- Booyah. At long last, getting baked has become easier than
ever dreamed by even the laziest stoner. Because firing up the bong or finding
a match or lighter to spark that great fattie you just rolled would be far too
much work, allow science to make life easier beginning in October with a cannabis-based chewing gum set to hit
marijuana dispensaries in Colorado, California, Arizona and Washington, D.C.
The roll-out (pun intended) may not seem that much differnet than the pot
brownies, candies and other homemade goodies stoners crank out when they come
down with a big case of the munchies, but instead of being made in some
ramshcakle kitchen in a single-bedroom apartment, Can Chew is a collaboration
of San Diego-based Medical Marijuana Inc., and Can Chew Technologies, a San
Diego chewing gum technology company headquartered in the Netherlands. Yes,
the ganja-friendly Dutch are involved. Can Chew is a cannabis chewing gum
containing Dronabinol, or THC, and it is supposedly for people suffering from
Alzheimer’s, appetite loss, multiple sclerosis and nausea. When chewed – by a
stoner or someone who actually needs pain relief – the gum releases fine
particles of THC into the oral mucosa – the lining of the mouth – allowing for
rapid absorption of the cannabis compound. The company claims this allows for
speedy relief from pain, nausea, tension and loss of appetite and Dr. Philip
Van Damme of Can Chew insists chronic pain sufferers, early and late-stage
cancer patients and even anorexics can benefit from the gum. What makes this
development so great for stoners is that concealing gum is much easier than
hiding a bag of pot and chewing gum to get stoned in public is much less
conspicuous than lighting up a doobie in the break room or lobby. Even if
stoners can’t get access to Can Chew, its mere existence could inspire them to
learn from the kooks who create homemade gum and come up with a high-quality
knock-off. Chew on, stoners……….
- Once the next great hope for American men’s tennis, Andy
Roddick will end his career in the very near future at the site of his biggest
triumph. The former No. 1-ranked player in the world never reached his supposed
potential, winning just one major championship and losing in the finals of the
sport’s biggest events four times, all to Roger Federer. Roddick announcer the
decision in a surprise news conference on Thursday, picking a unique way to
celebrate his birthday. He wasn’t in an expansive mood either. "I'll make this short and sweet: I've
decided that this is going to be my last tournament," he said. "I
just feel like it's time. I don't know that I'm healthy enough or committed
enough to go another year. I've always wanted to, in a perfect world, finish at
this event.” While he has only one major win among his 32 career tournament
victories, Roddick has been a success in at least one area of his career:
money. He has earned $20,540,390 through Thursday in his career and will try to
keep the meter running at least a while longer when he takes on Bernard Tomic
of Australia in the second round Friday night at Arthur Ashe Stadium.
"I think I wanted an opportunity to say goodbye
to people, as well. I don't know how tomorrow's going to go, and I hope it goes well, and I'm sticking
around," Roddick said. He has had some contentious moments with the media
over the past year and maybe walking away now is a wise move. As he walks away,
there isn't exactly a long line of aspiring American tennis greats waiting to
take up the torch. His win at the 2003 U.S. Open was the last Grand Slam
singles title for an American man and right now, Federer, Novak Djokevic, Andy
Murray and Rafael Nadal – none of them American – are the dominant forces in the
sport. As for Roddick, he explained that he has been thinking about retirement
for some time and knew for sure that the time now after his 6-3, 6-4, 6-4
first-round victory over 21-year-old American Rhyne Williams on Tuesday.
Heading into his match Friday evening, he and his massive serve
-- he used to hold the record of 155 mph – have a career record of 610-212 (a .742
winning percentage). It’s not as if he’s stumbling around courts, getting
pummeled by unranked opponents and embarrassing himself; Roddick has won titles
this year at Atlanta and Eastbourne, England. However, a growing rash of
injuries have plagued him as he has aged and in February dropped out of the top
20, then slid to No. 34 in March, his lowest ranking since 2001. He suffered a
right hamstring injury and was forced to retire during his second-round match
at the Australian Open in January. Rather than limp his way to the finish line and
hope for a few more productive years, he’s choosing to walk away with some of
his pride intact………
- The jokes and punchlines are plentiful, the stereotypes
abound and yet, the news that Quebec
police are on the lookout for thieves who made off with a considerable amount
of maple syrup from a large warehouse stocking over $30 million worth of the
sweet breakfast food topping is still funny. Ask the average person what they
think of when they think of Canada and the list will include, in some order,
mullets, Royal Mounties, the word “aboot,” Bryan Adams and maple syrup. That
fact makes the theft of a huge quantity of maple syrup from the site at
St-Louis-de-Blandford, Quebec all the more disturbing. The Federation of Quebec
Maple Syrup Producers discovered the missing syrup during a routine inventory,
during which they found dozens of empty barrels. The scale of the theft was so
large that Quebec Provincial Sgt. Claude Denis said Friday it was too soon to
determine the exact quantity or value of the syrup stolen from the facility
where over 10 million pounds are stored. Just imagining the sort of planning,
scheming and execution of plans and schemes required to make off with hundreds
of gallons of maple syrup is highly entertaining, even if one has to worry that
this tale will eventually become script fodder for the next bad Owen Wilson or
Eddie Murphy comedy people watch only when bored to death and trapped in the
center seat aboard an airplane across the Atlantic Ocean. Police have not
identified any suspects in the massive maple syrup theft and are just beginning
their investigation, although Mrs. Butterworth’s whereabouts at the time of the
theft still have not been confirmed………..
- Say it ain’t say, Hah-vard students, say it ain’t so. At
an Ivy League institution where the smartest of the smart are supposed to
reside, what are the odds that dozens of
Harvard undergrads would be under investigation for cheating after school
officials discovered they may have shared answers or plagiarized on a final
exam for a spring course? Quick, get a graduate student from the applied
mathematics department to figure that one out. On second thought, don’t bother.
In a hyper-competitive environment where Type-A personalities and those
obsessed with success all compete with one another to be the best, students not
cheating would be a more unusual sight. The university dropped its announcement
of the investigation Thursday – the same day as students began moving into
their dorms. Coincidence? Of course not. Nothing reminds students to operate
with integrity in the new semester quite like informing them that school
officials are looking into allegations of cheating by potentially 125 in an
undergrad class. The alleged cheating was discovered by a member of the other
wicked-smaht group on the Hah-vard campus, a faculty member teaching the class
who found similarities between several take-home finals. With nearly 250
students in the class and a professor lazy enough to hand out a take-home final
exam, cheating was all but guaranteed. Close to half of the students in the
class were called in before the administrative board and all of the exams are
being investigated to see if they were all cheating off their students or if
the answers were plagiarized from a third party. School officials are not releasing
the name of the class, the students' names or the exact number being
investigated, but insisted in a statement released Thursday morning that they
are taking the case über-seriously. “We take academic integrity very seriously
because it goes to the heart of our educational mission. Academic dishonesty
cannot and will not be tolerated at Harvard,” said Michael D. Smith, dean of
the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. The investigation is ongoing and under
university policies, any student found responsible for cheating will face
disciplinary including being asked to leave to college for an entire year……..
- All good things must end. This has nothing to do with MTV’s
decision to put down the cash cow of its reality TV enterprise, “Jersey Shore,”
but it is a nice quote. Yes, the end has come for the pioneer of mindless, stereotype-pandering,
lowest-common-denominator reality series on a network that used to be about
music and Thursday it became official as MTV announced that the skanks and
meatheads of “The Shore” will fold up shop after the series’ sixth season,
which premieres Oct. 4. The show debuted in December 2009 and little did anyone
know that a half-dozen fake Italian-Americans (a number that grew as the series
progressed) with a combined IQ of 14 would become such a cultural phenomenon
with their fist-pumping, GTL-ing ways. The Situation, Snooki, Ronnie and Co.
did more than their share of binge drinking, brawling on the boardwalk and even
foisting their idiocy on other countries when the show went abroad. The end was
obviously coming, as its actors had all begun focusing more on their own brands
and careers than on the show and several are now starring in their own
spinoffs. Production costs were skyrocketing in large part because of
increasing salary demands and with the cast set to make more than $2 million
each for the sixth season, there was very little value left in investing
further in the series. At the same time, ratings have slipped noticeably after
peaking at the start of the show’s fourth season, when it suckered in 8.8
million viewers. An expensive trip to film in Florence, Italy also drove up
costs and even the return of “Shore” to Jersey for Season 5 didn’t help revive
the ratings. Ratings slipped back down to first-season levels and although the
series remains cable’s No. 1-ranked series among ADD-addled 12-to 34-year-olds,
even those
numbers are down. With Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino now living with a sober
coach and Snooki (disturbingly)
now a mom, there was little chance for a turnaround. Instead, MTV will
celebrate “Jersey Shore” with an all-day marathon on Sept. 6, chase it with the
retrospective show “Gym, Tanning, Look Back” and then gather the entire gang at
the red carpet show for the MTV Video Music Awards for one final fist pump of solidarity………….
No comments:
Post a Comment