Mind if I Smoke, Dude?

I will never understand marijuana smokers. I've never smoked pot in my life--never inhaled (which I guess disqualifies me from ever running as President as a Democrat)--so I have no idea what compels people to do it. I just bring it up because of two incidents over the weekend.

The first was Saturday night at the U2 concert in Chicago. Someone in our section decided they would light up during the show. We were downwind of this person--so the smoke kept wafting over us. All I could think about was how the odor might be sticking to my clothes and what people are going to think when they could smell it on me during the bus and train ride home after the show. "Did you smell that guy with the Wisconsin Badgers gear on?" they would say to one another. "He must have been totally baked."

I know I shouldn't be surprised that someone was smoking marijunana at a rock concert--but nearly everyone in our section was old. I mean thirty-five and up. Don't you eventually give up on the teenage rebellion of getting high and move on to more mature things--like seven dollar cups of beer? Can any of these middle-aged stoners tell me anything great they have done while high? Was the music somehow better after you lit up? It's time to give up the weed and join the rest of us at the adult table now.

I also am curious as to why at every Packers home game someone is arrested for possession of marijuana inside Lambeau Field. Pot at a concert I can sort of understand--but at a professional football game? I wonder what the game starts looking like after the second or third joint. Maybe the stress of a close pre-season game with the Cleveland Browns is too much for those fans to handle. And how do you think that you can get away with smoking that without anyone noticing? I guess it makes those six-dollar hot dogs taste better--as you eat three of them to "cure" the munchies.

The real problem lieswithin the pot culture itself. I've been at a court hearing where a witness on the stand got into an argument with an attorney about the legality of smoking marijuana. The man had witnessed a murder. The defense attorney asked him if he had been lighting up that night--and the witness admitted he had been. The attorney asked him if he knew that was illegal. The guy said smoking pot isn't illegal. The attorney said "It's not?"--to which the witness replied "Possession of pot is illegal--and selling pot is illegal--but smoking it isn't illegal." As you might expect in a room full of legal experts--the laughter was difficult to stifle.

So smoke 'em if you got 'em pothead--apparently you think it's legal and acceptable anywhere. Just don't do it anywhere around me, please.