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It’s definitely Fall, going on Winter now, and that means less outdoor hangouts and more indoor get-togethers. This doesn’t have to mean smoking less weed, it just changes when, how, what or how you consume cannabis. The only things that need to change with the seasons are your dispensary etiquette and weed etiquette for cannabis socialization.
There’s definitely a lot of nasty habits we develop over the dog days of summer – taking sky high puffs and passes, leaving ashes on patios, forgetting to finish your edibles, or spilling the cannabis oils on the floor. Does this sound like good weed smoking etiquette? Heck no!
What’s your idea of etiquette at a dispensary? Do your buying habits change in colder weather? When’s the last time you sought to upgrade your weed part etiquette to make sure you’re helping your fellow stoners, and not harshing their mellow? Let’s discuss the latest & greatest for weed smoking etiquette in 2023 and beyond.
Dispensary Etiquette
Let’s start off with the do’s and don’ts of etiquette at your favorite dispensary. Dispensary etiquette is very simple: don’t touch the goods unless you’re told you can, and try to be patient with the budtenders while they service your weed needs. This is a little too simplistic, so we’ll elaborate:
Boundaries
Let’s talk about boundaries – not something we take lightly, but they often go unsaid or unnoticed, especially in retail spaces. Customers are very fond of “trying the goods before buying” and sifting through all of their available options, which can take up a lot of time and energy from dispensary employees. This isn’t a bad thing – as you’ll see in the later sections of dispensary etiquette, asking questions is a very integral part of the cannabis experience. That being said, it falls on we the customers to have tact, respect and awareness of the dispensary’s orderliness, cleanliness and good vibes.
If we’re hanging around dispensaries all day trying little nugs of this, an edible of that, picking up and putting things down in wrong areas, all the while taking up space for serious customers who need weed for medical ailments, then we’re not really puff-puff-passing as much as we are over-lipping the roach.
Boundaries are important with staff at dispensaries, as well as our fellow customers. If you’ve got some nugget of information about a certain cannabis product that might help someone, then by all means share it. However, if you’re just trying to look or sound smart with your infinite wisdom for all things marijuana, then it’s probably best to be like a vape cloud and be silent & dissipate.
Patience
What’s another thing customers are very fond of? Taking up a ton of time without even buying anything. These points are all well within the rights of the customer, but it behooves the entire cannabis industry for customers to know enough about these plants we smoke, eat and rub on before stepping into a store.
Knowledge of plant types, cannabinoids, terpenes, product features and more can help to save you and the store employees a lot of time in your quest to get the best cannabis for you. It’s well within the bounds of dispensary etiquette to go into a store with no idea of what to buy – that’s why the store has employees, after all. What we’re advocating for best dispensary etiquette practices is to do some research ahead of time – this will only serve to help you get exactly what’s best for you, and it assists the dispensary employees in assisting you best.
Patience is also key when it comes to experimenting with different kinds of cannabis products. If something doesn’t make you feel quite how you wanted it to on the first go, don’t just move onto the next product and undo all that work the dispensary did in trying to find it for you. If at first weed doesn’t help you succeed, try to get fried again. Nobody likes a quitter, especially not the nugs you’re toking on – give them a chance to get to know you while you really get familiar with them.
Questions
Ask. Lots. Of. Questions? The more details you glean from the pros at your favorite dispensary, the better cannabis experience you’ll have. This is because you need to be as clear and detailed with budtenders as possible, for them to have any hope in matching you with some buds that suit your tolerances & preferences.
There are thousands upon thousands of cannabis strains to choose from, available in a multitude of product types, concentrations, flavors and textures. You don’t know what you like until you try it, so try not to let yourself be hung up on one particular strain forever – variety is the cannabis-spice of life, after all.
Even the most savvy budtenders can take a few swings at some strains with you before one hits a homerun. Cannabis affects every single person differently. What makes this even tougher is factors like our diets, fitness levels, moods or sleep patterns can further influence how a strain makes us feel one time to another. So, one of the golden rules of cannabis is:
Dose low, increase it slow, and get to know every kind of cannabis you can.
Indoor Weed Etiquette
Since we just finished talking about what goes on inside dispensaries in terms of etiquette, let’s not shift our focus to the rooftops and patios just yet. Staying inside the confines of a house party, business or our own homes, indoor weed etiquette can require a lot of self-control on our parts.
As much as today is a golden age for public ganja consumption, we still have to be cognizant of other peoples’ comfort whenever or wherever we’re imbibing our favorite healing herb. Here’s a few basic, but essential tips to maintaining good standing with the hosts/building managers when you’re a stoner:
Airflow
One of the most important factors to consider whenever you’re enjoying marijuana is airflow. The quickest way to get yourself kicked out of a building is to light one up indoors – the second someone coughs or complains about the smoke/vape/smells, you’re done for. Even if you’re in a stoner-friendly domicile, smoking indoors causes breathing problems for anyone not taking sky high puff-puff-passes.
Managing airspace is no easy gig, but it falls to every cannabis user to be responsible for the smoke, vape or fumes they put into the shared airways of everyone. Simple steps like blowing smoke out a window, going outside to toke up, or only vaping away from big groups of people indoors can earn you a lot of cred in any gathering.
If you’re dropping edibles or doing concentrates, then by all means go nuts! There’s no secondhand brownie crumbs issue, is there?! Taking into account where your smoke is going will only help you to have a better high – as we all know, when you leave people alone with your weed activities, they’ll leave you and your weed alone.
Sharing
The absolute best weed etiquette to exhibit indoors has to do with something that comes easy to most stoners: the sharing of the ganja. Sharing buds with friends or family is a true right of puff-puff-passage in most stoner circles. Anyone who isn’t fond of sharing the gift of their cannabis with others isn’t really a true stoner, are they? The plants are so generous and giving, so it makes sense that the people who consume them follow in their… flowersteps.
Proper weed smoking etiquette is pretty explicit about greed vs generosity – he/she who tokes only for themselves shalt not fly the highest… but he/she who so giveth of their sacred buds shall know all that the plants have to show them (or something like that).
Cannabis was meant to be shared and enjoyed together – it’s one of the reasons that weed makes us feel so good in social settings, because it’s where we’re meant to be. Cannabis plants bring people together, like the gardeners of the crop of humanity, every sky high puff-puff-pass sends us soaring through life, as a flock of ganja-geese. That’s some deep, high-flying stoner philosophy right there!
Comfort
Weed etiquette wouldn’t be complete without mentioning every stoner’s favorite words… well, second favorite words to “snacks”: comfort. Getting comfortable in your favorite chair, lying in a hammock, lazing on the grass, or stargazing from the hood of your truck can be equally comfortable – especially if you do them stoned! Cannabis must be an interdimensional word for “comfort”, because there’s nothing more comforting than a steady high with good tunes, good company and good weed.
Don’t forget, however, that comfort doesn’t just apply to you as an individual – comfort levels can shift in a group, or change depending on who you’re with and in what setting. Indoor weed etiquette requires us all to match comfort levels whenever possible. This might mean sacrificing a stronger dose of live resin than you’d prefer for something more low-key for the weed noobs of your group.
On the flip side, you can always go off on your own to suit your comfort needs/wants with cannabis. Many seasoned stoners have learned to appreciate the dynamics of social gatherings, until they don’t serve their best interests anymore. When you hit this wall, kindly excuse yourself and go find a quiet corner to relax in, or a piece of art to capture your swirling imagination, and be comfortable in your own space too.
Outdoor Weed Smoking Etiquette
Now to the kind of weed smoking etiquette we’re all built for: sharing, not-caring, and partaking of our favorite plants in the great outdoors. Whether you’re lounging on a rooftop restaurant, camping with your mates, or hosting the best damn buds-pong tournament on your newly renovated patio, cannabis just seems to be meant to be enjoyed outside.
That sounds all well and good, doesn’t it? Well, there’s still a code of conduct to be respected whenever we light up outdoors – especially if it’s summer and fire-season is in its full conflagrations! The following cover some of the main outdoor weed smoking etiquette rules that every stoner should know:
Safety
Let’s get this one out of the way first, because it really should go without saying. If you’re planning on lighting up your buds with your buds, you always have to do your lighter and butt checks – i.e. make sure you didn’t leave an open flame lying around, and make sure you put those joints or bongs out fully before leaving it out to the elements.
This can be tricky for some people when they get so high that they don’t even know where their hands end and the joint begins, but you have to be able to push through your slow reactions and hallucinations to keep yourself and others safe. A simple rule of thumbs for any smokable cannabis products being consumed outdoors: if it isn’t done, keep it with you for more fun. Stache your sativas, pocket your pot, and remember where you have your roaches, and you’ll likely never have a weed-fire scare.
Safety doesn’t just apply to preventing fires – obviously, the whole “getting high” thing can cause a decent amount of danger, at times. Outdoor weed etiquette means keeping yourself in check by constantly being aware of others’ safety at all times. This means a lot of things – depending on where you are, who you’re with, and how long you’re planning on being “one with nature”. The main takeaway for cannabis safety outdoors is to never push yourself past your tolerances – know your limits, and play within them, as the saying goes.
Setting
Setting is everything when you’re trying to host a killer kush party, but it’s also really important to create a safe, fun and memorable space for those stoners you’re having over. If you’re not hosting but sharing space with some campers or music festival goers, the same rules still apply: know your environment, the good and bad, and be prepared for anything when the THC kicks in.
Nature can provide one heck of a stoned experience when done right; when executed wrongly, getting stoned outside can lead to maiming or mayhem. You can’t control every little thing when you’re out in nature’s backyard, but you can plan ahead, communicate with others throughout your experience, and be sure to keep your eyes, ears and stomachs in-tune with the weird world around you.
You can’t always create the setting you want to get stoned in, but you can maintain a balance of fun-and-functionality if you are organized. Set ground rules, follow up with how your fellow trippers are doing, have access to plenty of water and snacks, and respect the awesome powers of the natural world – do this, and nature will take care of you.
Experience
To experience cannabis is to know the densities of the universe… To know thyself… To see between the gaps in reality… To experience true weed smoking etiquette is to be a part of a soul-family of psychonauts, all journeying together on this rock spinning through space. Whenever you can put yourself in someone else’s shoes at a cannabis party, it’s very rewarding to them and to you.
Appreciating one another’s unique relationships to cannabis can lend a lot of excitement, wisdom or efficacy to how we personally consume weed. Case in point, whenever someone busts out the edibles at an outdoor event, the night begins to crackle with the energy of possibilities. Even if you’re not an avid edibles user, when others partake of them as a group it makes us feel safer about the possibility of a shared cannabis experience. This is exactly what we’re after in this guide to dispensary and weed etiquette: when we share experiences with cannabis, we are tapping into something greater than our individual selves.
Cannabis truly brings people closer together in the shared pursuits of novel experiences, profound insights and dazzling realizations about life, love, light and the universe. What’s more powerful than these kinds of dizzying philosophies of mind, heart and soul?
We’ll still be waiting here for you while you try to figure out something more profound. Thanks for reading this guide to weed etiquette in 2023. Do your part, be the best stoner you can be, and keep puff-puff-passing your weed-wisdom on.
