# What are "whites" in Little Feat's "Willin'"?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [October 17, 2014, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609 "2014-10-17T19:35:57Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/1 "2014-10-17T19:35:57Z")
I love [that song](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DyesPp6OUY). It’s been one of my very favorite songs since I first heard it on a compilation LP some 25 years ago. Thanks to lyrics sites, I since have been able to decipher the line “And I been from Tucson to Tucumcari, Tehachapi to Tonapah” (the only town I could make out was Tucson, but I’m not from the U.S., so bear with me). But what still puzzles me somewhat are the “whites” in the refrain:
\*And if you give me weed, whites and wine,
And you show me a sign,
I’ll be willin’,
To be movin’
\*
I know what weed and wine are, so I suspect that “whites” is a slang term for another substance. But for what?
---
### Author:  [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/2 "2014-10-17T19:40:26Z")
Amphetamines? [http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/White+cross+(drug)](http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/White+cross+(drug))
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### Author:  [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/3 "2014-10-17T19:41:18Z")
Yep. The trucker’s friend.
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### Author:  [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/4 "2014-10-17T19:48:16Z")
As well as the odd [deep-sea oil drilling rig driver](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2WUoi5Qpl4)’s friend. 😃
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### Author:  [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/5 "2014-10-17T20:07:19Z")
Thanks for the prompt answers. Should have been obvious for a trucker song. :smack:
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### Author:  [@LH75](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LH75)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/6 "2014-10-17T20:14:12Z")
Ten mg amphetamines. We used to call them “White Crosses”
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### Author:  [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/7 "2014-10-17T20:18:18Z")
While we’re at it: are the reds, greens and blues in the Stones’ “Sweet Virgina” also amphetamine pills?:
\*Drop your reds, drop your greens and blues.
[…]
And I hid the speed inside my shoe.
\*
Now, I know that “speed” is amphetamine. Did those pills come in all colors?
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### Author:  [@LH75](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LH75)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/8 "2014-10-17T20:22:06Z")
Reds were generally a barbiturate of some kind Seconal comes to mind. They would put you to sleep
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### Author:  [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/9 "2014-10-17T20:23:05Z")
“Livin’ on reds, vitamin C, and cocaine…”
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### Author:  [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/10 "2014-10-17T20:37:29Z")
And “greenies” are dexedrine, as any baseball player from (at least) the 1950s to 1980s knows.
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/11 "2014-10-17T20:38:16Z")
_We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and **a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers** … and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.
Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can._
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### Author:  [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/12 "2014-10-17T20:40:47Z")
Leaves the question what “blues” are. But I dimly remember from “Quadrophenia” (the movie) that they were some kind of benzedrines, but probably the drug lingo differed in Britain.
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### Author:  [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [October 17, 2014, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/13 "2014-10-17T20:58:53Z")
> [@silenus](#):
>
> _We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and **a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers** … and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls.
> Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can._
First chapter of\* Life\*?
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### Author:  [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/14 "2014-10-19T14:20:52Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#):
>
> First chapter of\* Life\*?
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
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### Author:  [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/15 "2014-10-19T16:03:29Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#):
>
> Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
Ah. It sounds like the description of the stuff Richards and the roadies had stuffed into the crevices of the car.
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### Author:  [@Ranger\_Jeff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranger_Jeff)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/16 "2014-10-19T16:53:32Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> Thanks for the prompt answers. Should have been obvious for a trucker song. :smack:
For the record, that’s an OLD trucker song. Trust me, it’s not like that much anymore.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/17 "2014-10-19T17:10:55Z")
> [@Ranger\_Jeff](#):
>
> For the record, that’s an OLD trucker song. Trust me, it’s not like that much anymore.
Different drugs today, or clean livin’? Genuinely curious.
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### Author:  [@Biffy\_the\_Elephant\_Shrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/18 "2014-10-19T17:43:01Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#):
>
> While we’re at it: are the reds, greens and blues in the Stones’ “Sweet Virgina” also amphetamine pills?:
In the case of “Sweet Virginia,” while “Drop your reds” is a plain reference to taking barbiturates, I think that following it with “drop your greens and blues” is just wordplay, with a likely pun on blues music thrown in. (As **Amateur Barbarian** notes, there’s such a thing as greenies, but I’ve never heard them referred to as greens.)
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### Author:  [@picker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picker)
#### Post date: [October 19, 2014, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/19 "2014-10-19T18:33:27Z")
‘Greens’ was slang for liquid PCP on marijuana in the mid 80’s, at least in the DC area.
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### Author:  [@Left\_Base](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Base)
#### Post date: [April 30, 2016, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-whites-in-little-feats-willin/701609/20 "2016-04-30T01:51:08Z")
Shoot, a feller could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all of that stuff.
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