If you're a heavy cannabis user, you probably already know most of these, but I find them valuable never the less. Enjoy!
    1. Thou shalt not turn down a smoke. This is a definitive rule to live by. (Unless very good reason like driving, working, etc..)

    2. The person who rolls the joint (no matter whose pot it is) lights it up and gets the first hit, unless it is a big group and someone always gets left with the roach, next time give them the first toke.

    3. If someone rolls a nice joint, and if it is appropriate, give them a compliment.

    4. It is never cool to bogart the bowl, even if it IS your weed.

    5. If someone is too uncoordinated to light the bowl, they must relinquish the bowl to a more capable person.

    6. When it is your turn, take a hit and pass it on. Don't sit there and keep people waiting for a hit while you chat.

    7. If you smoke with someone in your house, you should let them eat some of the food you have lying around. Munchies happen, don't be cheap with your food.

    8. If someone does offer you food, don't pig out on it. They had to buy it and most people have better uses for their money. (Like buying more pot).

    9. If someone asks for a sip of your drink, you should give them one. (Cotton mouth is no fun).

    10. Converse of the above, if you ask for a sip, don't take a large gulp and leave them without.

    11. If smoking a joint don't duck-ass the J. (Don't put it in your mouth and get it all sopping wet.)

    12. If smoking from a bong and there's not enough in the bowl for another hit, you should save the smoke for the next person. Don't vent the carb and take it for yourself.

    13. NEVER, REPEAT NEVER bitch about someone's pot being no good. If you don't like it, don't smoke it!

    14. If a friend gets you high, return the favor. It's good karma.

    15. If you buy weed from a friend or a friend of a friend, it is polite to smoke some with them, to show you are not the 'old bill' etc...

    16. If a person passes on one round, do not assume they are passing on the next.

    17. It is very impolite to hand someone an empty bowl without, at least, notifying them of its status.

    18. The person who fills the bowl gets first hits. It doesn't matter whose bowl it is.

    19. Always thank a person who gets you high. ALWAYS!! It makes it all worthwhile for the person who got you like that.

    20. If you are smoking with two other people and are in the middle, you don't get a hit every time the joint passes you. Be fair.

    21. When using a bong, don't dribble down the tube.

    22. Again, when using the bong, don't blow out the ashes.

    23. Never go to someone's house expecting them to smoke you out.

    24. If you spill the bong, then you clean it up. (Don't forget to refill the water/ice).

    25. Do not be a bogart!

a few others:

  • on "sparks": if you elected yourself to light the joint/blunt, and more than one person paid for the weed within, don't be a greedy bastard about it. get it smokin', then get it goin'.
  • the cypher: don't break it, unless those around you don't mind. it's just not cricket to skip someone, especially if you don't know him or her well.
  • "just smoke it, yo": i'm usually guilty of this one. sometimes, i'll just be really baked and going into ALOT of detail about something, when suddenly, someone points out that i've been holding the joint for a good minute or so. try to keep track of where the burning stuff is and keep it movin'!
  • a suggestion: now, i dunno if this is just with the people i know, but generally, if you usually don't smoke weed, and someone gets you blazed, don't offer them money in payment for the amount of marijuana you smoked. if they smoked with you, they knew how much you were getting, and they don't care.

It's come to my attention recently (I was probably straight at the time), that many beginners don’t have the foggiest idea about the finer intricacies of pot etiquette. If you’re at the point where you have permanent brown indents on your thumb and index finger, this node’s probably not for you.

But for those of you who are new to the wide, wide world of marijuana, pay special attention to this node. It may just save your life! (Well, ok, probably not, but it will definitely save you much embarrassment with the older crowd.) And while I don’t necessarily condone younger kids smoking, I do have a thing about doing it properly.

We need to look at the whole in parts. So firstly, let's start with:

ROLLING 101:

First cardinal rule of pot rolling:

He who paid for the pot, has first dibs on who lights the joint, regardless of who rolled it. While there are exceptions to this rule (which we’ll get into in a moment), this is generally the given.

Cardinal rule #2:

If you can’t roll, don’t fake it. You’re not going to fool anyone with a stubbie. You will however, piss everyone off. Especially if it’s the end of the baggie.

If the roller is not the owner, the roller must offer it to the owner for first light. It is generally common courtesy for the owner to inspect the joint, possibly even comment on it, then pass it back to the roller to light. This is not mandatory, as it was (s)he who got off their ass in the first place to get the cash to pay for the pot, and if they want to light it, so be it. But generally, it is done this way.

If (s)he who paid for the pot rolled it as well, then generally he’ll spark it up, but may, if it’s a really nice roll, show it off first. Warning: Don’t boast too much because it just makes people cranky if they have to wait too long for you to light the damn thing. So show it off and spark it up.

Some folks (especially if your from the East coast where Hashish is much more prevalent) like to add a little bit of tobacco to a joint. Do NOT do this if it’s not your pot without asking the owner first. I cannot stress this enough. Even if you are the owner, proper etiquette says that you should ask the others in the group if this is acceptable. However, it is, your pot after all. All I can say is that if you’re going to put tobacco in regardless, at least warn everyone else.

Speaking of Easterners, because hashish is common in the East, many of us have made a habit of putting a filter made up of a thin strip of cardboard into the joint for easier burning. This is recommended regardless of what you’re smoking. Just take a small strip of cardboard, roll it up and stick it into the end. The filter should not be more than 1 cm (1/3 of an inch for those of you down South). Some people don’t like to use filters as it doesn’t give you much of a roach to save, so once again, if it ain’t your pot, ask first.

SMOKING 101

Cardinal rule #3:

A JOINT IS NOT A MICROPHONE!!!

For some reason, people feel that they must tell you their life history as soon as the joint is handed to them. This is an extreme no-no. Everyone understands that some people can only get others to listen to them if they’re center stage. That’s fine and dandy. Just find another way to do it. Talking while everyone else is standing around waiting for you to pass the damn joint will not win friends and influence people. It will, (you guessed it) PISS THEM OFF! Whatever it is you need to say can wait. Provided it’s not “holy shit man! Your shoe’s on fire!” (But this generally only happens when smoking hash because of the bits that fall off when smoking in the wind). If this does happen, it is definitely ok to say something at this point.

If there’s a run in the joint, fix it. But DON’T goober all over the thing. There is nothing grosser than getting the entire dube slick. A small amount of saliva will suffice. If you don’t think you can handle it, pass the joint when finished, but for heaven’s sake, let the next person know that there’s a run in it. No doubt he’ll see it anyway, but this way you show that you’re smart enough to know what a run is. Add a little surprise in your voice and it will appear as if you just noticed it. You’ll save a lot of face with this. People hate people who don’t fix runs.

PASSING 101

Ahh, passing, or the art thereof. While trying to explain how to pass off a joint properly is beyond the scope of this simple node, who to pass to can be just as important (provided you’re not standing in a field of manure, in which case, how is much more important than who. Anyway, I digress… (must be the pot).

Ok, so here it is. If you bought it and rolled it, pass to your best friend first. After that, it’s out of your hands (literally). Generally it will follow in the direction that it started in (unless there’s a drop dead hot girl on the other side of the circle, in which case it will go directly to her)… Then again, fuck your best friend and just pass it straight to her. If you rolled, but didn’t pay for it, you MUST pass it to the purchaser. If you’re just somewhere in the middle of all this, consider yourself lucky and just keep the order going.

Why is who it goes to so important? Simply because, and this depends upon how many of you there are, someone always loses out on the last toke. While this in general sucks, it really bites if you’re the one and you paid for it! This brings us to another issue:

How many tokes do I take at a time?

This is trickier then it seems. There are so many factors to take into account. Firstly, how many people in the group? How big is the dube? Is there a bag o’ plenty, or is it the only dube? If you take too much, someone loses out and you look like the fool. If you take too little, there may not be another round, and you lose out. So what to do? Well, hopefully you were good at math before you dropped out of school to smoke pot all the time. If so, use basic algebra. D x P / T=???? Still confused? Me too. Just take a good set of tokes and pass the damn thing.

And Lastly:

No matter how small the roach, whether there’s a filter or not, you MUST pass it to the next guy. Let him be the one to snuff it out, or eat it, or whatever the Hell it is you guys (and girls) do with your roaches. Just make sure you’re not the one to make the call (unless of course, it’s your dube to begin with).

These rules may seem extreme, or bizarre, or both. Doesn’t matter. Follow them and in no time people will be flocking to your door to smoke you up. Guaranteed. Trust me.

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