Wine robs a man of his self-possession, opium greatly invigorates it.

June 7, 2009 8:15 PM

Confessions of an eBay opium addict (via Reddit)
posted by interrobang (46 comments total)

Chasing the Double Dragon.
In all fairness, the story's at a completely different URL, but it's the exact same story.
posted by boo_radley at 8:21 PM on June 7, 2009

I knew I had read this before. What' the story here, did someone just copy-paste it? Or did he sell it to a new market? Weird.
posted by empath at 8:23 PM on June 7, 2009

I have a niggling feeling that this may be a double.

This obviously just a liberal conspiracy to take away my god given right to use decorative opium poppy pods in my mixed media collage work.

You'll take my pods from my warm, loose hands.
posted by Telf at 8:23 PM on June 7, 2009

Oh, jesus christ.

The poppies my family planted back in the day to keep deer away from our tomato plants were the same kind.
Sure, you can make tea from poppies, if you really, really want to- but sensationalist articles like this are only going to get people who don't know anything riled up and lead to there being even more laws to punish people with in this fucked-up country.
posted by dunkadunc at 8:24 PM on June 7, 2009

Sure, you can make tea from poppies, if you really, really want to

I've really, really wanted to. And I have. Thanks, ebay!
posted by item at 8:29 PM on June 7, 2009

dunkadunc: "sensationalist articles like this are only going to get people who don't know anything riled up and lead to there being even more laws to punish people with in this fucked-up country."

From another good mefi opium post: "Narcotics have been systematically scapegoated and demonized. The idea that anyone can use drugs and escape a horrible fate is an anathema to these idiots. I predict that in the near future right-wingers will use drug hysteria as a pretext to set up an international police apparatus."
William S. Burroughs
(1914 - 1997)
posted by boo_radley at 8:33 PM on June 7, 2009 [6 favorites]

Yeah, this is word-for-word the same as the previous FPP.

Interesting story, though. Overly embellished prose, for sure, but interesting.
posted by paisley henosis at 8:37 PM on June 7, 2009

At the end of the article:

I've been off opium tea for almost two weeks: twelve days of nonstop low-grade flu and restless thoughts of maybe sawing off my head with a bowie knife. I've also considered a homemade lobotomy with a knitting needle. I can't live on this plane of plain sobriety.

Two weeks! Oh what a horrifying tale of woe. Also, doesn't writing an article like this make it more likely that someone will crack down on this kind of thing?
posted by delmoi at 8:39 PM on June 7, 2009

I certainly don't want there to be ANOTHER excuse for helicopters to be buzzing people's houses.
posted by dunkadunc at 8:43 PM on June 7, 2009

You know, people are always going on about "did Metafilter used to be better" or "Metafilter is going to hell" or whatnot. Sometime it would be an interesting experiment to let a double like this stand--while making sure that absolutely nobody saw the old thread from four years ago--and see how it played out this time. And then look at them side-by-side.
posted by not that girl at 8:44 PM on June 7, 2009 [7 favorites]

Seems familiar, like I read this a few years ago.
posted by jeblis at 8:45 PM on June 7, 2009

Didn't anyone ever tell this idiot that narcotic addiction is a mess? This post is ridiculous. It is one large duh.
posted by Oyéah at 8:46 PM on June 7, 2009

What' the story here, did someone just copy-paste it?

In publishing, it's called syndication. Well, usually. This probably appeared in several alt-weeklies at the time, and only a couple of them still (or ever) have it online.
posted by dhartung at 8:56 PM on June 7, 2009

double
posted by Sparx at 8:57 PM on June 7, 2009

I learned to make mead, too... I still make it sometimes.
posted by Huck500 at 8:59 PM on June 7, 2009

meurhgh. Missed Boo_radley's post as I careered down the page whilst simultaneously looking at the post. It is a good story though.
posted by Sparx at 9:00 PM on June 7, 2009

so many doubles lately, but they are juicy ones
posted by caddis at 9:01 PM on June 7, 2009

so many doubles lately, but they are juicy ones

I think we're starting to run out of internet.
posted by loquacious at 9:08 PM on June 7, 2009 [6 favorites]

Well, crap. Sorry for the double post.
posted by interrobang at 9:09 PM on June 7, 2009

Ah, poppy tea for a new generation...

Yeah, I was there back in 1996 for whole Jim and Heidi Hogshire fiasco. Jim and Heidi were the first (and perhaps only) Americans ever arrested for possession of dried florist's poppies.

It's a long, long, story, and I'll tell you just a part that changed my view of the criminal justice system forever. When Hogshire was busted they confiscated his M1 carbine and various other items as well as his dried poppies. His wife was also arrested, though she never even drank poppy tea.

They were immediately evicted from their Capitol Hill apartment, here in Seattle. Heidi stayed in Seattle, but Jim went on the lam. After a long time, Jim was able to find pro bono legal representation and the charges were dropped. Jim was still back East, and called me to have me go pick up his confiscated items.

I go down to the courthouse and get put through the whole rigmarole. Thankfully, I was able to transport all his stuff by myself. It was weird walking through downtown Seattle carrying an M1 carbine...

Hogshire wanted me to double check the manifesto of what was seized with what the cops actually returned. I carefully unpack all the stuff on my living room floor. One M1 carbine, serial number double checked, a bunch of stuff I don't remember, and three scales. One scale was a Dillon Precision triple beam balance, used for reloading. Another scale was some sort of prosaic kitchen scale for weighing out spices and whatnot. The third scale I didn't immediately recognize. It had an electrical cord coming out, so I assumed it was electronic. But I saw no "Tare" button, or even an on-off switch.

Then the moment of epiphany.

The Seattle police department had seized and booked into evidence as drug paraphernalia a COFFEE MUG WARMER.
posted by Tube at 9:10 PM on June 7, 2009 [19 favorites]

I just clicked on the "I found it on eBay under Crafts>Floral Supplies>Flowers, Foliage>Dried" link in the old FPP and there's still lots of poppy pods for sale, so not much of a crack down in the last 4 years.
Also: organic chemistry student busted for home-brewing "poppy" beer from ebay poppies.
posted by 445supermag at 9:14 PM on June 7, 2009

I was gonna let this slide the first time, but now I'm gonna have to report this to the proper authorities.
posted by jeblis at 9:17 PM on June 7, 2009

> The Seattle police department had seized and booked into evidence as drug paraphernalia a COFFEE MUG WARMER.

Having warm coffee readily available can assist in illicit activity; possessing a device specifically intended for warming coffee just lowers the barriers to that activity even further.
posted by darth_tedious at 9:17 PM on June 7, 2009 [1 favorite]

Seriously? Its bad enough I get to be treated like an addict and criminal every month to get the pain pills I have to have to function. This does not help.

Ass.
posted by strixus at 9:19 PM on June 7, 2009 [1 favorite]

There was an article about poppyheads ten years ago in Harper's which resulted in a crackdown in the wholesale poppy plant market.

On the Internet you can still buy narcotic poppy pods, but it takes a hell of a lot of work to build up the kind of addiction this author did.

And the addiction story is the same as that for alcohol, meth, oxycodone, heroin, nicotine, et cetera. Oh, and let's not forget benzos! Chemical addiction: a story as old as humankind.

If this is you: count on three days of hell. After that, the chemical is mostly out of your system. Avoid NA; sleep with melatonin and valerian.

Try antidepressants, because chances are that your normal serotonin/dopamine system is out of whack. Personally, I would avoid SSRI's and go with Wellbutrin, but that's because SSRI's make me feel like I'm back on LSD.

That is my prescription in a nutshell. I am not a physician nor do I know what I am talking about, any more than those nutjobs selling vitamins on weekend radio time...except that I have nothing to sell.
posted by kozad at 9:24 PM on June 7, 2009 [1 favorite]

I think we're starting to run out of internet.

I prefer to call it Peak Link.
posted by Ritchie at 9:29 PM on June 7, 2009 [6 favorites]

hey guys, dont be so quick to delete this double...the story might be the same, but the political implications sure have changed.
posted by sexyrobot at 9:29 PM on June 7, 2009 [1 favorite]

more info...
posted by sexyrobot at 9:32 PM on June 7, 2009

Oh, fuck.

What is it with Republican women and pearls?
posted by dunkadunc at 9:37 PM on June 7, 2009

> but the political implications sure have changed.

love the "giant hand puppet" photo of her in the website header.
posted by darth_tedious at 9:42 PM on June 7, 2009

Years ago I tried opiates for the first time via vicodin and percocet that was prescribed for a few teeth I had pulled. After taking it the first time, I squirreled it away for recreational use and used lots of ibuprofen instead. I had months of "fun" when I would use it on the weekends to unwind from work. Then it all ran out and I was sad.

I went searching for substitutions and ran across the whole poppy tea thing, E-Bay, pods, etc. I never did order anything - it seemed overly expensive and a bit of a pain in the ass with all the preparation. I figured if I wanted to get high that bad I'd just buy some weed. Plus, any legal ramifications from weed would be far less than opiate-products, whether it be poppy pods or another person's prescriptions I happened to get my hands on. So I'm kinda glad I never went down that path and stopped recreational opiate use; it sucks for the author of the article to be that entrenched in addiction. I hope that anyone in those situations can find the help and support they need.
posted by JibberJabber at 9:42 PM on June 7, 2009

actually, i see that the photo of her rotates... you'll have to visit the Meg 2010! site repeatedly to see her puppet arms reaching to clasp you.
posted by darth_tedious at 9:48 PM on June 7, 2009

Why would anyone want to be the governor of California? Seems like all the options out there are pretty awful. Meg Whitman vs. Diane Feinstein? Really?
posted by delmoi at 9:48 PM on June 7, 2009

I first read this in 03, I think. Poppy tea is rather bitter.
posted by spaltavian at 9:49 PM on June 7, 2009

it seemed overly expensive and a bit of a pain in the ass with all the preparation.

Yeah you were just beginning. I love stories about Victorian opiate abuse:

On Godfrey's Cordial I have seen little children in the shop put the neck of the bottle in their mouths and bite the cork, so fond are they of the preparation ... ... could not resist the temptation of drinking it until the whole was consumed before reaching home, so that the mothers were obliged to come for it themselves.

It was economical too! The article states $12/week in today's prices, cheaper than gin or beer. I would go so far as to say that opiate use is a lot safer alternative (long-term) than alcohol.
posted by geoff. at 9:55 PM on June 7, 2009 [1 favorite]

This has got to be one of the most backass ways of going about getting high from opiates. Did he want to be Coleridge or something? His friend who used to get his heroin died, so he decides to ... go to eBay for poppy pods? You might as well join to army in the hopes of being shipped off to Afghanistan. "I'm not much for doing 100 pushups with someone's foot on my back as he yells at me and calls me a gutless worm, but I knew this was my one shot at getting right to the mother lode!"
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 9:56 PM on June 7, 2009

Waitaminute, he's just going to have intercourse with the deliverer, feel weird about it and then pop in one of those entertainment cartridges, isn't he? Gives me the howling fantods.

#infsum
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:57 PM on June 7, 2009

it takes a hell of a lot of work to build up the kind of addiction this author did.

Not really. You just turn on your laptop and start typing.

Not that I'm implying anything, but it's a really cliche-ridden story that hits all the "omg I'm such an adventurous badass journalist that I got myself in trouble and now I'm going to write semi-competently about it" stops.
posted by drjimmy11 at 10:08 PM on June 7, 2009

Why would anyone want to be the governor of California?

i heard she plans to actually use eBay to help 'fix' some of california's many problems (including selling off 'unnecessary' public lands and other property)...so, short answer: for profit.

but maybe people won't be so interested in electing her when they find out she's a drug dealer.
posted by sexyrobot at 10:13 PM on June 7, 2009

Not that I'm implying anything, but it's a really cliche-ridden story that hits all the "omg I'm such an adventurous badass journalist that I got myself in trouble and now I'm going to write semi-competently about it" stops.

I blame Hunter Thompson for this. Thanks, Duke, for inspiring a slew of deluded hacks to write about getting loaded and behaving like an ass.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 10:17 PM on June 7, 2009

What is it with Republican women and pearls?

I think it's called confirmation bias.
posted by The Deej at 10:22 PM on June 7, 2009

Those are Free Trade faux pearls, Deej. Every last one of them.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 10:27 PM on June 7, 2009

I blame Hunter Thompson for this.

That's like blaming the Sex Pistols for all the shitty, shitty punk bands that sprung up over the next 3 decades.

On second thought, yeah, go ahead and blame the Good Doctor.
posted by item at 10:27 PM on June 7, 2009

Fair Trade, too. Whatever. Also, the strings binding them were made by union workers.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 10:28 PM on June 7, 2009

On second thought, yeah, go ahead and blame the Good Doctor.

I was pretty much kidding, to be honest. I've just had to read sooo many very bad articles from (mostly) guys who would normally just be overindulging assholes had they not gotten the notion that they can dazzle other people with their personalities without having to meet them, just by describing their boorish, drug-fueled behavior on paper, that there were times I almost wished Thompson had never been hired by Rolling Stone. Doesn't detract from Songs of the Damned's awesomeness.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 10:31 PM on June 7, 2009

Thanks, Duke, for inspiring a slew of deluded hacks to write about getting loaded and behaving like an ass.

*deletes novel. Cries*
posted by Sparx at 10:33 PM on June 7, 2009