Journalist Bruce Barcott was a legal marijuana skeptic. Conditioned by decades of “Just Say No” and Reefer Madness-style anti-pot propaganda–and influenced by his own desultory experience with the drug and those who use it–he initially opposed Initiative 502, the piece of legislation that brought grass into the mainstream in Washington State. Once the new regulations passed (with his grudging support) he became increasingly curious about the effects the new freedom would have on the present and future of his home state.

Barcott embarked on a kind of cannabis katabasis, journeying into the underworlds of growers, sellers, and smokers, with stops among the cops, lawyers, and politicians that have fed a prison industry fat from marijuana-related convictions. In the end, Barcott emerged with (somewhat) changed opinions and an engaging, wide-ranging, and funny book: Weed the People: The Future of Legal Marijuana in America. 

Throughout the course of his travels, he picked up many strange souvenirs, accessories, and bits of indispensable weed wisdom. He shares a few of them here.

White Lighters, Sweet Hoodies, and Other Swag I Find Myself Left With

A List of 7 Curious Items Foisted upon Me and Otherwise Acquired During the Making of Weed the People, by Bruce Barcott

In November 2012, I faced a voting ballot at home in Washington State with an initiative that had me stumped. Marijuana legalization: Yes or no? I didn’t like pot, hadn’t touched it since college, and had concerns about legalization’s potential effects on my two teenage kids. In the end, I held my nose and voted yes. History changed. I spent the next two years chronicling that history, probing the history and science of marijuana, examining the politics of today’s legalization movement and taking a deep dive into the emerging legal pot industry. The result: Weed the People, a book about one writer’s search for truth, justice, context, sanity and a way to talk to my kids about pot using actual facts. Along the way I collected a few souvenirs that people thrust upon me and, in the moment, I found no way to decline without appearing rude. During my coming book tour, I will dispense many of these items to a few lucky readers of legal age.

Branded T-shirts

In the 70s, children wore beer and tavern T-shirts to elementary school. I knew kids whose entire wardrobe seemed to consist of Primo Beer T-shirts and Mexican hoodies from Hussong’s Cantina. At the time, these were considered acceptable attire. That is no longer the case. And so I find myself, at the end of my two-year journey into the world of legal marijuana, with a box full of unwearable T-shirts advertising cannabis stores, medical dispensaries, ancillary brands and edible products. Marijuana may be legal in Colorado and Washington (and now Oregon, Alaska, and Washington, D.C.), but legality didn’t changed social mores overnight. Culturally, pot isn’t beer. In my hometown it would take a brass pair to wear a marijuana T-shirt into the local grocery store. You won’t catch my 13-year-old son strolling into math class togged in a tee advertising a Denver weed emporium. Yet everywhere I went on my reporting journey, people threw T-shirts at me. Some days it seemed as if two or three struck me in the face as I walked through the dispensary door.

O.pen Vape pens

I think I acquired these little gems (third and fourth from the left in photo) at a private party that closed an investment meeting or an industry conference. In 2014 vape pens were all the rage, and dozens of brands tried to capture market share. Only O.pen Vape seemed to rise to level of mainstream recognition. But I was never sure how to speak of the device. Was it an O.pen Vape? Or an Open Vape pen? The whole thing was confusing. The pen itself wasn’t confusing in the least, however. The company’s sleek, Apple-worthy design made the O.pen one of the few truly beautiful products to emerge from the legal cannabis industry.

Jar of Kush Cream

Early in the book I spend some time with the founding partners at Privateer Holdings, a $70 million private equity firm that invests in the legal cannabis industry. One day they heard a pitch from the owners of Kush Creams, a craft-scale producer of cannabis-infused topical creams. Megan and Ben, the owners, left some samples with us. Privateer partner Brendan Kennedy took a couple of jars to his wife, Pacific Northwest Ballet principal dancer Maria Chapman, who explained that she used it on her ankles as an analgesic and anti-inflammatory. It helped her ease the pain without putting ever more Advil into her system. I took a jar home and, months later, tried it on my creaky knee. It actually worked. Now I keep a jar in my gym bag with my hockey gear, and sometimes I rub a little on my knee before yoga. My wife calls it “the pot cream.”

Cannabis Cup hoodie

Melanie Holland, the media director for Denver’s 2014 Cannabis Cup, guided me through the dabbing zones and into the backstage warrens of that epic stoner state fair. “This your first Cannabis Cup?” she asked. I nodded. “You might get a contact high,” she warned. I didn’t, but I did walk away with this sweet, sweet hoodie, which Melanie tossed to me on my way out the door. As with the T-shirts, rare is the occasion for which this garment seems suitable for a gentleman of a certain age. That’s not to gainsay its undeniable awesomeness. I mean, look at that… er… smoking eagle grasping two fat flowers of kine bud in its talons. Not to mention the Snoop-worthy goblet filled with same on the hoodie’s front. This is a quality article of clothing. It’s just not one I am able to wear in public.

Child-resistant zip bag

Meet Ross Kirsch, the cannabis packaging king. Or on-his-way-to-becoming-the-king. Kirsch is an ancillary-products entrepreneur. He doesn’t grow weed. He doesn’t sell weed. He makes the bags you take it home in. When Colorado regulators demanded “child resistant” packaging for retail marijuana products, Kirsch spotted a niche waiting to be filled. He hatched a new design—note the green interlocking clasps—pitched investors, deposited their checks and caught the next flight to China, where he perfected the zipper at a factory in Guangdong. I was there the day he pitched, and rode in the cab with Kirsch on his way to catch the Air China flight. When I next saw him a few months later, he was delivering pallets of the bags to cannabis retailers in Denver.

Rodawg joint tin

Now that you’ve rolled four tight, state-legal joints, how are you supposed to secure them in your suit pocket or purse? Here’s the answer: the Rodawg joint tin. It’s like an Altoids tin after a 30-day cleanse-and-slim. The clasp closure makes a seal that traps most of the smell, and there’s a little custom bed inside to snug today’s cone-shaped doobies.

White cigarette lighters

One day C&C Cannabis Company founder Pete O’Neil gave me two C&C branded lighters because “apparently we made a mistake and ordered white lighters,” he said. “Which you’re not supposed to do. That’s a thing. Did you know that’s a thing?” I shook my head. Among the cannabis cognoscenti, white lighters are bad luck—like really bad. According to urban legend, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain were supposedly in possession of white lighters when they were found dead. They were probably wearing socks, too, but nobody goes around whispering, Dude, you know about socks, right? Anyway. White lighters. They’re a thing.