This article is sponsored by Ganja Gold.
What’s the first joint you really remember?
Not necessarily the first joint you smoked, or the first one you rolled. But the first one that really made an impression? The one that let you know you’d be coming back? That you’ll tell your kids about… when they’re a little older.
Today, there are plenty of serviceable pre-rolls available at any dispensary counter in a legal-use state, from bargain choices to top-shelf selections like Ganja Gold’s Tarantula line. Featuring high-quality flower, a coating of clear distillate, and a dusting of kief and hash as a final touch, Tarantulas provide a one-of-a-kind smoking experience that’s sure to make an occasion into a night to remember.
Not every joint that makes such an impression, though, shares the Tarantula’s pedigree. Still, most every cannabis consumer could tell you where they were and what they were doing when they lit up a particularly memorable joint.
Firing up one of Ganja Gold’s Tarantula pre-rolls. (Leafly)
We started off by asking Ganja Gold CEO Alex Patel about a memorable joint, and he told us about a pair that were particularly important to him.
Smoke Break
I was working at a sales job in the cannabis industry and had come to the point where I was kind of questioning why I was in the business. I was rolling a joint, and since I was having a rough day, I decided to pour some cannabis oil on it. And when I did that, it slipped out of my hand, fell on the ground and collected dust. And that’s when the light went off – I picked it up thinking ‘That dust could be kief.’
So I rolled a new one, coated the whole thing with oil, and dusted it with kief. I lit it up, and holy moly, it just went up in flames!” Then I took a couple of rips and man, it felt just like the first time I smoked cannabis.
That first time was back when I was still in high school and working at The Gap. I was a little nervous about cannabis, but I smoked a joint with a co-worker on my break. When I came back to work, I was just grinning from ear to ear and handing out discounts to everyone who came through my line.
Both of those joints were moments that changed my perception of cannabis forever, and that changed my life. They were moments that I wanted to share with people, feelings that I’ve never forgotten; and everyone on our team has stories of their own like that. Now, with products like the Tarantula, we get to help people make their own stories. And that’s a pretty good feeling, too.
We heard similar stories of life changing joints from some of our colleagues here at Leafly. From smoking with strangers to tales of family bonding, here are a couple of the joints that our staff will never forget.
DIY
I had always wanted to learn to roll a joint, but everyone who tried to teach me previously got frustrated too quickly and snatched the rolling-duties from my hands. My first visit to the West Coast, we went to LA to hang out with a buddy who was living there. He not only taught me how to roll a joint properly, but also recruited me to assist in rolling a joint that was as long as my forearm. We then smoked that sucker until it was totally gone. As far as first forays into joint-rolling go, I’d say it was a big success.
While rolling a joint is a skill many folks pick up early, but it can take years to master. (InnerVisionPRO/iStock)
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas…
It was Christmas Eve, and my parents had just gotten divorced at Thanksgiving. I invited my dad to come spend the holiday with me in Vermont, just the two of us doing some cross-country skiing at a lodge in the middle of the woods. Since the divorce was still so fresh, we spent a lot of time talking about ways we could cope with the stress and emotions that came along with it.
My father always knew that I consumed cannabis, but never condoned it. I decided to muster up the courage and tell my dad about how cannabis has helped me deal with stress and anxiety. He spent the next couple of minutes asking me how the “hydroponic stuff” differed from what he smoked in the 70’s. Excited that he was actually interested instead of giving me a lecture, I began to explain how I smoke cannabis daily and that I view it the same way as some people view taking anxiety medication.
The right joint can help warm up even the coldest winter. (AlbertPego/iStock)
I’ll never forget when he asked if I “had any on me” and coincidentally, I did. I pulled a joint out of my jacket pocket which I was planning on smoking when I left him behind on the trail, and asked him if he wanted to give it a go. He made a joke about not having to worry if my mom found out and said he’d “have a little bit.” I sparked it up, still wondering if this was some sort of trick.
We sat on a wooden bench in the middle of the woods, our skis still attached to our feet, and laughed about how this Christmas was much different than the last. We skied a little more until we made it back to the cabin, where we ate beef stew by a roaring fire and listening to Christmas carols played on a fiddle. It could not have been more perfect.
The World’s Best Weed
The worst joint I’ve ever smoked was prefaced with the bold phrase “This is the world’s best weed, kid.” The elderly woman who had made this claim then pulled a joint out from inside her bra. It looked like it’d been rolled with toilet paper or a used napkin, and contained a few small flakes of cannabis, like someone was rationing cannabis during the Great Depression, which might have actually been when this was rolled.
After much deliberation, I set my dignity aside and smoked the Boob Joint. What can I say—it was college, I was desperate.
If You Can’t Stand the Heat…
I was visiting a friend for his birthday while he was going to school in a small town in the middle of nowhere. There wasn’t much to do there other than drink crappy light beers, so that’s how the trip started. After a long night of debauchery, we all woke up with massive and well-earned hangovers. In response, we made it our mission to roll the biggest cone we could.
Everyone pooled resources, and in the end, we had about 16 grams contributed, which our designated roller turned into the largest cone he could make from a pack of king-size Raw papers. We decided the small downstairs bedroom would be the perfect place to hotbox this behemoth.
It’s getting a bit smoky in here. (BraunS/iStock)
We must have had 20 people in the room, and we made it a rule not leave or open the door for any reason. About two-thirds of the way through this baseball bat of a joint we were all choking and practically drowning ourselves in cannabis fumes when one of the non-smokers decided they couldn’t take it anymore.
He cracked open the door to escape and was immediately bombarded with every available inanimate object in the room. Roughly six hours later, once we were able to move and actually enjoy the effects that had slowly tapered back down to a reasonable level of comfort, we ordered pizza and played video games. An extremely successful Sunday by college standards, but one with lasting consequences—our friend who tapped out still catches hell about it from the rest of us to this day.
