“Unable to Handle My Candy”: The Maureen Dowd Story

Grey Lady columnist Maureen Dowd wrote an already-classic column this week about purchasing some edible, legal marijuana in Colorado. Things did not go well for America’s favorite opinionated redhead and her last dance with Mary Jane:

The caramel-chocolate flavored candy bar looked so innocent, like the Sky Bars I used to love as a child. … But then I felt a scary shudder go through my body and brain. I barely made it from the desk to the bed, where I lay curled up in a hallucinatory state for the next eight hours. I was thirsty but couldn’t move to get water. Or even turn off the lights. I was panting and paranoid, sure that when the room-service waiter knocked and I didn’t answer, he’d call the police and have me arrested for being unable to handle my candy.

I strained to remember where I was or even what I was wearing, touching my green corduroy jeans and staring at the exposed-brick wall. As my paranoia deepened, I became convinced that I had died and no one was telling me.

I remember that feeling! One time when I got high — also legally, in Copenhagen — I too ate more hash cookies than I should have because there was no guidance on the packaging and what started out as a lark in an art museum turned into hours by myself in my dorm room climbing the walls. I crawled to the phone and stared at the keypad, willing myself to remember the phone number of my parents back in DC. Somehow, I decided, if I could remember all ten digits in order, that would save me.

Like Liz Lemon, I was never good at drugs. Once, in college, I smoked up with a friend before a QSA meeting and when I got there realized I had somehow put my knee-high Doc Marten boots on the wrong feet. MEMORIES. The key takeaway here is that the Internet is making lots of fun of Maureen “The Fires of MoDo” Dowd, and Colorado is giggling uncontrollably all the way to the bank.

Apparently “Colorado raked in about $12.6 million the first three months after pot was legalized for adults 21 and over.” Not everyone is having a bad trip! In fact, the state of Colorado is having such a good time it must feel like it’s hallucinating. According to a recent AP story:

In Colorado, Hickenlooper’s proposal listed six priorities for spending the pot sales taxes. The spending plan included $45.5 million for youth use prevention, $40.4 million for substance abuse treatment and $12.4 million for public health. “We view our top priority as creating an environment where negative impacts on children from marijuana legalization are avoided completely,” Hickenlooper wrote in a letter to legislative budget writers, which must approve the plan.

The governor also proposed a $5.8 million, three-year “statewide media campaign on marijuana use,” presumably highlighting the drug’s health risks. The state Department of Transportation would get $1.9 million for a new “Drive High, Get a DUI” campaign to tout the state’s new marijuana blood-limit standard for drivers. Also, Hickenlooper has proposed spending $7 million for an additional 105 beds in residential treatment centers for substance abuse disorders.

Hee hee! Hickenlooper. Sorry, what we were talking about? Oh right, tax revenue. Sure, spend it battling substance abuse, or maybe on schools or something? Whatever. I could really go for some Cheez-Its right now.

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