Grateful Dead

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First off apologies to jrf and anyone else who finds the subject boring. It seems to me to a subject that will inevitably crop up here from time to time, as various drug cultures were fundamental to The Deads career. If you took drugs out of the bands history, you would have a very different band. I also hope not to offend anyone with what I say.. I agreed with Seth' comments on the risks associated with heroin use-particularly the impact of poverty on heroin use. I also worked with addicts for 20 years-and another common cause of death was fluctuating strengths of the drug. Additional dangers occurred due to the drug being cut with other dangerous substances-anything from barbiturates to violin polish round here. Both these risks are relieved by the prescribing of opiates-at least then people know what they are getting. Actually this applies to all illegal drugs. Two young people died at a festival here in England last weekend after taking ecstasy that was far, far too strong for their systems to cope with. Another common cause of death with heroin is injecting after a period of abstinence, when your body has lost its tolerance. Also... existing drug laws-they just don't work!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stpRIyHHw8g I apologize for such the goddamn long, rambling post in advance. I have always felt love here, as well as dissension, but isn't that life? No one is making you read this. Disengage if you wish. This forum has chosen me, not the other way around. I find it tired when folks who are done with the the same old boring conversation that leads nowhere feel the need to comment on it and continue the thread. William Burroughs and others have insisted that long time heroin use really has no direct detrimental effects on the body, if it is clean. Detractors, explain Keith Richards, Ozzy, and dozens of others... no wait, let me: plant-based derivatives like heroin and cocaine become much more toxic when cut by greedy asshole dealers who dilute these purer forms of recreational madness with cheap fillers. If your life is out of whack and you are looking for something to fill that hole, gambling is probably a worse idea. Or binge-eating, any drug, etc. If you have to obsessively engage in an activity to stabilize you, keep your demons at bay, etc., try exercise! Go swimming or buy a pair of running shoes. Man, it's 1,000 times better than drugs, overall. I just got home from Red Rocks, saw Ween. Not a great show, but great conversation with good friends. We drank whiskey, beer, and did a little blow, really face-numbing top-quality shit. Some in the party smoked the Devil's weed, though I did not (though, what a beautiful aroma). Go ahead, arrest me. I'll be gone by the time you get here, smirking at the airport with a vodka and OJ and low blood pressure. People just need to handle their business responsibly and not lose their way. A little bit of this and a little bit of that is probably the reason why God put it here, to find inspiration, to inspire great art and thinking outside the box: not for people like Jerry Garcia to completely lose their balance and become chronically overweight, diabetic, and generally unhealthy. Do not become a hog and a constantly-addicted overenjoyer of these things; ye allow these mood enhancers to elevate you. It's a slippery slope, but shit I see people fucking up DRIVING every day. Don't give these assholes easy access to hard drugs. But, don't fucking lock up those of us who are nonviolent, productive, generally benevolent and kind of helping this whole damaged game limp along... Drugs are just like guns, there are way too many of both around, and when they get into the hands of people who are damaged and unbalanced, and can't handle themselves at all, drugs or guns (God forbid both!) getting into their hands, horrible things can ensue. I love kids and I offer love to all of you. I find Buddhism not to be a religion, more just a philosophy. I don't subscribe to it, they don't ask me to send in money. Life, itself, here on this benign rock, constitutes animation of a physical being: from a blade of grass, to a rabbit, to a dog, then a human, is there not a general INVISIBLE to the naked eye animation frequency, a propulsion, that by our designed nature allows us to pick up upon how wide of a bandwidth we can receive? Like, a shrub is dumb and does nothing. Or, is it alive and perfectly brilliant because it cannot fail in it's limited programming, you know, it can't go throw a cigarette out the car window or vote republican in America. But it is alive, with the same God-inspired energy we have. Ah, to be a shrub. Ignorance is bliss. Vote for Trump or Pence and you'll get to come back as one, get pissed on by a dog. This love comes from God, people. God is a girl and she is hot. She is so clever and nice, she gave us incarnated in this go-round as men a chance with our testosterone-induced momentum a shot at, you know, nailing her. Shit! It works. The Grateful Dead knew this. The whole Man Smart, Woman Smarter thing perfectly aligns with natural selection. When my woman lays down for me, I'm a real nice docile fellow for a few days. Wash, rinse, repeat. Ladies I revere your patience, your tolerance for our shortcomings, our failures, and in some case our rather vile physical shortcomings. Understand now, woman is God? All of the best art in all genres has been produced, for our benefit, by geniuses who were by their very nature tortured just to be here, and their dynamic expression of self through their chosen medium (paint, literature, music, etc) was more of a control release valve to keep themselves sane and on this plane for as long as they could. Many eventually killed themselves anyway, whether directly or indirectly. Van Gogh comes to mind. Edgar Allan Poe. Chris Cornell. I have kids too young to read this. I don't want your older kids to read this and think I'm advocating anything. Kids, stay in school and don't do drugs. You are beautiful, with your whole life ahead of you, don't go down that rabbit hole. You may or may not climb out. I advocate personal responsibility and some kind of moderation. If you lack the control gene, don't eat, drink, smoke, snort, inject, or fuck anything not FDA approved. It will lead you down the path of ruin. I'm done sipping my last whiskey, I'm tired, and I have a plane to catch tomorrow. The next day, when I wake up fresh and go running, I'll look at the sun streaming through the trees and work up a good sweat and it could be months before I party again. I used to be excessive, but now I'm just around it a little. Putting on some Bob Marley now, low and slow... things like Three Little Birds, Jammin, oh - and Judge Not.

....the Boyz weren't exactly the most exciting to watch. That's not the point at all. Unless you were in the first few rows. Different story. I'm really not quite sure what point I was trying to make. Carry on....

A few things: My understanding, from working around doctors for 2 decades and from Junkies being a significant portion of the patients I've worked around, is that Heroin is highly acidic. When "that heroin is in my blood" your blood is actually corrossive to some body tissue, including heart valves and liver and kidneys. Over time, this corrosion weakens your vasculature (including in the brain) and makes you more vulnerable to infections, strokes, cancer, etc. Arguing over whether Jerry's heart attack was diet or drug induced is not going to reach any definitive answer, just a choice of possibilities. Argue at your own peril. "(Junkies) generally look thin and scraggly." That is because committed users are usually spending virtually all their money on Heroin. A wealthy person with many wealthy parties interested in maintaining him, and with free time and good drug-connections, can use all the Heroin he wants while still living securely. Most junkies really die of poverty-related causes after Heroin use has driven them into poverty. Their weakened bodies are thrown into risky sex-work, street-sleeping, and living off dumpster-food. An infection at an injection site, aggravated by over-exposure to wet and cold, malnutrition, and a weakened immune system is a common cause of Junkie death (at least in the shadows of San Francisco). Without money, Jerry would have died a lot sooner. Without Heroin, Jerry would have lived a lot longer. Carry on.

....I touched heroin once. Tasted it. Walked the fuck away. edit. Lead me into the blind pony stable....

I just figured it out.. MUATM's is going to be the only place they reveal the contents of this year's box set. So if we don't go, we have blindly pony up on the box set not knowing what it is. I get it now. Genius..

1989... Again I'm not attending for 2 reasons 1/ I was at this show don't need to relive it. 2/ It's ANOTHER show from1989. I was hoping for either 8/4/76 or 11/24/78, but alas it wasn't meant to be. Needless to say for the first time EVER I'm disappointed with a GD selection.

Have never attended before and certainly won’t this year.We all know that 7-19-89 exists in high quality. Yet they serve up leftovers? Edit: We also know that Brent’s last at Tinley Park exist. Edit2: And presumably any stadium show from 87 on probably exists too due to the use of the video projection screens during the show.

Heroin wreaks havoc on the body just as the other mentioned vices do.But Jerry died of a heart attack due to a clogged artery. No offense taken by your comments and I totally respect and support your desire to steer your kids away from heroin. That’s a drug I would never touch.