weights and measures

We get asked all the time to translate dealer and user-speak into plain English and simpler mathematics: How much is in a teenager? What’s an 8-ball? If I buy a quarter-ounce, how many grams will I get?

Those of us still in the game have boned up on our weights and measures to make sure our dealer is giving us what we’ve paid for. We learned what lingo equals what weight and then what that weight looks like in its little baggie. No one wants to get ripped off, right?

The savvier shoppers among us know that the price of a stash might be negotiated, especially when we can be flexible about the amount we buy. In the ever-changing drug marketplace, there can be Costco-sized discounts available for customers who have the cash (and the nerve) to buy in bulk. That said, we think it’s really important to know how much we’re consuming, especially if we’re buying in bulk. Eating a pint of ice cream isn’t the same thing as downing a half-gallon, now is it?

Get out your pencils, here’s the crash course ...

A common “starter” weight that speed is sold in is a quarter. It’s called a quarter because it weighs a quarter gram, get it? That weight will usually fill up half of one of those cute 1” x 1” plastic zip-top baggies. Remember third grade math and the dreaded fractions? Here’s where that information you thought you’d never need comes in handy: a half is twice the amount of a quarter. Speed is also bought and sold in grams or in multiple quarters or grams.

Moving on beyond the quarters and halves of the weekend warrior, we enter the realm of the teener. Like mnemonic devices? To get to the weight a teener represents think “sweet 16” ‘cuz a teener is 1/16 of an ounce. Going up a rung (or down, depending on how you feel about increased quantities of meth in your life) we’ve got the magic 8-ball. That’s twice the weight of a teener or, 1/8 of an ounce. So an 8-ball is bigger than a teenager. Again with those damned fractions, right?

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE:

* If you buy a teener (1/16th of an ounce) and divvy it up into quarters, you’ll get a little over 7 quarters. A teener is a little more than 1.75 grams.
* If you buy two teeners, you’ve got an 8-ball. An 8-ball’s got a little more than 14 quarters, or 3.5 grams.
* A little geography to confuse things a bit: teener and 8-ball are most often American terms. Remember that so you remember that they refer primarily to ounces.


Term Amount Going Rate in S.F.
Quarter 1/4 gram
(0.01 ounce) $20 - $40
Half 1/2 gram
( 0.02 ounce) $40 - $80
Teenager 1/16 ounce
(1.8 grams) $120 -
8-Ball 1/8 ounce
(3.5 grams) $250 -
Ounce 1.00
ounce $1200 -

tweaker vocabulary

Amped:
High on speed, in the way that is desired and sought by users; see also: Over-amped.

Bag Fag:
A straight man that has sex with other guys when he receives a bag of dope in return.

Bag Whore:
Cruising for drugs more than the hook-up, a bag whore is the person who is always happy to use your stash but never has or buys speed of their own; a person who replies to “has favors” and “can host” profiles but never provides the speed.

Bump:
A small amount of speed, usually less than a line, most often snorted.

Cook:
Someone who manufactures meth.

Crank:
A variety of speed commonly seen as “dirty” or “dishwater”; cheap, crappy speed; see also: Dick Dope, Raw.

Crash:
Coming down from high. Symptoms include physical exhaustion, sleepiness, depression and mental confusion.

Crystal:
The kind of speed we seek out, in its “pure” crystalline form, looking like bits of glass or ice; see also: Shards.

Dick Dope:
Also called Dirty Dope, this term refers to cheap, less-than-pure (though very little of what we get is truly pure, right?) speed.

Domer:
A hit from a pipe; blowing a white cloud of smoke so thick, it goes straight to your dome.

Hit:
The amount usually ingested via whatever means of administration one has chosen; this can be a Bump or a Line or whatever other amount one uses.

Kingsford:
Someone who burns the dope inside a PIZZO.

Line:
Think the 1970s and cocaine; a literal line of powdered speed ready for snorting.

Match Head:
The amount of crystal that used to get you through 12 cocktails and a whole night at an after-hours club (about the size of the ignitable end of a match, but isn't enough to get you out of bed today.

Over-Amped:
Higher than you want to be, too much of a good thing way too soon.

Pizzo:
Glass pipe used for smoking meth, also known as a bowl, stem, tool or utensil.

Point:
A syringe; also called Rigs, Sets, Fits, Pencils… check at your local needle exchange and ask what they call them.

Quarter:
One-fourth of a gram, the usual minimum purchase amount.

Ramping:
Using incrementally larger amounts over an accustomed, usually short period of time in a an attempt to reach the desired effect; this is something that comes with practice.

Raw:
As in Crank and Dick Dope above, this is crappy, dishwater dope akin to old-school biker speed.

Skid Marks:
Black carbon on the outside of a PIZZO, caused by the lighter or torch.

Toot:
A straw or gutted pen used to snort/scoop/handle meth.

Trail Mix
Ecstasy and speed in powdered form, usually heard &/or shared on the dance floor via a bumper. Sometimes it’s coke, not speed mixed with the E.

Z's:
Ounces, when purchasing or selling in such quantity/volume.

a brief history of meth

.

what concerns us most about the current meth epidemic is its impact on the physical, emotional and social health of gay men. A big part of this impact is the clearly defined relationship between meth use and HIV transmission because men on speed are taking increased risks that they would not ordinarily take. That said, let us give you a little quickie down and dirty history lesson.

Way back in 1887, amphetamine was first synthesized in Germany. A related compound, methamphetamine - speed, crank, ice, Tina, whatever you currently call it - was later synthesized in Japan about 30 years later, in 1919.

In 1927, a British chemist researched the stimulating effects of meth. He quickly realized their potential for producing increased alertness, alleviating fatigue and inducing euphoria. Excited over the new prospects of the drug, he studied their ability to mimic an adrenaline rush in the body and the well-known 'fight or flight' response.

During WWII and due to their energizing and antidepressant properties, amphetamines were sanctioned by the governments of the United States, Germany and Japan and given to many men in their militaries. It has been estimated that during the last years of WWII, millions of Japanese soldiers, defense workers and civilians used amphetamines so that by the end of the war at least 2 percent of Japanese adults were dependent on the drug. Yeah but, you might think, 2 percent's not a large number until you realize that's 2 percent of the entire population!

In the United States, post-war studies of American military prisoners revealed that a notable number of these guys reported abusing amphetamine inhalers. In 1959, the first use in the United States of intravenous injection of the contents of a Benzedrine inhaler was reported; in 1971, the last non-prescription inhaler was removed from the U.S. market pursuant to the passage of the Controlled Substances Act of 1970. In the United States, there have been three distinct methamphetamine epidemics: one in the 1950s, a second in the late 1960s, and the third and current one that began in the mid-1990s.

meth production

You're already aware of the caricature of the meth cook racing around town to all the Walgreen's or Rite Aids or Eckerd's, frantically buying up all the cold medicine he can get his hands on. Why, you might ask? Here's why: the main active ingredients are ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. But because the state and Federal governments continue to control access to these substances, they can be very hard to get in quantity. Sure enough, there are cooks who make speed locally but depending on where you are in the country, the meth you see or use might have been produced in countries where access to ephedrine is less stringently controlled, if it's controlled at all.

Increased regulation of pure ephedrine and pseudoephedrine has meant that even more toxic substances are used in order to strip the desired chemicals from other products. Thus you have those alarming "It's made of battery acid and fertilizer" stories. Technically, it's made with a bunch of scary stuff. But that doesn't mean that some of the base ingredients' other chemicals won't remain in the finished product. And that's why there can be variations in the consistency and color of what you've ended up with in your quarter gram baggie.

Cooking speed is a very dangerous process, involving a variety of liquids and solids, almost all of which are toxic all by themselves. The most common way to produce meth is a quick cook process that requires only a few hours. And that's a chemistry class disaster waiting to happen since there's all that liquefying and making gaseous and heating in makeshift pressure cookers and filtering and on and on and on. Trailer park firestorms or explosions in out of the way motel rooms, anyone? The mess that's left over after production is really nasty and there's lots of it. For each pound of product there's about five pounds of residual chemical crap to contend with and whom do you think takes care of that stuff? When the authorities go in to clean up, those guys are wearing Haz-Mat space suits!

Last though not at all least, you've got to wonder about what the speed is cut with, meaning what solid substances have been added to the meth to stretch out what has been produced. Do you really think you're getting pure product? Think again. In California we've heard about a variety of things being used as cut: talcum powder, salt, sugar, antidepressant meds like Prozac, HIV meds like protease inhibitors, Ritalin, adult and infant laxatives and Epsom salts.

Party and Play

PNP or ‘Party and Play’ means doing speed (the party) and having sex (the play). It can last for several hours or days of near continuous sexual activity.

Things to watch out for:
Breaks in the skin: All that friction during long sex sessions can cause abrasions. Your dick can feel like it has been sunburned, your nipples can feel like you ran a marathon without a jog bra and your asshole can feel like the TransBay Tube. All this activity can increase your chances of exchanging an STD, including HIV, but it will also just leave you sore for a few days. Condom Breakage – For some reason they have yet to develop a condom that will last for 9 hours of continuous fucking! Not eating or sleeping for several days plays havoc with your entire body and increases susceptibility to all diseases. Sharing toys – dildos, butt plugs, that type of thing – can also mean you're sharing diseases. Before anything goes in you, make sure it's clean. Most guys notice that their standards for sex partners change between 3pm and 3am. Well, on a three-day jag, your impeccably high standards in sexual partners can change from Mr. Right for the Night, to Mr. Right Now, only to end up with Mr. Available. And who knows the sexual health of these people? Find out! And of course, you end up being Mr. Available to someone else. A multi-day sex jag can undo several months at the gym, a fifty dollar hair-cut, hundreds of dollars of skin and hair care products, and the hours you spent selecting the right outfit. For heavy sexual scenes (heavy SM, role play, fisting etc), especially with relative or complete strangers, the more loaded you are, the more you can get lost in the scene which, of course, is one of its attractions. Generally, it is a good idea to keep at least one foot in reality just in case the fantasy takes a nasty turn and you need to break the scene.

Strategies to reduce possible harm:
Change sexual positions often, increase the amount of lube that you use or put on new condoms on some prearranged schedule. Set a timer to remind yourself to give your body what it needs: water, medications, a rest, some food, etc. You can use an alarm, timer, when a CD or video stops playing, or timed lights. Not recommended: candles (fire hazard), or relying on a non-alarm clock (Do you really think you could remember a target time or look at the clock regularly?). Cock rings, when left on for hours, can cause major problems down there. Best advice: use a leather tie and loosen it every once in a while. Set target limits for how long you want to binge before your binge begins. You can control this by controlling your available cash. Giving the rest of your available cash, credit and ATM cards to a trusted friend may work and will certainly prove if you can trust your friend. A better method would be to put your money and plastic in a safe deposit box on Friday so it’d be difficult to get until Monday. Drugs, heavy sex (S-M, role playing or fisting) and strangers can be a very dangerous combination. Don't get into anything too heavy with a stranger or someone you don't trust. Even if you set limits, if both or all of you are on drugs, your limits may go out the window.

what is crystal meth

When we talk about anything with a pop culture aspect we use coded language. And when we do that there are always regional differences, cultural differences and subcultural differences to contend with. Crystal methamphetamine goes by lots of different street names: Crystal Meth, Crystal, Crissy, Tina, Crank, Speed, Shards, Glass, Ice, Go, Whizz, Dope... you get the picture.

Whatever name it goes by, crystal is a stimulant - an 'upper.'

Just like when you use other uppers -caffeine, chocolate, cocaine - using crystal induces a chemical "fight-or-flight" response and changes a whole host of bodily functions: your heart rate goes up and thus your blood pressure increases, the pupils in your eyes open up wide, you feel more alert and as though you have more stamina, you get a sense of physical motivation and you definitely have increased verbal activity even though some of what you're saying might not make sense to other people. Meanwhile, other functions decrease, like the sense of hunger and thirst or the need for sleep, you know, things that will get in the way of this "fight-or-flight" action.

The color of meth can vary a lot, depending on its purity. In its cheapest and less processed form called crank, the drug takes on varying shades of greasy-brown, sometimes with black flecks. Meth gets its nickname crystal because of the appearance of its most sought after form. Usually it's found, seen or acquired as a clear-to-white crystalline substance that can look like long, thin shards of broken glass. The crystals can be swallowed or smoked as is, crushed into a powder for snorting or dissolved in a liquid before swallowing, injecting or booty bumping.

meth sex

For guys who use and even for some who don’t, crystal meth has earned an infamous association with sex. After having sex on crystal, some guys find that plain old sex is boring, not intense enough, not exciting enough. Eventually some of us felt like we couldn’t have sex without it. We might like being dominated in bed, but being dominated by crystal isn’t fun for anyone.

Some of us use when we cruise because we find that meth heightens arousal and increases sexual stamina. There’s also the delayed orgasm which makes play time go on and on and on. It’s a big drag that impotence is a common side effect. This impotence is sometimes called crystal dick. You’re sexually aroused but your cock won’t cooperate; you can’t keep it up or, even worse, get it up in the first place.

Crystal meth may increase your confidence at the same time it lowers inhibitions. Under the influence, we might give in to our impulses and do stuff we might not otherwise have done. There’s a big risk of HIV infection through unprotected sex and perhaps more so while under the influence of meth. How come? Often enough, when we’re zooming, everything we’ve been told, learned and practiced in terms of safe sex seems to be forgotten. And it’s forgotten when we need it most because when we’re high sexual activity and the desire for it increases like nobody’s business. Some men who get fucked while they’re high on speed are less sensitive to pain and may find themselves seeking out, asking for and having more aggressive sex for longer periods. Nothing wrong with an aggro-fuck now and again, but without feeling all of what’s going on, injury is more likely to occur and the risk of HIV infection is increased. If you party and play, use lots of lube and, if you can, condoms to decrease the risk of HIV infection.

ISO Hunt goes down!

"One of the most popular torrent search sites, IsoHunt, was taken down on tuesday. The owners of the site say that the move came from their ISP without prior notice, though it is probably linked with the MPAA's lawsuit against various torrent search sites earlier this year. They plan on moving ISPs from the US to Canada, and say that moving the servers so someplace like Sweden or Sealand is not an option, as they put it: "BitTorrent was created for legitimate distribution of large media files, and we stand by that philosophy as a search engine and aggregator."" This is a story we've heard before with other sites, only serving to further demonstrate that playing wack a mole with torrent aggregators isn't the solution to anything.

Study: Meth Use Declining

Methamphetamine use continued to decline in nearly every part of the country last year as the government sharpened its crackdown on precursor chemicals used to make the illegal drug.

Overall, the number of workplace employees who tested positive for meth dropped 22 percent last year, according to a study released Wednesday by New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics Inc., the nation's largest drug-testing company. Meth use in the Northeast, however, remained steady.

At the same time, the Drug Enforcement Administration issued a report showing the number of illegal meth lab seizures plunged 31 percent last year, from 7,347 to 5,080.

White House drug policy director John Walters said laws restricting the sale of cold medicines containing pseudoephedrine, a key ingredient used to cook meth, and efforts to thwart drug trafficking from Mexico have disrupted the market for meth.

"When we are able to put strategic pressure on the supply of these drugs, what we're seeing is a direct effect for the better on the number of users that we can actually measure with drug tests," Walters said.

The Quest report also found cocaine use in the general work force fell by 19 percent in 2007, the biggest single-year decline in a decade. Figures are based on the results of more than 8.4 million drug tests performed for employers.

While meth use decreased, the Quest study reports that positive tests for amphetamines - less potent stimulants - increased by 5 percent over the same period. Quest researcher Barry Sample said the increase in amphetamine use suggests some workers might be replacing one stimulant drug for another.

As the number of meth labs began shrinking in the United States, they have been replaced by "superlabs" in Mexico and Mexican-run labs in some U.S. border states. DEA Acting Administrator Michele Leonhart said interdiction efforts, coupled with U.S. pressure on the Mexican government to reduce imports of pseudoephedrine into that country, have helped cut down meth trafficking across the border.

"We for the first time on the meth front hear the traffickers themselves and informants report that there's a change," Leonhart said. "They are having a hard time getting the product out of Mexico."

Bill Hansell, commissioner of Umatilla County in Oregon, said he's noticed a decrease in meth usage in his state, but he stressed that it's still a top law enforcement problem.

"We're still seeing a huge percentage of crimes committed that are meth-related," Hansell said.

Some lawmakers in Congress have complained that the Bush administration has cut hundreds of millions of dollars in law enforcement grants used to fight meth and other drug crimes in rural areas.

Walters said the administration is targeting resources where they can have the most benefit.

Grandpa

Police: Man Known As 'Grandpa' Sold Meth
GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (AP) ― Police arrested a 68-year-old man nicknamed "Grandpa" on suspicion that he was dealing methamphetamine from an apartment complex for retirees.

A court affidavit shows the arrest of Robert Hakel came after authorities launched an investigation against him in 2007. Hakel is facing five felony drug distribution charges.

Police say they also arrested eight people suspected of buying drugs from Hakel Wednesday. He was arrested outside of a liquor store with two ounces of meth and about $1,300.

Police say they suspect Hakel was getting meth from an Arizona man.

Meth Users Turning To Urine To Get High

(WCCO) When Wright County deputies opened up a smelly rented storage locker last June, they had no idea what they would find. Inside a man had stored 50 gallon jugs of urine.

"The officers that responded looked at it and said, 'yeah, that's odd,'" said Wright County Narcotics Sgt. Becky Howell.

The deputies gave the go-ahead to the owners to throw out the urine. When they did, they got sick.

A week and half later, that report hit Howell's desk.

"I said, 'Oh my gosh, this is a meth lab, this is a urine extraction lab,'" Howell said.

It's a new way to get meth. Some people drink the meth-tainted urine outright to get high. Others filter the drug back out through the cooking process.

"I'm not 100 percent sure what this guy was doing," said Howell. "Five years ago, I probably would have been surprised at that. But now, knowing and understanding methamphetamine and an addict's addiction to it, it doesn't surprise me."

It did surprise Jeremy Rezac. He's a recovering meth addict who used to cook up to $20,000 worth of the drug a day. Back then, he said it was easy to buy pseudoephedrine or ephedrine in the form of pills.

"A couple hundred bucks, send junkies, out to get your pills for you. A couple of hours later you were ready to rock and roll," he said.

But all of that changed in the summer of 2005 when lawmakers passed one of the toughest meth laws in the country. It added 10 new BCA agents, dealt out new penalties for child endangerment and placed limits on the amount of pseudoephedrine and ephedrine one person can buy in a month. It also put those pills behind the pharmacy counter and made everyone sign a log.

The state said that brought homegrown meth labs down by 70 percent.

"You can't find that product no more. You can't find it on the streets no more. The government did what they needed to do," said Rezac. "It takes a lot of time and money and I think the average meth user, meth cook, they don't want the hassle anymore."

Howell said there's still a group that does deal with the hassle and has quickly found a way around the law.

She's seen addicts travel in packs to different drug stores because they know the pharmacies do not communicate with each other.

Of the big retail chains, only Walgreens and Target keep an internal database to track pseudoephedrine pills purchases within their own stores. None of chains share with their competitors.

"They know they can still go shopping for pills and go to the various stores and obtain their packages. They can sign the ledger, prove their ID and then they can move to the next store," Howell said.

She said her deputies don't have the time or resources to cross-check all of the logs to match the addict with their purchase.

State Sen. Julie Rosen, R-Fairmont, wants that loophole to change.

"The meth law that was passed in 2005 was tremendous," she said, "but now that drug scene has morphed. It's changing. Meth is morphing and changing. We need to adapt and be quick on our feet also."

She's considering legislation that would track pseudoephedrine and prescription drug purchases across different stores. Pharmacies would enter a patient's personal information and their purchase into a central database.

Only officers with a search warrant would have access to that information.

Rosen would also like more money for treatment programs.

"I feel we are sitting back on our heels a little bit," Rosen said. "We are saying OK, we did our job, our job has been done. We passed that great bill and now we're good."

Rosen plans on working closely with the state's new meth coordinator.

In December Gov. Tim Pawlenty appointed Chuck Noerenberg to this newly-created position.
His job is to figure out where the state stands on meth and where Minnesota has to go.

"We have the foundation in place but we still have a very serious problem in Minnesota," he said, pointing out that 80 percent of meth in the state is imported from Mexico.

His initial priorities will focus on a new child-endangerment protocol and assessing what types of treatment work best.

"Meth treatment is longer and more complex than other chemical dependency treatment and that's something we need to have a better understanding before we sink a lot of money into it," Noerenberg said.

While the state has made great progress in combating homegrown meth, no one in government, law enforcement or even on the streets expects the drug to go away soon.

थे मत Minute

How Not To Get You Ass Kicked By The Police