A Breakdown of all the Ways to Enjoy Marajuana- Part III

Welcome to part III of our series about the different ways to enjoy marijuana. We started with my favorite ways first. I love to enjoy marijuana in a joint because it is so communal and sharable this way. I also love to use a pipe to smoke the grass that I purchases at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. This is again because it is communal and also is a bit less wasteful than a joint can be.

My next favorite way to enjoy marijuana and the topic of this week’s blog is a bong. A bong is also known as a water pipe. This is because it uses water. A bong consists of a round, long tube with an opening on the top. This opening is what you will put your mouth over to inhale the smoke. A bong also has what is often called a “stem.” This is the piece on which the bowl is. The bowl is the place in which you place your weed.

Once the weed is ground, it is placed in the bowl. The pot is lit with a lighter and you place your mouth over the tube and begin to inhale somewhat slowly. This inhale will cause the water in the tube to bubble. You want to inhale as long as it takes to fill the tube with smoke. Once it is filled, you will pull the stem and take one final, quick inhale to clear the bong. This will cause the water to bubble intensely. Then you will proceed to get very, very high.

This is probably the top reason I love to use a bong to enjoy the marijuana I buy from Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. You can get a very quick and very intense high, often from only one hit (a hit is one pull or puff off of whatever it is you are smoking.) This is compared to a joint or a pipe where you might take anywhere from three to eight some hits to get the same effect. For this reason, a bong is my go to choice when I want a quick and easy high. One hit and done. I like that.Another reason I love to smoke a bong is because of the tube and the water. Filling the tube with water means that the smoke is filtered and cooled as you burn the marijuana with the lighter. This makes it more enjoyable and less likely to burn or irritate your throat.

Bongs can also be really pretty. I have a lovely blue/green glass bong that is about a foot and half tall. It is often mistaken for a vase, which is a good thing when mom comes to visit. Their beauty makes then a good conversation piece. It is said that the smoke in a glass piece can make it change colors. While I’ve only seen my bong go from light to dark, I’ve seen other glass pieces get some nice color after some smoking. There you have it, all the reasons I love to smoke grass from glass bong. Maybe it’s something you’d like to try out. If so, get yourself to Denver’s Altitude Dispensary to pick one out.
 

A Breakdown of all the Ways to Enjoy Marajuana- Part II

Last week I shared with you my most favorite way to partake in the lovely cannabis products you can purchase at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. This week, I will tell you about my second favorite way to smoke—with a pipe. This is likely the most common way to enjoy it. At least it used to be the most common way to enjoy flower, but perhaps the surge of edibles and concentrates has changed that. I’m not sure, maybe that’s another blog.

A pipe is exactly what you may have seen your grandfather smoke tobacco out of. It is the same concept. You stuff a bunch of pot purchased at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary somewhat tightly into the ‘bowl’, or round empty spot which can be filled, and then you place a flame to that. You inhale through the long stem part and the smoke tunnels through that.

You want it pretty tightly packed because in this way you can get it to be what stoners call ‘cherried.’ This means that it is burning and you do not need to keep hitting it with a flame. You can just keep inhaling without the need to relight it.

This is convenient when you are passing the bowl around. I mentioned in my last blog that my favorite way to smoke is with a joint and that this is because it is so communal. Smoking a pipe, or a bong that you can buy at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary can also be communal. Generally you stand in a circle and pass the pipe around to your friends.

These pipes can be all sorts of materials, but the generally accepted best material is glass. Though when I was younger, I surely wasn’t smoking out of the beautifully colorful and handcrafted glass pipes we have today. I mean these could seriously be considered works of art. One of the reasons glass is preferred is because of the ever changing colors and designs within the piece as you smoke out of it. Over time, the smoke changes what it looks like from day to day.

Nope, when I was younger, I was usually smoking out of a metal pipe—the kind that looks like sink parts. In fact, sometimes, that’s exactly where I’d get my screens for those pipes. There was a necessity for a screen because I was not smoking the beautiful weed that you can get at Denver’s best dispensary. Nope, I was smoking what we affectionately called, brick weed (more on that in another blog to come.) When you’ve got brick weed, you’ve got to break it up and sort it to get the stems and seeds out and this results in the need for a screen so that you don’t suck the grass up with your inhale.

Aren’t we all so luck that we can now legally purchase kind bud from the best dispensary in Denver? I know I am. No more eating ashy grass. Nope! So there you have it—my second favorite way to smoke weed—out of a pipe, preferably glass and preferably with a bunch of friends. So head on out to Denver’s Altitude Dispensary and get you something to put in your pipe and smoke.

A Breakdown of all the Ways to Enjoy Marajuana- Part I

We have briefly touched on all the different ways to enjoy all the various products sold at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. This series of blogs aims to dive a bit deeper. I’ll chronicle the different means to partake in the devil’s lettuce according to my preferences.

My most preferred way to enjoy cannabis is with a good old fashioned joint. It is likely for this express reason that it is my preferred method. I consider myself a purist, though I’m not sure anyone else would. And as such, I prefer to smoke marijuana the way it has been smoked for years and years and years— rolled into very thin papers and twisted off at the end. Once sparked, this joint is passed around a group of people- old friends, new friends, show friends, camp friends, all the friends. I fee this is the most communal way to share this most precious flower. There’s just something about everyone smoking the same grass, getting the same high that makes the high all the more enjoyable.

Alas, ever after years and years of practicing—using the dollar bill method and even using a devise made to roll the joint for you (if you can just remember which side of the paper goes in first)—I am no good at rolling properly tight joints (they need to be tight so that they smoke easily and slowly.) But no worries if you too can’t roll. Denver’s Altitude Dispensary sells “pre-rolls.” These are pre-rolled joints for you to enjoy at your leisure. They are ready when you are, no assembly required. Phew. You can buy one or two or a pack of pre-rolled joints. The quantity of marijuana within is measured so that you know exactly what and how much you are smoking.

Joints are great to have handy when you are on the go. This is versus at home where you might have the space and time to properly, say, load a bowl or a bong (see next blog for details into this preferred method of smoking). I love to have joints at the ready for concerts, or camping, or hikes, or BBQs, or really anywhere when I’m not at home. It’s fun to be the one that pulls out a few pre-rolls from Altitude Dispensary to spark up and share with a handful of friends. You become the life of the party. Joints are also a great way to make new friends.

While, perhaps the most wasteful way to smoke (the only downside I can think of), it is to me the best and most communal way to smoke. I say it’s wasteful because a joint is continually lit (if it’s rolled tightly enough). This means that the joint keeps burning even when people are not inhaling it. This means there will be some marijuana which is not smoked and simply goes into the air instead of your lungs. So, there you have it—my number one preferred method to smoke the beautiful flower that comes from Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. Joints are easy and communal and just all around fun to share. Stay tuned next week for part II of this guide where I’ll write about bongs and pipes.

So You Want to be a Budtender

I get it. I really do. Like I mentioned in my last blog, I, not so secretly, have the same aspiration to be a budtender. In that blog I wrote about all the different duties a budtender has in a dispensary like Denver’s Altitude Dispensary. You may have been surprised that it went beyond simply just ringing up sales. On top of retail, you must also know your products well enough to be able to make informed recommendations to your customers.

Wanting to be a budtender is kind of similar to how I was fascinated with bartending back when I was not quite of age yet to drink. To be surrounded by all those bottles of liquor and smiling happy people imbibing colorful cocktails seemed like a dream. And now, the chance to be in the heart of the cannabis industry surrounded by canisters of bright green bud and colorful edibles also sounds like a dream. Dispensaries such as Denver’s Altitude Dispensary are often hiring budtenders.

So, what are the skills and qualifications you need to become a budtender in Colorado and how do you go about applying to become one? First off, you must be twenty-one years of age or older, just like you must be at least this age to legally purchase cannabis products in a dispensary.

Next, you may be surprised to know that you must have a license to work in the cannabis industry. This license is called your MED badge. In order to get this you must be a Colorado resident without any legal issues—you are not a felon, you do not have outstanding fines etc. You will prove this by getting fingerprinted. If all of these things are on the up and up, then your final step is to fill out an application to apply for your MED badge.

Once you have your badge, you can then begin to search for a budtender job at various dispensaries like Altitude Dispensary. Of course, to increase your chances of being hired, you will want to do all you can to be knowledgeable and on top of all the cannabis industry news, laws, and trends. You must know all the cannabis rules and regulations in Colorado. You also must have a positive, friendly and professional attitude.

Of course, having some experience in sales and customer service will also be helpful. Your passion for all things cannabis will also serve you well. You must be an expert in the products you will be selling, so be sure to do your due diligence as far as educating yourself.

There you have it! If being a budtender is something you aspire to do, here are the tips to help get you started preparing for and looking for your dream job. One last tip I have for you, spend plenty of time in your local, friendly Altitude Dispensary. While there, talk to their budtenders, ask them questions, try out the products and become as knowledgable as you can so that you will be the best applicant you can be.

Throughout these blogs it has occurred to me that I have talked about the friendly and knowledgeable budtenders at Altitude Dispensary in Denver quite a lot. Yet, I’ve never actually explained just what exactly a budtender is and what responsibilities they hold. So this blog will enlighten you on this oh so important role in a dispensary.

When marijuana became legal in many states and dispensaries like Altitude Dispensary in Denver started popping up as the place we could go to browse, select and purchase cannabis, those dispensaries needed knowledgeable sales clerks. These sales clerks are there to help with the whole process of entering a shop and leaving with the products you want or need.

Because the cannabis industry is very clever, they decided to call these sales clerks, budtenders. This is a combination of the word ‘bud’-a slang for cannabis along the lines of ‘weed,’ or ‘grass,’ and the end of the word ‘bartender.’ A bartender slings bar drinks and a budtender slings bud. Genius!

I cannot tell you how I giggled when I first heard this word upon entering my first dispensary. I love a good pun, and especially one for potheads. Fun fact—as of 2018 the word ‘budtender’ is an official word in the Merriam-Webster dictionary!

I also can’t tell you how awed I was when I saw official budtender certificates (more on this in a forthcoming blog) framed and hanging in the shops. I may have secretly wanted to become a budtender back when the thrill and newness of the legalization was hot. I may not so secretly still want to be one because what fun to be in the thick of all things cannabis!

So what exactly does a budtender do. I can tell you straight off, their job goes far beyond simply ringing up people’s purchases. At Denver’s Altitude Dispensary a budtender’s job is wide and varied. On any given day a budtender might educate customers about the different products the dispensary has. This includes all the different cannabis products—flower, edibles, CBD, vapes, different smoking apparatuses, and various other products within the store.

This means your budtender must know their stuff, and they do. They must stay on top of all the new strains, products, news, law changes, and trends. It is in this way that they serve their customers well.

With this knowledge, your budtender is able to recommend different products to fit your needs. They also can advise you on best practices as far as dosage and safety when consuming cannabis. They also weigh and package the product. As well, they may be involved in the identification and paperwork process.

Who knew a budtender did so much? They are so much more than just a sales clerk and the informed budtenders at Denver’s Altitude Dispensary are there to answer any questions you may have. Whether it’s about the right strain, the correct dosage, or the type of cannabis that will serve you best, your budtender has the answer.