2011 will long be remembered by stoners for two crucial reasons: Ancient Aliens coming to Netflix Instant, thereby perfecting the act of getting blazed and sitting on your couch watching dumb shit on TV, and Trader Joes' introduction of their Milk Chocolate Covered Potato Chips, which is the perfect food accompaniment to doing so. It was also, for the 96th straight year running, a good year for dope-smoking pop music fans.
Today begins round three of our new blog feature "Variations on a Theme," in which we devote digital ink to a topic that fascinates us. This week, it's weed.
Every weekday morning and at various points throughout the week, Reader staffers will produce a post—a personal essay, a longer-form reported story, a photo gallery, or something more off-the-wall—on the week's theme.
We've already devoted plenty of ink to the topic of marijuana—most recently Mick Dumke and Ben Joravsky's "The politics of pot," which explores politicians' reluctance to decriminalize pot possession.
But there's no such thing as marijuana overkill. And so we begin Weed Week with Mick Dumke's post on Father Michael Pfleger, a pro-pot-decriminalization priest. Check back each day for more weed-related posts.
And in case you missed it, here's a handy compendium of the two prior installments of Variations on a Theme: Architecture Week and Vegetarian Week.
In honor of WeedWeek, I'm going to inaugurate an occasional series of posts documenting dishes best consumed while intoxicated or while recovering from altered states of consciousness. Pick your poison, but in most cases—as with the infamous Slinger, or Polk & Western Hot Dogs' abominable french fry sandwich—no one should eat these things without immoderate chemical input.
Father Michael Pfleger has been railing against drugs and violence—and generating headlines—since the 1970s. A white priest serving an African-American parish, he's never shied from the spotlight, especially when he's got the chance to talk about race and racism. He also happens to do an astounding Hillary Clinton impression.
