"LSD helps alcoholics to give up drinking"

Let's assume that the findings which the BBC reports are true, this would make the perfect question for Question Time or that awful programme on BBC1 on Sunday morning at 10 o'clock where panellist and audience alike compete to be the most judgmental and prejudiced, the question being "Do you think it would be a good idea to treat alcoholics with the occasional LSD tab?"

There'll be bonus points for the first member of the panel to say "binge drinking epidemic", "vulnerable" or "I've seen the harm which illegal drugs cause to communities" and suchlike shite.

Short Lists

Thanks to those who made suggestions for last week's Short List (towns in different countries with similar sounding names).

Onus Probandy now submits this teaser:

"A famous old joke: "What's brown and sticky? A stick".

Ha ha. Now, this joke relies on a special property of the word "stick" and the adjective "sticky". Normally, that "y" suffix to a noun makes the adjective mean "like the noun"; but in the case of stick it has a secondary meaning, making the joke possible.

The short list I'm after (and I have no definitive answers) is the list of words that share this property. They don't have to be funny. e.g. "What's white and cloudy? A cloud" would not qualify, because the adjective means "noun-y". "

I guess it's the sort of thing that will drive you mad if you actively try and think of one - by going through every adjective ending with "y" and working backwards - but maybe one or two will spring to mind.

PS, £-s-d stands for "pounds, shillings and pence" and can also be pronounced "LSD", not to be confused with lysergic acid diethylamide, of course.

That whole 'legalising drugs' thing

Mummylonglegs stepped up to the oche, and I left a comment as follows (repeated here for posterity):

Completely agreed. And with drugs, there is a sliding scale, and I would suggest legalisation as follows:

1. Magic mushrooms - available from any greengrocer who can tell a poisonous mushroom from an edible one.

2. Mild cannabis - available from normal tobacconist/off-licence, over-18s only.

3. Ecstasy - available only at chemists, max. two tablets per customer Fridays and Saturdays only, over-18s only.

4. Cocaine - same as ecstasy - max. 1 gram per customer.

5. LSD - same as ecstasy, two tabs per customer but with six monthly renewable certificate from psychiatrist to say you are not nuts.

5. Heroin for injection - available with monthly repeat prescription from doctor at pharmacists.

6. Crack, still illegal, obviously.

And so on, I'm sure I've missed a few, but you just slot them in. All of these to be taxed like booze or fags, to be handed out with tedious leaflets with helpful advice for safe use and an admonishing glare.

[Modest] Outbreak of commonsense in Mexico

From The Metro:

Mexico has relaxed its drug laws, allowing people to possess small amounts of cannabis, cocaine or heroin for personal use.

Free government treatment for drug addicts is also promised under new regulations that come into force today. The law sets out maximum "personal use" amounts for drugs, also including LSD and methamphetamine. People found with no more than the limits allow will no longer face criminal prosecution - but if caught for a third time will be forced into treatment.

Under previous law, possessing any amount of drugs was punishable by stiff jail sentences, but there was some leeway for addicts caught with smaller amounts.

But Bernardo Espino del Castillo, from the attorney general's office, said in practice no one was prosecuted and sentenced to jail for small-time possession. "We couldn't charge somebody who was in possession of a dose of a drug, there was no way, because the person would claim they were an addict," he added, "This person obviously couldn't be charged, not yesterday, not the day before, not a year ago, but the bad thing was that it was left up to the discretion of the detective, and it could open the door to corruption or extortion."

Officers sometimes hauled suspects to police stations and demanded bribes, threatening long jail sentences if people did not pay.

"This is not legalisation, this is regulating the issue and giving citizens greater legal certainty for a practice that was already in place," Espino del Castillo added.

The maximum amount of marijuana considered to be for "personal use" under the new law is 5g - the equivalent of about four joints. The limit is half a gram for cocaine, enough for about four lines, while the other restrictions are 50mg of heroin, 40mg of methamphetamine and 0.015mg of LSD.

Horizon: Is Alcohol worse than Ecstasy?

I had to nip to the loo (two cans of lager and Horizon's on the BBC, so no ad-breaks) and pop upstairs (to get another half ounce of Old Holborn and some more Rizlas), so I missed the statistics on cocaine users and deaths therefrom*, but I'm still surprised that they put in Heroin** at number 1. If I scribbled it down correctly, they said 300,000 users, and despite the fact that these poor people are peddled the worst adulterated filth, nowhere near proper pure medicinal heroin, it only causes 700 deaths a year. That's one-in-four-hundred users.

As opposed to Heroin-substitute Methadone*** at number 4 with 33,000 users and 295 deaths, and apparently it doesn't even give you a buzz. And it's a pissy green colour.

* Did this include crack-cocaine? Now that's nasty stuff, that is.
** ^TM Bayer AG, ca. 1897
*** ^TM Hoechst AG, ca. 1938

Update: full list here.