"?

That would be more logical wouldn't it?

I didn't make these designations up I'm just reporting on them as they exist, from my fairly extensive dealings with people who's business it is to know.
posted by Roach at 4:58 PM on April 9, 2007

Although these (supposedly real) people in this article seemed relatively harmless.

Depends on how far down the spiral you draw your cross section from. Are these people still using like this today with regular frequency? Because if they are I bet day five is a lot less about choreographing quirky dance steps and more about performing ad hoc facial worm removal procedures with needle nose pliers. Or blasting holes in the walls when you see those monsters coming for you.

Shit gets worse over time with hard drugs. It's calculus, you can't beat it or avoid it.
posted by The Straightener at 5:02 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

You think every tweaker burst forth fully formed with face sores and no teeth? Takes time to fall that far.

I'm sure about the facial sores, but the teeth thing is just caused by tweakers drinking lots of soda and not brushing their teeth. The sores are maybe due to impurities or something else, but I doubt it's the drug itself. After all, it's been FDA approved for decades. Crackheads also grow sores, etc.
posted by delmoi at 5:08 PM on April 9, 2007

"I'm sure about the facial sores, but the teeth thing is just caused by tweakers drinking lots of soda and not brushing their teeth."

I don't think there's a medical/dental consensus yet on the rotting teeth thing, or even if it really is happening.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 5:14 PM on April 9, 2007

Whenever a line of dialogue is altered, a scene cut or a plot point relocated in the film, Marcus and Heather call it out to Sasha, a dreadlocked artist who's drawing a huge, elaborate pen-and-ink diagram on a sheet of butcher paper. The diagram's title is "Two Towers: Film vs. Book, a Deconstruction."


nothing's better than drugs for giving people with an utter lack of imagination the delusion that they are creative.

turns out your teachers where right when they told you drugs weren't cool. not because they're illegal or dangerous, but because they make the users so fucking boring.
posted by drjimmy11 at 5:14 PM on April 9, 2007 [3 favorites]

I have a question that has periodically puzzled me but I have never asked anyone. Why can meth be smoked as a hydrochloride salt? It's my understanding that other drugs like cocaine and heroin must be in freebase form, since they decompose before they vaporise as a salt, so why is meth different?
posted by [expletive deleted] at 5:16 PM on April 9, 2007

Well, if substance A is pure crystal meth, and substance B is crystal meth cut with other stuff, wouldn't it make more sense to call substance A "crystal meth" and substance B something else, instead of calling substance A something else and substance B "crystal meth"?

You're obviously don't work in the Marketing Department.
posted by donovan at 5:26 PM on April 9, 2007 [3 favorites]

drinking lots of soda and not brushing their teeth

what utter bollocks. i've been guzzling soda and avoiding a toothbrush for years and i've still got mine. most of them. sort of.
posted by quonsar at 5:28 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

There is a medical reason for the no-teeth thing. Meth (regardless of purity) causes a signifigant decrease in saliva production. This has two effects 1) makes teeth much more vulnerable to decay 2) makes the user thirsty. In this state soda (already not great for your teeth) can cause a lot of damage quickly.
posted by Riemann at 5:31 PM on April 9, 2007

From scratch's link: Shabu-shabu means "swish-swish,"

This explains a lot.
posted by loquacious at 5:32 PM on April 9, 2007

You think every tweaker burst forth fully formed with face sores and no teeth? Takes time to fall that far.
posted by quite unimportant at 3:51 PM on April 9 [+][!]

Yes, everyone knows it's impossible to use drugs responsibly and functionally! *sips beer*
posted by mek at 5:32 PM on April 9, 2007 [2 favorites]

Ethereal Bligh writes "I don't think there's a medical/dental consensus yet on the rotting teeth thing, or even if it really is happening."

I've known a number of chronic meth users, and without exceptions they've all developed profound dental problems. I think it has something to do with calcium deficiency possibly resulting from poor (or lack of) diet. Further digging reveals more info courtesy the American Dental Association.
posted by mullingitover at 5:40 PM on April 9, 2007

I think guzzling a carton or two of Otter Pops isn't going to help your smile either.
posted by R. Mutt at 6:03 PM on April 9, 2007

You would seriously need to be dosed up to your eyeballs to spend even a minute in the company of those tossers. Some drunk having a rant at you is bad enough, but I can't even imagine the hellishness of being surrounded by a bunch of tweakers holding forth with this kind of bollocks:

"Oh, my God, you know the fucking war, right? The liberation, the occupation, whatever? And the Palestinians, right? And the Israelis and the Muslims and Hindus and all the hate and the fucking guns and the bombs and the, uh, the, uh, you know, all the children with their legs blown off by land mines in Afghanistan, right? You see what I'm saying? I mean, you all know, you've all seen like a million times that one picture of that little boy from Afghanistan, right? And he's in his little purple robe, with his little white sheepherder's hat, and his little Christmas Carol, um, what do you call it? His Tiny Tim crutches, you know, right? And he's got these, like, you know, like these little sad, brown, puppy dog, fucking abused-animal, dog-pound, take-me-home-please eyes, right? I mean, God...okay, right now, let's get online, and let's find out who he is and where he lives and, and, and, let's find out what we need to do to buy him a new leg, right now! Who's got a laptop?"
posted by UbuRoivas at 6:04 PM on April 9, 2007

The Kasprov/Deep Blue recreation actually sounds like quite a fun thing to do on speed.
posted by jcruelty at 6:23 PM on April 9, 2007

Yeah, I had to stop reading because they all sounded so obnoxious. What a bunch of lame turds.
posted by HighTechUnderpants at 6:29 PM on April 9, 2007

So... Hipsters smoke meth to become nerds? How's that work?
posted by katillathehun at 6:33 PM on April 9, 2007 [3 favorites]

posted by katillathehun So... Hipsters smoke meth to become nerds? How's that work?

(Losers - talent) + (x)$income + (x)shabu ∑ (x)Hipsers √(-talent)
posted by fandango_matt at 6:41 PM on April 9, 2007 [6 favorites]

meth is for teenagers, not wealthy adults. Those people are so annoying.
posted by wumpus at 6:42 PM on April 9, 2007

I'd bookmarked it for later reading, but now it sounds like I shouldn't bother.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:00 PM on April 9, 2007

Oh metamphetamine is a Huge Social Scourge. Wow. I've never heard that before.
posted by davy at 7:23 PM on April 9, 2007

The people in the article were a) fortunate enough to afford regular medical and dental care and anyway b) too smart to do speed as a habit but only as an occasional recreation. It can be a fun thing to play with every now and then, if you're careful. Same deal as heroin: don't get a jones.
posted by davy at 7:26 PM on April 9, 2007

If I could get a steady supply of good opium I would be much happier person, and so would those around me.
posted by davy at 7:28 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

I watched a heavy meth user completely destroy his teeth over the course of about a year. Of course, he was also homeless and had a tongue piercing that he played with constantly.
posted by contraption at 7:32 PM on April 9, 2007

Metafilter: It's not just for the white-trash crowd.
posted by iguanapolitico at 7:34 PM on April 9, 2007

Oh metafilter is a Huge Social Scourge. Wow. I've never heard that before.
posted by UbuRoivas at 7:42 PM on April 9, 2007

And here I thought Stephen Glass couldn't find any more work.

I KNEW these guys sounded a little too "colorful"

Wheres the part where one of them demands a new Miata?
posted by Senor Cardgage at 7:44 PM on April 9, 2007

Did JFK really get jacked in his ass with crystal meth during the Cuban missile crisis? That would be news to me.

telstar wrote:
> All that trouble when they could just go get an ADHD
> diagnosis (extremely easy) and get a prescription.

I did get an ADHD diagnosis, but I don't want to get anywhere near that shit! What an icky drug.
posted by Broadside Affront at 7:53 PM on April 9, 2007

I'm white trash but I don't know it.
posted by nola at 8:21 PM on April 9, 2007

In the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, the world was taken to the brink of nuclear war by a President who mixed mood-modulating steroids [for his Addison's disease] and amphetamines. Kennedy also took meperidine (Demerol), methadone (Dolophine), methylphenidate (Ritalin), meprobamate (Miltown), chlordiazepoxide (Librium), miscellaneous barbiturates and thyroid hormone - though not all at the same time. A 1972 New York Times report quotes a doctor treating Kennedy who allegedly warned him about amphetamine use: "no President with his finger on the red button has any business taking stuff like that."

from http://www.amphetamines.com/john-kennedy.html
posted by bashos_frog at 8:47 PM on April 9, 2007

(I'd heard some of this before - the Ritalin, and the Addison's)
posted by bashos_frog at 8:48 PM on April 9, 2007

turns out your teachers where right when they told you drugs weren't cool. not because they're illegal or dangerous, but because they make the users so fucking boring

Well god, same as alcohol. Have you never been the sole sober person in a room full of drunks? I'm sure these folks are plenty entertaining to others on the same high.

Not defending it. Just sayin.
posted by dreamsign at 9:09 PM on April 9, 2007

Very fictional sounding, though entertaining, sorta.

I want some Otter Pops.

GATEWAY DRUG!
posted by blacklite at 9:21 PM on April 9, 2007

(Losers - talent) + (x)$income + (x)shabu ∑ (x)Hipsers √(-talent)

And that's what we call methamatics.
posted by wanderingmind at 9:32 PM on April 9, 2007

Was it just me, or was the "free-association at warp 9" paragraph on page 2 reminiscent of some of the dialogue from the movie Swingers?

And he's in his little purple robe, with his little white sheepherder's hat, and his little Christmas Carol, um, what do you call it? His Tiny Tim crutches, you know, right? And he's got these, like, you know, like these little sad, brown, puppy dog, fucking abused-animal, dog-pound, take-me-home-please eyes, right?

vs.

Trent: Yeah, you're not hurting it. You're just kinda gently batting the bunny around, you know what I mean? And the bunny's scared Mike, the bunny's scared of you, shivering.
Sue: And you got these fucking claws and these fangs...
Trent: And you got these fucking claws and these fangs, man! And you're looking at your claws and you're looking at your fangs. And you're thinking to yourself, you don't know what to do, man. "I don't know how to kill the bunny." With *this* you don't know how to kill the bunny, do you know what I mean?
Sue: You're like a big bear, man.

posted by jeversol at 9:47 PM on April 9, 2007

I actually know the author of this piece somewhat. Here's the story that got him a whole lot of press.
posted by Bookhouse at 9:47 PM on April 9, 2007 [11 favorites]

And that's what we call methamatics.

Highlarious.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 9:55 PM on April 9, 2007 [1 favorite]

Great link Bookhouse.
posted by Samuel Farrow at 9:56 PM on April 9, 2007

damn, Bookhouse.
posted by juliplease at 10:04 PM on April 9, 2007

Damn indeed. That should be a FPP in and of itself, bookhouse.
posted by jeversol at 10:13 PM on April 9, 2007

Holy fuck, Bookhouse! No wonder he follows meth-heads around on 72-hour binges!
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:24 PM on April 9, 2007

I know an Ask Metafilter thread where that link belongs!
posted by Justinian at 10:40 PM on April 9, 2007

Holy hell, Bookhouse. The story behind that link made me forget why I was reading it, and I was going to blast you (well not really) for inflicting it on the thread. But I see the connection now.

Powerful story, to hopelessly understate things.
posted by dreamsign at 11:42 PM on April 9, 2007

It's been posted here before - and the guy was arrested for alleged stalking of the rapist.
posted by By The Grace of God at 1:42 AM on April 10, 2007

I had no idea it was from the same author. I remember the other post being on Mefi.
posted by chunking express at 6:09 AM on April 10, 2007

Great post, quick, entertaining read.

Not meaning to pileon the molester stalking derail, but for closure here's the final chapter.
posted by HyperBlue at 10:32 AM on April 10, 2007

It's been posted here before - and the guy was arrested for alleged stalking of the rapist.

Another MeFi thread on the 'Stalking the Bogeyman' article.
posted by ericb at 11:38 AM on April 10, 2007 [1 favorite]

Bookhouse's link made this already-good post a great one. I ran with the weekend warrior scene for some time. My past is clean, but I could always see the pain in many of the party people's faces. They were escaping. One of which is currently going the way of Edie Sedgwick. Likely, for much of the same reason as illustrated in Bookhouse's link. It's all a bit clearer now. Wow.
posted by vaportrail at 6:44 PM on April 10, 2007

A friend of mine who was a meth user said the facial scars come from users picking at their face; since meth dehydrates its users, they break out and form a habit of compulsively picking at their pimples.
posted by spiderskull at 7:33 PM on April 10, 2007 [1 favorite]

This article makes the drug look pretty glamorous. It looks like an advertisement for meth, for God's sake.
posted by tehloki at 10:02 PM on April 10, 2007

Really?!? I admit that I had a similar feeling upon reading it, but thought that this glamorousness would only be apparent to people who had never had to endure people in this state. It's so far from glamorous, it's enthusiastically directionless & boring-on-steroids, but for about twenty times as long as a drunk is unfocused & tedious. Hanging round a bunch of utter prats spaced off their nuts for three days straight? No, thanks!
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:50 PM on April 10, 2007

glamorous?

it sounds fucking boring to me.
posted by Tacos Are Pretty Great at 11:26 PM on April 10, 2007

I mean glamorous as in it reads like the first half of Fear and Loathing, or Trainspotting: Everybody's all hunky-dory and having a good time. No crash, no freakout, just a "was it?" at the end to throw the teeniest bit of doubt into the mix.
posted by tehloki at 11:41 PM on April 10, 2007

So what? While I don't entirely agree (I think there's plenty of tweaked distress here) I don't think it really matters. Should all writing about drugs contain a moral lesson?
posted by OmieWise at 5:29 AM on April 11, 2007

Tehloki: The thing is, for those folks, at that point of their use, it probably was all hunky-dory and having a good time. That's how casual drug use is. When it becomes chronic, then it starts being second half of Trainspotting.

I suppose the article could be written to make even the first, casual use part look like some sort of twisted nightmare, but then the author would be writing fiction, not non-fiction. After all, if the first steps of drug use were horrible and terrifying, there wouldn't be a drug problem, because nobody would do drugs.
posted by Bugbread at 5:54 AM on April 11, 2007

I certainly didn't find anything about the article glamorous, unless having cash makes you glamorous by default. I found the pointless exercise and their lame attempts at justifying their behaviour kind of sad. That's what I thought was trying to be conveyed.
posted by chunking express at 7:17 AM on April 11, 2007

Man I hate casual abusers of ADHD drugs. It makes getting the drugs I use correctly a huge chore and leads to all sorts of daft accusations.

If I don't take the ADD/ADHD meds, I act something like a toned down version the chatty/unpredictable phase the tweekers in the article went through. Repeat, this is what happens when I don't take them.
posted by BeerGrin at 8:10 AM on April 11, 2007

You take methamphetamine for ADD?
posted by OmieWise at 8:29 AM on April 11, 2007

OmieWise writes "You take methamphetamine for ADD?"

One of the ADD drugs, Desoxyn, is methamphetamine.
posted by Bugbread at 9:56 AM on April 11, 2007

RE:

Ditto, BeerGrin. I was on Ritalin and several other forms of stimulant/amphetamine for ADHD for about 8 years in elementary/high school. When I took them, I became dull, withdrawn, and, well, "focused", I guess. When I finally got off the medications, my personality returned to something resembling normal, but I was neither hyperactive nor focused - I was just... dull.
posted by tehloki at 6:07 PM on April 11, 2007

Meth Mouth. Ugh.
posted by five fresh fish at 7:06 PM on April 11, 2007

I think you've been conned, fff.

That's obviously just a screen shot from a Predator movie.
posted by UbuRoivas at 7:34 PM on April 11, 2007

The meth article is a reprint from four years ago. I remember reading it before, possibly here.

http://www.westword.com/2003-09-04/news/72-hour-party-people/2
posted by craniac at 7:35 PM on April 11, 2007

Dude, that's the link in the OP. You trippin' or something?
posted by tehloki at 8:30 PM on April 11, 2007