# A “X-Mas Dinner to Remember” or “Yes, this really happened to us.” **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 27, 2009, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676 "2009-12-27T04:09:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/21 "2009-12-27T07:12:20Z")
Why in the world are you hiding your stash in the kitchen? Don’t you have a closet, or some other inviolable private space in your home (I presume that you live with your mother)? ---
**Author:** ![Rhythmdvl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/85f322/32.png) [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/22 "2009-12-27T07:25:39Z")
> [@Lamar\_Mundane](#): > > Anyone who is familiar with both rosemary and pot is :rolleyes: at this post. This. I guess it could have gone gone either way. But no … this. :rolleyes: > [@misterW](#): > > Rosemary does not compress easily, pot does. A large frying pan with other stuff in it…I don’t know, see for yourself, if you don’t believe me. Do you realize that this actually works against your story? I have “seen for myself,” and again point to the vastly different quantities (compressed or not) needed to either flavor a dish or extract a recreational amount of THC. You claim the alleged girlfriend is an “excellent cook” who “doesn’t use recipes for most part; she goes by appearance, taste, smell.” This pretends at a marginal familiarity with rosemary and quantities needed. It’s absurd to think that anyone (again, excepting anyone who normally rides the short bus) would confuse one amount for another, compression aside. Even if the excellent cook added whole buds without breaking them up, we’re still in need of two vastly different quantities. If she’s used to cooking with dried/jarred rosemary, she’s used to working at the _teaspoon_ level, not the handful level. > [@](#): > > All I can say is that nobody noticed anything unusual with the potatoes while eating them. It takes a lot to mask the earthy, dark, intense taste of pot-infused _X_. It’s decidedly **not** a flavor additive to be highlighted in any dish. Furthermore, any quantity added sufficient to get more than an ant high will leave lots of detritus in the dish. This is why when preparing to cook with it you need multiple pressings and filterings to save the product and remove the waste. Imagine flavoring something by adding fresh coffee grounds to a dish — this is little different. > [@misterW](#): > > Yeah, they had less than me, and were pretty much back to normal in a few hours … **I still can’t believe it actually happened**. A consumed high — especially one that is powerful enough to evoke the described reactions in the OP — is not over in just a few hours (especially not among people who don’t smoke). That is one of a handful of reasons why eating isn’t as common as smoking (another, apropos to the thread, is that its consumption-to-effect ratio is much less efficient than smoking). Yeah, maybe it “actually happened,” but you left yourself a lot of room for plausible deniability. … Kids, there are fantastic resources out there for cooking, all easily found but not linkable on the Dope (now that’s an odd sentence). Don’t waste your pot thinking you can throw a bit into a stir-fry and end up with a spacey dish. There are a few things you’ll want to do (e.g., the aforementioned straining), a host of good practices to follow (e.g., how long to cook, what to cook with, what to mix with), and of course, good recipes to follow. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/23 "2009-12-27T07:45:10Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Why in the world are you hiding your stash in the kitchen? Don’t you have a closet, or some other inviolable private space in your home (I presume that you live with your mother)? Well, clearly the kitchen has one drawback, which has been noted for the future. I live by myself (my mother was visiting from a short distance away), so going to great lengths to hide it was not a big concern. I reasoned that nobody would glance twice at a spice bottle with a green substance in it, and it seemed kind of humorous, so I went with it. ---
**Author:** ![BigBertha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d78d45/32.png) [@BigBertha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigBertha)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/24 "2009-12-27T08:01:52Z")
I do not care if it was true or not, thast the first good laugh I’ve had in months! so thank you. It is hard to beleive one would get those kind of reactions though. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/25 "2009-12-27T08:08:18Z")
That’s way cooler than having the Bumpass’ dogs eat the turkey. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/26 "2009-12-27T11:21:32Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > Is the girlfriend “innocent” because she normally rides the short bus? Had it not been pot but actual rosemary, would she have blindly added that much to the recipe? Did she add more and more because it _still_ didn’t taste like rosemary? Didn’t anyone at the table notice that rather funky (heh) taste of the potatoes? (Pot is _not_ a cooking spice – though I’d love to see it show up in Pensey’s catalog!) > > Something is definitely missing here. Did you slip everyone a roofie and try and blame it on the girlfriend? :dubious: And how did anybody who has handled rosemary in any form except powdered mistake the pointy needles of rosemary, or the hard broken needles of rosemary for pot? Oregano I could sort of understand, but rosemary?!:dubious: ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/27 "2009-12-27T12:08:36Z")
Kids these days don’t make pot brownies? I know weed is a lot stronger now than when I last had a toke back in the 80’s, but shit man the high from eating pot was different but in no way was it a hollucinegenic vomit spewing experience. Sheesh, IIRC, many proponents of medical marijuana make the claim that it reduces nausea. Unless it was PCP laced pot (which IMHO did have some pretty strange effects) Sounds more like an urban legend than something believeable. ---
**Author:** ![Vambo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/6de8d8/32.png) [@Vambo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vambo)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/28 "2009-12-27T12:24:24Z")
Dump those uptight creeps and join the darkside, we have canna-cookies! ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/29 "2009-12-27T14:06:31Z")
> [@misterW](#): > > Yeah, I smoke very infrequently. Maybe every year or two. And I ate damn near the whole dish of potatoes. Good god. My mind is still fuzzy. I’m calling BS on this thread. If you ate the most of the dish, why was everybody else tripping? ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/30 "2009-12-27T14:50:57Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > I’m calling BS on this thread. If you ate the most of the dish, why was everybody else tripping? I’m calling BS on your reading comprehension. The other two were not tripping, nor did I ever say they were. They had much smaller doses. My mother, who vomited, has been taking cancer medication that makes her feel like crap. The way she described it was that the pot intensified the already crappy feelings that she was experiencing. Also keep in mind that when unexpected physical sensations come out of nowhere, it can be very unsettling, especially if you are already very concerned about your health. She thought she might be having the first stages of a heart attack. The girlfriend also was not tripping. She probably had the mildest dose. She experienced feeling buzzed, then feeling nauseous as the room spun. She then had some emotional swings before it faded out. I expect the emotional swings were strongly influenced by nervousness over being high combined with anxiety over witnessing my Mom’s reaction, which was ANYTHING but reassuring. Also keep in mind that neither one of them stands over 5’1", and neither one of them smokes pot. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/31 "2009-12-27T14:54:20Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > And how did anybody who has handled rosemary in any form except powdered mistake the pointy needles of rosemary, or the hard broken needles of rosemary for pot? Oregano I could sort of understand, but rosemary?!:dubious: Yeah, that was my WTF moment. Not a very experienced cook if you think that some leafy substance is rosemary. And dried rosemary used in those quantities would make the food completely inedible, which an experienced cook would have recognized. ---
**Author:** ![casdave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c6cbf5/32.png) [@casdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/casdave)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/32 "2009-12-27T14:59:45Z")
Rosemary is a pretty aromatic herb, you would not use more than a couple of heaped teaspoons. Now spread this amount around at least three people, and from the sound of the OP it is probably more like 5 or 6, nope, just don’t see the whole hallucinagenic thing with these kinds of amounts. Add to this that it is consumed with a large amount of food, thats going to take quite some time to have an effect, even if we double the amounts, its not going to cause such powerful hallucinations. I’m also surprised that given this was a personal stash, the owner did not recognise the effects, at least on themselves. Rosemary and pot don’t look even a tiny bit like each other, no cook would put in an unknown herb into food without at least tasting it to get an idea of strength of flavour - and that funky taste would enough for any cook to leave it out. How much pot looks green btw? I don’t think I ever saw any pot that looked all that green except for the very fresh bud stuff, and you would never mistake it for rosemary. I ain’t buying it. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/33 "2009-12-27T15:00:49Z")
> [@China\_Guy](#): > > Kids these days don’t make pot brownies? I know weed is a lot stronger now than when I last had a toke back in the 80’s, but shit man the high from eating pot was different but in no way was it a hollucinegenic vomit spewing experience. Sheesh, IIRC, many proponents of medical marijuana make the claim that it reduces nausea. Unless it was PCP laced pot (which IMHO did have some pretty strange effects) > > Sounds more like an urban legend than something believeable. Actual hallucinations were subtle things that only happened at the peak and only experienced by the person who had much more than the others. I don’t know how many brownies one ordinarily eats, but I sure went to town with those potatoes. Vomit spewing was I suspect more related to previous health conditions coupled with anxiety and paranoia. It does sound like an urban legend. In fact, the thing that really freaked me out when I was experiencing the height of the trip, was that the story is so ridiculous it sounds implausible. Therefore (I told myself), my mind must have constructed it as a way of distancing myself from some trauma, like a fatal wound. ---
**Author:** ![Renee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/renee/32/287_2.png) [@Renee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Renee)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/34 "2009-12-27T15:14:19Z")
I’m not buying it, either. Rosemary has a very obvious and distinctive smell, and looks nothing like pot. If you’d said she was an inexperienced cook I might have bought it, but anyone that’s used rosemary before would never mistake it for pot. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/35 "2009-12-27T15:21:17Z")
> [@casdave](#): > > Now spread this amount around at least three people, and from the sound of the OP it is probably more like 5 or 6, nope, just don’t see the whole hallucinagenic thing with these kinds of amounts. Where are you getting 5 or 6 people from?? Three people. Myself, my girlfriend, and my mom. > [@](#): > > Add to this that it is consumed with a large amount of food, thats going to take quite some time to have an effect, even if we double the amounts, its not going to cause such powerful hallucinations. First, there were not “powerful hallucinations.” At the height of my trip, there were subtle visual hallucinations, which I can describe if you are interested. The main symptoms I experienced were waves of a powerful physical buzz, extreme paranoia, extreme disorientation, and loss of ability to think or communicate coherently. > [@](#): > > I’m also surprised that given this was a personal stash, the owner did not recognise the effects, at least on themselves. I did, at first. At first the high was similar to smoking. But within a couple of hours it had intensified to the point where I became convinced that it must have been laced with something. The idea of that freaked me out, increasing my anxiety 10 fold, which eventually led to me abandoning that idea and moving on to other theories, as I noted. > [@](#): > > I don’t think I ever saw any pot that looked all that green except for the very fresh bud stuff, and you would never mistake it for rosemary. Now your argument is that this couldn’t have happened because pot isn’t green? Are you serious? ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/36 "2009-12-27T15:40:00Z")
> [@Renee](#): > > I’m not buying it, either. Rosemary has a very obvious and distinctive smell, and looks nothing like pot. If you’d said she was an inexperienced cook I might have bought it, but anyone that’s used rosemary before would never mistake it for pot. I was surprised too, and for the reasons you stated. I think the combination of other distractions coupled with it being clearly labeled in the original bottle tipped the scale. Also, some spices come in different forms. For example, if you always bought thyme as a powder, you might not know it also is found as little leaves. I think she assumed (as she did 5 other things at once) that this was that type of variation; that perhaps the buds were clumps of rosemary leaves. Strange, yes, but I have made silly decisions when distracted as well. What can I say? I would imagine many truly bizarre events involve either improbable coincidences or illogical decisions by people, probably often times a combination of both. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/37 "2009-12-27T15:42:09Z")
> [@BoBettie](#): > > ZOMG Reefer Madness! > > I can only imagine how terrible something like that would taste. I heard a rumor that weed brownies reportedly taste “terrible” and can be hard to choke down, much less something that strong tasting in a bland food like potatoes. Fascinating. I don’t know, I’ve never eaten it before. The potatoes were also cooked with olive oil, garlic, and onions; that probably helped mask the taste. ---
**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/38 "2009-12-27T15:47:43Z")
Mmmmmmm, Pot taters. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/39 "2009-12-27T16:05:34Z")
> [@Rhythmdvl](#): > > …It’s absurd to think that anyone (again, excepting anyone who normally rides the short bus) would confuse one amount for another, compression aside…Kids, there are fantastic resources out there for cooking, all easily found but not linkable on the Dope… It would be interesting and informative to try to reconstruct the amounts used and how they led to the effects I described. However, I’m not particularly interested in wasting my time with you. I know that you are far from the expert that you would like to come across as on this subject matter. You are also quite rude. Play cannabis expert on a message board if it makes you feel important, but there is no need to be insulting. ---
**Author:** ![misterW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@misterW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/misterW)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2009, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676/40 "2009-12-27T16:18:07Z")
> [@Electric\_Warrior](#): > > What does “acted on accordingly” mean in this situation? Well, when I realized that it was actually carbon monoxide affecting us, it meant trying to herd all of us out of the house and into the snow. This was difficult because I kept getting lost in thought and forgetting what I was doing. Apparently I tried this multiple times. I guess there was no outward action when I became certain that I had already suffered some type of fatal wound. Mostly just shock, sadness, and mentally preparing myself for the end. When I abandoned both of these hypotheses and moved on to the obvious answer (experiments at the Hadron super collider going awry and resulting in the time/space fabric being torn), I left the house and attempted to find another person – if they were not experiencing what we experienced, then perhaps it was hallucinogens or a local gas or poison; if they were also experiencing the sort of craziness that we were, then it must be Hadron. Iron clad logic, to be sure… : ) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-x-mas-dinner-to-remember-or-yes-this-really-happened-to-us/522676.md?page=3)