485 lines
19 KiB
Plaintext
485 lines
19 KiB
Plaintext
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I want to thank everyone who replied to my post a couple
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of days ago. So to pay you back, here's a summary of what people said:
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My reactions to the suggestions are in []'s
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(The second part of this post looks like it could be the beginning of
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an interesting FAQ)
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I asked two questions. One:
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1) One person in this group wants to take two hits, and has only taken
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one weak hit before. He didn't show an incredible sensitivity to it, and I've
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known him for years and can attest that he has no deep-seated psychoses that
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would well up. Is it harmful for a "newbie" like that to take two? He wants
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to get visuals, he says....
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Here are various replies (no names attached)
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that would be a big no! especially if this stuff lasts over 12 hours! gads..
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give him one....if he whines, give him maybe 1 1/4...but don't give into him..
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he'll regret it and so will you...you may not think that there is that much
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difference between batches or that 1/4 a hit isn't that much a difference, but
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it is! unless you want your friend to be terrified, don't do it...it will be
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much more happy for all of you if he just takes 1
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[Turned out alright - he still didn't see anything unless he closed his eyes
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and put them right next to a light. He did feel a little edgy, too, but he
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didn't freak out or anything.]
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Not harmful, but he needs to be sure of a good mindset, and a good environment.
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I've had a fair amount of variation on my trips, but generally have "tight
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grips" on reality, so it takes more to make me see the light show. I took
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two hits a few weeks ago for just that reason, and it was pretty extreme.
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I was a bit tense about it at times, but it was a good trip overall. I
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did have a very attentive babysitter in my girlfriend, but even without
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her I think I would have been ok.
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[Yes, the environment was a problem. Half of our group decided they couldn't
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attend at the last minute, creating a big damper on the fun... he and I
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both have "tight grips" on reality too...]
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I never understood this. I have always had visuals, no matter
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what the dosage. Tracers, phosphenes, breathing walls, and
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symmetric patterns at low doses; people spontaneously growing
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hair & turning into people-cats & things going into motion at
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higher dosages. But I found, though, that with experience I
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learned what to look for. I have probably learned to coax out
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the visuals.
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[yeah, that's probably most of it there - learning to coax it out]
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If the guy has some experience, and had a good time with it, he
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can probably handle two. Just keep a kind eye on him, and prime
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him for having an awesome wild time. Keep the lights low and
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encourage him to spend some time watching the inside of his
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eyelids.
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giv him 1 1/2...it's not that he'll have a bad trip...but it;s like
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having your feet swept out from underyou...it can be a big shock..trust
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me, my boyfriend has a very tight grip on reality and kept wanting
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to get back to the level of his first trip,..so he took 1, 1 1/4,
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and then one night 2 1/4.....he spent most of the night in panic,
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not knowing what was going on, how to deal with it,e tc....it can
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be a big shock
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[No real panic ensued, but he was starting to sketch when a friend who
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had dropped by for a while took him to the supermarket at three in the
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morning (over my objections!). Not a good thing...]
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Will you be doing this in the evening? Do you have a quiet, dark
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closet somewhere? Suggest to your friend that he check in to such a space
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for a few minutes and enjoy the show on the inside of his eyelids. One hit
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of the strength you describe should be adequate.
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[We were inside most of the time, at night, mainly because there wasn't
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much "outside" where we live, and it was a very dark night]
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If your acid is not strong enough to induce visuals 2 hits should
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not be too much. You caould also have your 4 friends take 1 and 1/2
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each at the start. I use to do this sort of thing. And then if it's
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not enough after and hour and a 1/2 take another 1/4 or 1/2. But make
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sure you wait at least that long, 'cause the lag time is considerable.
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Now, my other question:
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2) Speaking from experience, I know that while tripping even looking at
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a piece of graph paper can entertain for hours, but I was hoping I could
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help create a mood at this Acid-Test that would help heighten the experience.
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I already have the music - the Orb, possibly Pink Floyd, maybe some techno
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if we feel really energetic... but I was wondering what sort of visuals and
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toys would be great (and really cheap, too). I already have Fractint as a
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possibility, as well as a number of computer screen-drawers such as
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O-My-God. I also know from experience that TV can be a really jarring
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experience, but I was thinking maybe there might be something that I
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could rent that would flip some lids, like a David Lynch film or something.
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Remember, the keyword is cheap, household, etc....
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Replies:
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cheap toys? we got a whole closet of them...k-mart is a mecca of fun..
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here's just a quick list--
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64 box of crayons and big sheets of paper
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finger paitns
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slime
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kaledioscopes
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dragon lenses
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pinwheels
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bubbles
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tinfoil (crinkle it up and see what the wrinkles form)
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sponge cubes painted with fluorescent paint
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books of optical illusions
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a ball of yarn unravelled (fun to get tangeld up in)
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whipped cream (fun to stick your fingers in)
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shiny junk jewelry
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patterned clothing (paisely, tie dye, etc)
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black light bulb
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[bubbles worked well, so did crayons. We got flourescent markers and
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crayons and went nuts (he had brought a flourescent lamp)]
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food is important too....you get the munchies and it's fun to play with--
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[One of my friends couldn't taste a thing, while the other was going nuts
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over the bubbles in a glass of Sprite.]
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music--
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the orb is good [YES YES YES YES!!!]
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klf-- chill out [Not bad, it's good when you're coming down]
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anything by negativeland [A little rough for us; too choppy]
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soundtrack to the last temptation of christ (passion by peter gabriel)
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childhood records- mr rogers, sesame street,e tc
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movies-- depending on your attention span...this weekend i nearly went
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edgyand whiny because fantasia was sooooo long
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the grinch who stole x-mas
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the mind's eye-- a video availiable at raedio shack and blockbuster taht
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is computer generated graphics
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[Mind's Eye was GREAT!!! It's a nonstop medley of computer video images;
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not talking heads going on and on about their new piece of SGI equipment.
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Very flowing, lots of movement, which was great.]
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tapes of collected very old cartoons (ones from the 50s are great)
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[Ren and Stimpy was SCARY.] [As usual.]
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children's movies
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don't get the wall or anything depressing or that has death...everyone will
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be very upset
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My advice: Avoid Pink Floyd
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No, I'm not flaming the music. I like the music.
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However, I find much of it to be quite depressing.
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Not the type of thing to screw with on acid.
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My main advice would be to make it less a pre-planned, psych. lab
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type of experience. If they feel like going outside, get 'em up to
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Tilden Park to look at the stars. Or just turn the lights off and
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let them focus on their own thoughts; if you're bombarded with
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sensory input, you often don't have the focus to make the kind of
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intellectual insights that are the real value of an acid trip.
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Also, don't make it too serious. The oddest things can be
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deleriously funny on acid. I once spent a half an hour dosed with
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friends listening to a muzak station on the radio and cackling
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hilariously. All those saccharine trivializations of rock songs
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(Stairway to Heaven) seem so much more absurd.
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Toys: K-Mart has, in the party section, six packs of various fun things
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for kids. Most of them make good trip toys as well. My favorite is
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a set of different lenses that look like dragonfly eyes etc, and make
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multiple images. Another fun thing is diffraction glasses. You look
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goofy, but there are neat effects you can see with them while tripping.
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Rentals: Two recommendations, _The Mind's Eye_ (should be able to get from
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blockbuster) and _Fantasia_. I also have some Psychic TV videos, but they
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are hard to find and expensive.
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Computer stuff: Fractint is good, but can get boring, because it's so
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complex and you have to do lots of stuff to make it look interesting.
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Something simpler, like the Satori portion of After Dark (a screen saver)
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would be better.
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Music: the KLF is excellent, especially things like _Chill Out_. Other
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ambient house (like the Orb) would be good. The newest Orb single is
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excellent trip music, but will run you over $20, since it's an import.
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[The Blue Room is BEAUTIFUL. Towers of Dub seemed as little too choppy for
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us. Acid house and more creative Techno (Orbital, Give Peace a Dance Vol.
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2 and 3, Hypnotone's album) worked great.]
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A cheap toy that's a guaranteed winner:
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Get a bowl, fill it half full or so with corn starch or
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potato starch; add water until the starch is all wet, but
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don't make it too watery. This makes a VERY weird
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substance that will freak you out cold sober. Give it
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to your pals when they start to peak, and they won't
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believe it.
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[Didn't get to try this.]
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Let me see... _The Mind's Eye_ is a computer animation video that you can
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get at Radio Shack (ack!), which a lot of my friends tripped to last
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semester. I was high on life at the time (:-) but it was really cool.
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Other toys that I like: candles, mini-maglights (a type of flashlight,
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indispensible), kaleidoscopes, koosh-balls, any sort of stone with intricate
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patterns, Fractint (now that you mentioned it, it is great, but have the
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.gifs ready, generating on the fly is too slow for me), bubbles, especially
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the huge ones.
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Of course, you never know what some people will like. That same night, I
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had people feeling my hair, and going nuts over a cafeteria style cup.
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HMMMM...
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My personal favorite though, is nature. Trees, shrubs, the sky, stars,
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flowers... get outside if there is a nice (harmless) environment to wander
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though. School is great for me, we have 6 campuses together, and a few of
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them are beautiful.
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Write back with any other responses you get, or the results of your friends'
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trips. Oh, one awesome piece of listening - Negativeland! Truly bizarre,
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take my word on it. Designed with LSD in mind I would believe. Not really
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music, just sound effects with weird dialogs, if I remember right. Check it
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out!
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Have yet to try LSD, but if you're looking for mind-fucking movies, then
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definitely Lynch's Eraserhead is a major idea. Or Jacob's LAdder.
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[I wasn't EVEN going to try this. I've seen Jacob's Ladder. You don't
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need to be on anything to get the wind knocked out of you by this film.]
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[Thumbs down!]
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Don't rent a David Lynch film. While I am a D.L. fan, I do not
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reccomend him on acid. I watched Wild at Heart while coming down, and
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the violence really bothered me.
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[Agreed. And basically trying to follow ANY plot becomes difficult.]
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Set and setting. Your main job, I think, will be taking care of
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all the details that your friends will be too preoccupied to
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think about. Or rather, you don't want them thinking about the
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grand plan behind the stereo wiring... Keep the atmosphere safe.
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Turn the phone off, or the answering machine on "destroy" mode.
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Clean the bathroom. Don't turn on bright lights-- candles are
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good.
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Choose music that your trippers like, first of all. I would
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tend to choose calmer, more "textural" music-- Eno instead of
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the Buzzcocks, the Orb instead of whistley techno. Be careful
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about the emotional tone of the music. Your friends are going
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to be very suggestible & emotionally open.
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Some fun cheap toys:
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a black light and fluorescent crayons
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marbles, especially the big clear kind
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glow-sticks
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kaleidoscopes
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Fischer-Price letter magnets
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a Scrabble set... try playing in the early stages
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Expensive toys:
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plasma globe
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Visual stuff:
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Max Ernst's "Frottages"
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spirals
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op-art patterns
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We have a book of 3D mazes which is also fun.
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Animals are fun. Definitely coax the cat in to get fussed over,
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if a cat lives in the house you'll be using. Some friends with
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snakes & lizards once trotted them out to get looked at. If
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lizards don't make your friends nervous, they might enjoy the
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patterns on the skin.
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[My animals were afraid of _us_. Oh well :]
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If the neighbors aren't going to get annoyed, and you have
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access to musical instruments, let them bang around on them.
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A guitar with a phaser or flanger is fun.
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Fractint is probably a good idea. If you have access to a
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color Macintosh, the After Dark module "Satori" is astounding.
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I'm told that Sonic the Hedgehog is also a lot of fun.
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[Fractint was amazing. Color-cycling for an hour.]
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Video/TV/movies: I've never been interested in watching tv,
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though people tell me that they get into MTV. Fractal videos
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*are* fun, though. Todd Rundgren's "GrokGazer". And if any
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of you are wealthy enough to have a video camera, video feedback
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is fun. We had one with a "NOT" button, that inverted the color.
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Beautiful chaotic patterns... which we wisely taped for future
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viewing.
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You'll discover why those grotesque tye-dye shirts are soooo
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popular :-) Seriously, art books with abstract patterns are
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very fun.
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[yes, and simple, black and white illustrations were just as cool, if not
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more, than real busy photos]
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---
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Fractint is _great_ to look at. Great! I've never tripped, but I showed
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a friend that program when she was tripping, and she didn't want me to
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trun it off. Even the next day, she wanted to see it.
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Anything that catches your eye is a good idea. Anything that looks as if
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it might spin is good. Mirrors are good, but that can make a half bad
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trip into hell ("My skin! What's cralwing all over my skin!").
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[The other two, like most people, have a self-esteem on the low side, and
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looking in a mirror didn't help that]
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Also, one of the _best_ thinks around is a poster by Susan Sendon Buleat
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(sp last name), Go to your local magik/spiritual/occult store and ask
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for her, and you'll get a poster. $5 max. great stuff. Her stuff looks
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like a person, but, wait, is she an eagle? Or a tiger? Her eyes look
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like a at, but her nose and forhead look like a bird! But she's a woman!
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Wait a sec! :-)
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Fractint is just great. On the other hand, you probably won't have
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the attention span to watch a film... unless you were just planning it as
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a backdrop. But David Lynch? You said you have a novice among you - do
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you really want to play with paranoia? I think Dennis Hopper would be a
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bit much.
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GO OUTSIDE!
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Toys and music are fun, but I think that's something to be reserved later, when
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the trip has been going on for a long time. I love being outside, parks are
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especially nice, but if these people are novices I think avoiding crowds is a
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good thing. Just remember to tell them that really, no one will know. (You
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always think that people know you're tripping but they don't)
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Also, if one person took it, and it lasted for only 4 and a half hours w/o vis
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auls (this was one hit?) then 1 and a half or 2 is definately my
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recommendation.
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If there's any nervous moments, tell them that it's really nothing to worry
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about. The key is that you HAVE control. If you want to look at your hand and
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it appears swollen and wierd and nnot your own, you could be frightened, but if
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you choose to look at it and realize how amazing it is (think of everything th
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at your hand can do) then, suddenly, nothing is frightning.....
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Anyway....have a good time! BTW some toys are quite entertaining!
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Prisms especially. Sometimes kalidiscopes too.
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One of my favorites id to listen to Surrealistic Pillow -- That
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Jefferson Airplane 1969 sound was made for acid. Also, old Frank Zappa
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(We're Only in it for the Money (original mix please)). Note that I
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was 8 when this stuff was coming out, but it's superior trip music.
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Those with true cerebral fortitude can try Captain Beefheart's Trout
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Mask Replica -- I never understood the words to this album until I
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dropped and heard it.
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Visual toy to die for:
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This kept a roomful of people happy for about 5 hours one time (but
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it was a considerable dose -- mega visual).
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We had a hanging lamp in the middle of the room -- from a long cord
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we hung one of those round multio-faceted cut-glass baubles. Then just
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at the center where it was hung we put a lit candle. When we swung the
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crystal in a circle we could wath 4 or 5 little balls chasing each
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other around a glowing central sun. When the facets made prismatic
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flashes, the remained hanging in the air before our fried retinas, so
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that the ball(s) seemed to be following a bright track with rainbow
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speckles.
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Have fun -- trippers can be amusing companions. Then again, one of
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my favorites is just to sit in the dark with "special music" your
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cortex can construct a pretty good atmosphere all on its own.
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Try video games! Flight Simulator is great while tripping,
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but on a less technical note the advanced "Space Invaders"-type
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games can amuse for hours.
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A movie I find relaxing, visually stimulating, and enjoyable,
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on or off acid, is "Yellow Submarine" by the Beatles. You get
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the feeling the Beatles deliberately wrote much of the
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animation for their tripping buddies in the real world, all
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the way from the Blue Meanies to PepperLand. Your local video
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rental place should have it.
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As for toys, since LSD enhances the senses (or at least
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distorts them) use of simple toys with wild designs and
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textures works great for tripping. I suggest: Koosh Balls,
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kalediscopes (the real kind, though the computer kind works
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too), rubber balls, orange concentrate eaten WITHOUT dilution,
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lightsticks, Christmas tree lights, strobe lights; anything
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with a strange texture, wild pattern, or weird light. $5 will
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get you enough trip toys in any variety store for a 12-hour
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trip, and be sure to stop by the grocery store for interesting
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foods!
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----
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A personal favorite of mine is camping. If you're not in the mood for work,
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just make it real low-impact (bring a longburning fireplace log, water, food,
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lawn chairs, etc). I've had some incredible experiences sitting by the campfire
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listening to music and staring into the flames...
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Incidently, I almost always prefer the outdoors for tripping, whether
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camping or not. Walls get me down :)
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Mostly great recommendations. The acid test itself could have been better,
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but there were two main things wrong: when two of the four trippers cancelled,
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it put a damper on the rest of us; and all three of us decided we liked
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tripping with lotsa people around. Secondly, we were going into this expecting
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the drug to be the main focus of our entertainment, whereas we should have
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just tried to focus on doing something else really actively, and letting the
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drug just alter our experience of that other activity.
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Also, I have a small 10mw laser, so my friend decided to rent a fog machine
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to see how it looked. It looked WONDERFUL, especially when we played around
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with this crystal candlestick holder in the laser beam, causing all these
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insane angles. GREAT stuff. (I was always manning the laser so they would try
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to look up into the tube or anything ...)
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Again, thank you all for the suggestions!!!
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Brian
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