Not so many years ago there was an explosion in cigar smoking that led to numerous cigar clubs opening across the U.S.; this year, 2013, may be the year of the pot club.
North of downtown Denver a new type of club has opened that caters to smokers of marijuana. Club 64 opened this past Monday with an initial membership of 200. The owners put out an announcement only 24 hours earlier that membership would be a mere $29.99 and you bring your own pot.
The club’s opening was much more popular than the owners could’ve hoped for with a large crowd gathering to revel in their drug induced state of euphoria.
With an air of 1920s opium dens these clubs have begun to pop up less than a month after Colorado’s governor signed into law a constitutional amendment allowing recreational use of marijuana. The name “Club 64” comes from the number of the state’s constitutional amendment.
Another club joined Club 64 as the first legal pot dens in the nation and many more are expected.
Colorado’s marijuana amendment prohibits public consumption and the state’s smoke-free laws ban indoor smoker gatherings; however Club 64 gets around these laws by neither selling marijuana nor allowing public access; membership is required to enter Club 64 and since members bring their own pot existing laws cannot deny members their right to recreational marijuana consumption.
The club also doesn’t reside in a fixed brick-and-mortar location. Each month members will gather at different locations and the membership fee is only good for a single event. The first “meeting” was held at a very 1960s hemp-based clothing store near downtown Denver. Clothing in the store was shoved out of the way to allow for tables as stoned members puffed away to a showing of the movie “The Big Lebowski.”
What, doesn’t anyone respect Cheech and Chong anymore?
While Club 64 doesn’t sell food, they did hand out sodas with their official snacks: Goldfish and Cheetos. These “official snacks” were inspired by Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper infamous statement, “don’t break out the Cheetos or Goldfish too quickly.” The only thing missing from the night was a few thousand bags of Doritos.
Corry said the pot clubs are intended for people who can’t use marijuana at home because of local ordinance or because their landlords threaten eviction.
“It’s just a place for adults to exercise their constitutional rights together,” one member said. “We’re not selling pot here.”
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to predict that Colorado will see a distinct drop in productivity as its population “mellows out.” Perhaps this will be a grand experiment, along with the other free-smoking state, Washington, to see what happens when the majority of the population of a state becomes pot-heads; yet one has to wonder how many Jeff Spicolis can one state have?
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