Very excited today because WillJay has a T&T scheduled at Bluebird. I had some great posts with WillJay leading up to this visit, plus I've never been to Bluebird, so I figured I'm going to kill two birds and get stoned (as Kinky Friedman would say as a pun on kill two birds with one stone). Fantastic. T&T at 10 a.m.!
Did I tell you how relaxing it is to sleep on the houseboat? Of course, none of us can recall what it was like to sleep as a little baby, rocking back and forth in a cradle. But somewhere buried in your subconscious, I believe that sleeping on a boat triggers some happy sensor deep, deep, deep in your mind. On the boat, you sleep so peacefully. So peacefully, in fact, that you often do not recall shutting off the alarm. So peacefully, I tell you, that no matter how excited you are to awaken and meet new people and enjoy new experiences, you will continue sleeping.
Oh hell, it is 9:45 and the T&T is in 15 minutes! As I scurry to put on clothing and look 1/2 way presentable, I do a little quick math. Houseboat near Heineken to Rembrandtsplein = 15 minutes, then Rembrandtsplein to near Bluebird is, hmm, yep, another 15 minutes. I'm going to be 30 minutes late. Hell.
Bluebird Talk & Toke
Right on time, like clockwork, 30 minutes later I'm there. Of course, I don't know what anyone looks like, so I walk into BB, walk right past a group sitting in the front, and go upstairs to make a purchase. While looking at the menu, I feel in my coat pocket to find an entire bag of weed. WTF? I was certain that I smoked everything, but no, here is a bag and card from La Tertulia. Evidently I swung by La Tertulia at some point on day 3, but for the life of me I don't know when. That little conundrum will remain for, well, the rest of my life. Even now I don't recall going, and neither does my wife. I briefly consider whether this is the long lost bag of G13 Haze from last year! Pfft, no, because this coat is a different coat.
Anyway, back to WillJay and his entourage. I evidently do not need any weed as not only is my left pocket full of what I marked as "Purple", but also my right jacket pocket is loaded with 3 other bags. I am getting old, or Sinterklaas and his compadre, Black Pete, visited a bit early. I'm still in a bit of a fog from that wonderful sleep. Well, I have 4 bags of weed.
I get my cappuccino and look around. No one is there. Well, someone stepped on a dog, but the dog owner was a loner, so that was not Willjay. I did a bit of Sherlockian deductive reasoning and figured that the little group in the front door was the infamous WillJay and his entourage. Problem solved.
Down to the front, there is one seat left. Everyone introduces themselves. The equally infamous Fat Old Dwarf, who was nothing like I expected as FOD is neither fat nor old nor a dwarf, is in a deep conversation with WillJay. WillJay's wife is across from me. WillJay's friends from Richmond, VA show up, and may very well have been the group who stepped on that black dog that blended into the black floor. Oops! Oh well, they are super nice folks.
FOD was sharing hash, which I did not catch the strain. Then WillJay passes some hash in his wooden bowl. No idea about that strain, either.
I will forever recall this meeting as my first time to experience hash. Thanks guys!
You guys need to meet WillJay and his wife. Very interesting. WillJay, if I don't make it up to your neck of the US anytime soon, we will do what we can to make it and reintroduce ourselves next summer.
What was so refreshing about WillJay is that I relate a bit more to what I gather as his outlook on marijuana. I'm just wowed/impressed/insert verb over so many of you who can sniff marijuana, smoke a bit, then tell you the strain qualities, the tastes, the effect, if it is citrusy or woody or earthy or diesel or whatever taste. I do not have such a sophisticated palate. I wish I could, but I just don't pick up those nuances. As DLN shared his 24K out of his Pax 3, then quizzed me on the taste, maybe if you plant a taste in my mind with a suggestion, I can taste that suggestion, but on my own, no. 24K has a tangerine taste? OK, sure. Sour diesel has a fuel taste? Alright. About all I can really do is tell you that CS Yo-Yo weed has a taste that I can only describe as very clean, and other weed does not always have that 'clean' taste.
So, my Neanderthal taste buds are useless. Instead, I relegate weed into two categories: (1) does this weed get me really high; or, (2) does this weed only get me a little bit high.
Not to put words in Willjay's mouth at all, but in the very brief conversation with he and his wife, I got the impression that strains, labels, taste qualities, sativa vs. indica, and all of the other measures take a back seat to what one can see and smell. Thank God for meeting you, Willjay, b/c I feel like a novice on this board at times when everyone is waxing poetically about a certain strain. I do enjoy reading how you other guys can tear a strain apart and analyze it, though. But as for me, I have to go with the unscientific method of selecting weed in AMS about the same way that I would select a good piece of fruit at the Noordermarkt. Does it look like that fruit should look? Smell like it should smell? Have good weight for its size. If so, purchase. If not, pass.
Anyway, Willjay, I certainly welcome your thoughts here. I'd also be equally on board with funding OHMF, DLN, CCs, Gapie, Marok, and virtually everyone else on this board by starting a business where you teach people about weed like a wine connoisseur teaches oenophiles about wine.
The T&T winds down all too quickly. I felt like I was just getting started. Oh man, this hash is fantastic! I will forever read the hash reviews with deep interest. Thanks again, Willjay, Willjay's wife, and FOD!
Time to walk back to the boat. I'm missing little buddy a bit, too. From experience, I know I'll arrive at the boat in 30 min. Somehow that 30 min. stretched into one solid hour, though. I know why. I was super high! Walking around AMS when you are super high is a real treat.
While standing on the corner at Rembrandtsplein trying to decide if the Night Watch statues were completely accurate representations, a fairly large group of tourists came upon me. The tour guide with the little yellow sign looked at me and said I need to stay in the group. Sure thing! I'm happy doing whatever with a bunch of lost tourists who were gaping at the bars.
This group evidently just got off the canal boats at the Amstel and were walking down Reguliersgracht to the Museumplein. As we entered Thorbeckeplein, I tried to convince a few tourists that they should sneak out at night (these were 50+ year old tourists, so I don't think they needed to sneak out) and visit what is Café Nasty during the day, but blossoms into Club Nasty at night.
I got distracted on the bridge at Ponte Arcari, and the tour guide told me to stand by her. She asked me if I bought anything from someone while I was at Rembrandtsplein. I said no, b/c I didn't see any street vendors with any good watercolor paintings. She just frowned and said something about not purchasing any marijuana from anyone on the street. I nodded and agreed with her that such a thing would be stupid with so many coffeeshops. I then pointed out that if the group wants anything, Barneys is right up ahead. She just looked at me with what I thought was the oddest look. So I did what anyone else would do in that situation. I changed the subject. I started chattering away with this tour guide about what they were seeing at the museums. Are they going to Van Gogh? Rijks? Stedelijk? Moco? I shared with her that I was going to Moco later with the family.
"Moco with the family?" she asked. No. We were going to Van Gogh.
'We?' I thought. Oh hell, she thinks I'm part of the group.
Then she asked again not IF I purchased, but WHAT I purchased. I then told her about finding the baggies in my coat pocket.
She was not amused. It obviously dawned on her that I was not in their group. I was just some guy standing with wonder at an intersection that she grabbed by the arm and directed me to walk with them.
She informed me that I no longer needed to walk in their group, and was not welcome. I told her that I appreciated her escorting me across the busy intersections, but felt obliged to remind her that it was she who grabbed my arm and commanded me to stay in the group. I don't think that anyone in the tour group was the wiser.
Bye bye, tour group. Thanks for helping me cross the street in my post-hash stoned state of mind!
For the life of me I don't know how I can recall nearly every detail of that walk from Bluebird with such accuracy but cannot recall going to La Tertulia.
Moco Museum
We visited the Moco Museum. Lots of Dalis and Banksy. Good selection, and if you like Dali, it is a great little museum.
After Moco
The rest of the day was very relaxing. The wife wanted to stay in the Rembrandtsplein area. That morning high seemed to last the entire day.
At one point we hung out in the Amstelveen area and listened to a very good, sultry modern jazz band that is the sort who would play in some of the jazz clubs in the Paris area around the Fontaine des Innocents in the Les Halles area of Paris. They were great. Little buddy and I danced around while they played really good, sultry jazz-type renditions of The Jackson Five. They had a killer rendition of "I Want You Back".
Before going home, I had to stock up on some hash! So I popped into Barneys and purchased a gram of King Hassan. So the King Hassan was very good. I read where you guys post that hash should burn evenly and white, which it did. To me, I don't know what it tasted like, but it looked really good and got me very high!
This day was an amazing day!
Tomorrow, King's Day.
