why do addicts “burn” the foil before using it for a chase? I’ve heard that if you dont you can get tin poisoning, but most foil is aluminium nowadays is it not?
In the circles I used to move in we did not bother to burn the foil at all. I have heard people say that there is a “plastic layer” on some foils that needed to be burnt off, but I think that this is just an urban legend.
I also used to hear that there was a right and wrong side to place the heroin on (shiny or dull). There is no difference between the two sides of the foil - whichever side of the sheet is in contact with the rolers in the pressing process ends up shiny!
Finally, you are correct. Although we call it “tin foil” it is, in fact, made of aluminium.
I’ve been clean for over a year now, so I’m not too up on current myths on the scene.
I used to smole pot using aluminum foil with pin holes through it, as a substitute screen.
As fas as I can tell, it damaged no cause. 
Beware however that aluminum not only has a bad
taste, it can cause alzheimers disease when you get
a lot of it in your bloodstream over your life.
I’m sorry, but this is not really supported by fact.
From The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
I’m sorry. I should have said “may cause alzhimers”
I knew that it wasn’t completely conclusive, but I forgot
to mention that.
Its hard to imagine heroin users worrying about Alzheimers whilst they were rattling.
They don’t worry too much about breathing in the fillers that are cut in, at one time strychnine was a common filler.
This is an ancient drug myth, albeit one typically applied to LSD rather than heroin. Nobody cuts drugs with strychnine; what would be the point? Why kill your customer base with something that’s probably more expensive than the drug itself, and certainly more expensive than something benign like milk sugar?
Does anyone have any more Urban Legends they’d like to add?
You can’t get high the first time you smoke.
Wanking - it can make you go blind, aye.
She will not get pregnant if its her first time.
Yea, right,
http://www.focusas.com/Heroin.html
http://www.wedetox.net/drug_opiates.html
I can get loads of these if you want.
But what would I know, I only work in a jail stuffed full of junkies.
In fact abuse of Strychnine was very popular in Victorian Engalnd(I shall not comment upon other nations since I do not know their history of drug usage)
Strychnine is a potent stimulant and believe it or not, the synthetic version of Heroin, Diazepam, is a recommended treatment for Strychnine poisoning.
Strychnine has the immediate effect of dilating blood vessels around the face giving the user a rosy cheeked look, this was prized by a certain class of Victorian lady.
Strychnine was also used in cycling as a stimulant, the Tour de France was known for it but the use of it seems mostly to have been in the ultra hard and long stages of the Tour prior to WWII.
Mixing stimulants with depreassant drugs is pretty common, Cocaine and Heroin, known also as ‘speedballs’
Many substances are harmful poisons but can be taken safely(in the short term) in low doses, arsenic is one other.
Strychnine is apparently used in conjunction with LSD, though I have to say that I have not come across a person who would admit to this.
Eat crow chile!
All of those appear to be fairly unobjective sites, including sites advocating drug testing and such.
Diazepam is Valium, which is not an opiate (or an opioid, for that matter). It’s a sedative. Heroin itself is considered “semi-synthetic”. As well, I’ve never heard of strychnine being used as a stimulant, although I must admit I’ve never looked into it
Possible, although I’ve heard this also ascribed to other plant-derived poisons, namely belladonna. I’ve never seen a reliable source confirming this, however.
Here’s a quote regarding the supposed strychnine/LSD connection:
“From 1972 to 1977 i was Director of Florida’s anonymous street drug testing program (Clearwater Free Clinic/Drug Analysis Project) and later was a research associate with UpFront, Inc. in Miami (1978 & 79). During this period of time i was directly familiar with the results from our analytical labs and those operating in California, Oregon and Detroit. I recall NO instances of samples of (actual) LSD being combined with strychnine, brucine or amphetamines and derivitives of amphetamine. (Which is not to say that there were no instances of people intentionally co-dosing with other drugs such as amphetamine; seems to me there were some clinical experiments where such a combination was tested and i recall people telling me about instances when they had done the same.)”
True, this was a Usenet post, and could certainly be falsified; however, people have claimed that strychnine was present in LSD (either as a “cut”, or as a byproduct of the synthesis process) since the mid-1960s, and I’m coming up with only two cases in which people claimed to find strychnine in powdered LSD: one in which a trace amount was reported via a chromatography test (1971), although apparently a second test proved negative. The second instance came from Albert Hofmann (the “father of LSD”), who claimed that strychnine had been sold as powdered LSD. Apparently, though, he could provide no details and no cite when contacted regarding this claim.
As well, the active dosage of LSD is in the microgram levels; you couldn’t fit enough strychnine in a square of blotter paper to cause much harm.
Did you mean methadone? I don’t if it’s used to treat strychnine poisoning.
know
Apply where appropriate.
right on, occ. btw, casdave, three of the four sites you cited suffer from the dreaded “Fox Terrier” syndrome; that is, their content is ALMOST EXACTLY ALIKE!
tf?
jb
Hmmm, looks like I’ll have to do somewhat better in my searching.
Here is one site that mentions the use of Strychnine as a performance enhancing drug in sport around 1900, though there is every liklehood it was used before then, as one feature of Victorian sporting prowess was considered to be extreme endurance, I believe that some long distance speed walking event records still date from this time, even if they are not standard distances.
http://www.prn.usm.my/bulletin/sun/1996/sun27.html
and another
from which
This site mentions the addition of Strychnine and Caffeine but it hints that this is mostly a European phenomenon.
http://www.undcp.org/bulletin/bulletin_1975-01-01_1_page007.html#bf006
Fair enough, but most sites about heroin use seem to be of the prohibition type, with a few medical journals scattered about.
Looking at the treatment for Strychnine poisoning, it appears to be very important that the patient is kept quiet, and calm to avoid the convulsions.
As for metioning Diazepam, dunno what got into me, it should have been Demerol, never mind, I suppose its cause they both start with a ‘D’.
Quite * why* heroin and strychnine are mixed and the effects that users get, I don’t know but I bet I know a few who do, so I’ll ask around at work, shouldn’t be too hard to find out.
The “name an Urban Legend” hijack was more fun than the “strychnine” hijack. Can we go back to it, please?
[additional hijack] btw, upon further inspection, casdave’s last link appears to be the Q source for the rest.
[/additional hijack]
[karma balancing doubleplusunhijack]
quoth Mad Matt
[karma balancing doubleplusunhijack]
i don’t get it. i am under the impression that both sides of the foil are in contact with the rollers. i mean, how the hell else would foil be rolled?
to get back to the OP, i am also under the impression that foils (at least, the hoity toity ‘quality’ foils) have a coating of some sort on one side. i may have read this in scientific american, i may have been told this as an urban legend (“My sister totally has this friend who was babysitting, and she made the kids baked potatoes in the oven for dinner, but she put the foil on backwards, and the potatoes didn’t bake!!!”), and i may have read this on the side of my Reynold’s Wrap a few months back.
and but i mean, c’mon- it only makes sense that there’d be some coating on the foil. seriously, we’ve been able to foil aluminum for some time now; there have not (i will bet anyone a fiver on this) been many metal-foil-pressing revelations in the last twenty years. but foil (or so the foil cabal claims) is much ‘better’ nowadays (always followed by a ‘!’), i guess maybe more efficient at conduction or infrared reflection (i’m shootin’ for the latter, btw) or something. and coatings would explain this marked improvement. so what up on this?
does foil have a coating on one side? and if so, it it harmful or unpleasant to smoke that, or smack one’s bitch up with same?
jb