Scientific American gives an excellent report on carfentanil, a massively powerful opiate, and they describe the chemical and what steps are being taken to bring addicts out of an overdose but it's extremely difficult due to the power of the drug. (Scientific American: Wave of Overdoses with Little-Known Drug Raises Alarm Amid Opioid Crisis)
The article describes the drug but it's sufficient to summarize that here as it's an elephant tranquilizer. Who knew it was even possible to tranquilize an elephant but this is the stuff to do it.
There is further information in the article about the lack of benefit from Narcan because carfentanil in combination with heroin binds opiate receptors in the brain so strongly the Narcan may not be powerful enough to help.
Additionally, they describe efforts by the states to increase abilities to deal with this drug which seems relatively recently introduced to the street as an extreme booster for heroin.
Notably absent from the article is where the dealers get it. I'm reluctant to google how to make it because that invites a SWAT team to break down the door and shoot me. Nevertheless, it's important because we need to know if carfentanil is as easy to make as meth or what. Is it possible to crank this out from Jim Bob's Trailer Park Meth Lab or does it take sophisticated techniques. If the latter then what is the source which provides so much of it that it's sufficient to require whatever minimal valid need exists for the drug and also to supply the street.
"Black man don't own no jetplanes. How does it get here?" - "Boyz in the Hood"
During a life which has featured substantial drug abuse, I never knew anyone who got addicted to heroin until the last few years and my history goes back to 1965. Something I saw early in my malcontented life was a couple of people spiking something and it might have been heroin but I did not ask and watched in horror (they weren't that close and we were just hanging out).
The thing which horrified me right off the top was they didn't just stick the spike into one arm as they would do one and then the other, maybe afterward switching back to the first. They didn't actually shoot any of the drug each time but rather they teased themselves with the pain and I've had some major lessons in my life but that one I can see as if it happens right now. That memory has never faded.
Something which may well have insulated me to some extent is I usually don't much hear the lyrics of a song as anything more than melody. When it's as dramatic as "The Pusherman" by Steppenwolf, they're almost impossible to miss but I remembered yesterday another one which was a staple for the Jelly Pudding days of WEBN 102.7 in Cincinnati (i.e. definitely sixties).
Cream featured Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker and "Spoonful" was part of the live recording for "Wheels of Fire" for which the song ran for almost twenty minutes. "Wheels of Fire" was the height of Cream's evolution since Clapton has often reformed his bands over the years so he could keep pursuing the dream in always new ways.
Lyrics have not usually been that interesting to me since most could have been written by snapping turtles but the lyrics to "Spoonful" were important for exactly the reason Lotho has described previously. "Wheels of Fire" is definitely sixties and not some vague dark future.
Review the lyrics for yourself and it's clear they're talking about love but it isn't for a woman. The same is true for "Crystal Ship" by The Doors as that one was about drugs too but it was crafty and that sneaked past a whole lot of people. Just as with "Spoonful," I didn't realize until some time after what they really said.
I'm not sure how influential these lyrics really were since that kind of deep drug abuse was in the deepest underculture where most really didn't want to go, if we even knew it existed. There's no waffling on culpability as my only purpose is to relate my experience and you can make of it what you will.
"Spoonful"
Note: the transcription of the lyrics has multiple relatively-simple errors so maybe that task was done by someone for whom English is a second language.
Could fill spoons full of diamonds,
Could fill spoons full of gold.
Just a little spoon of your precious love
Will satisfy my soul.
Men lies about it.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies about it.
Everything's a-fightin' about the spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Could fill spoons full of coffee,
Could fill spoons full of tea.
Just a little spoon of your precious love;
Is that enough for me?
Men lies about it.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies about it.
Everything's a-fightin' about the spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Could fill spoons full of water,
Save them from the desert sands.
But a little spoon of your forty-five
Saved you from another man.
Men lies.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies.
Everything's a-fightin' about it.
Everything's a-cryin' about it.
Everything's a-diein' about it.
Everything's a-cryin' about it.
Everything's a-liein' about it.
Little old, little old spoonfull.
Die'n about it
Cryin about it
That spoon, that spoon
Little old, little old spoonfull
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Everything's a-diein' about it.
The article describes the drug but it's sufficient to summarize that here as it's an elephant tranquilizer. Who knew it was even possible to tranquilize an elephant but this is the stuff to do it.
There is further information in the article about the lack of benefit from Narcan because carfentanil in combination with heroin binds opiate receptors in the brain so strongly the Narcan may not be powerful enough to help.
Additionally, they describe efforts by the states to increase abilities to deal with this drug which seems relatively recently introduced to the street as an extreme booster for heroin.
Notably absent from the article is where the dealers get it. I'm reluctant to google how to make it because that invites a SWAT team to break down the door and shoot me. Nevertheless, it's important because we need to know if carfentanil is as easy to make as meth or what. Is it possible to crank this out from Jim Bob's Trailer Park Meth Lab or does it take sophisticated techniques. If the latter then what is the source which provides so much of it that it's sufficient to require whatever minimal valid need exists for the drug and also to supply the street.
"Black man don't own no jetplanes. How does it get here?" - "Boyz in the Hood"
During a life which has featured substantial drug abuse, I never knew anyone who got addicted to heroin until the last few years and my history goes back to 1965. Something I saw early in my malcontented life was a couple of people spiking something and it might have been heroin but I did not ask and watched in horror (they weren't that close and we were just hanging out).
The thing which horrified me right off the top was they didn't just stick the spike into one arm as they would do one and then the other, maybe afterward switching back to the first. They didn't actually shoot any of the drug each time but rather they teased themselves with the pain and I've had some major lessons in my life but that one I can see as if it happens right now. That memory has never faded.
Something which may well have insulated me to some extent is I usually don't much hear the lyrics of a song as anything more than melody. When it's as dramatic as "The Pusherman" by Steppenwolf, they're almost impossible to miss but I remembered yesterday another one which was a staple for the Jelly Pudding days of WEBN 102.7 in Cincinnati (i.e. definitely sixties).
Cream featured Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker and "Spoonful" was part of the live recording for "Wheels of Fire" for which the song ran for almost twenty minutes. "Wheels of Fire" was the height of Cream's evolution since Clapton has often reformed his bands over the years so he could keep pursuing the dream in always new ways.
Lyrics have not usually been that interesting to me since most could have been written by snapping turtles but the lyrics to "Spoonful" were important for exactly the reason Lotho has described previously. "Wheels of Fire" is definitely sixties and not some vague dark future.
Review the lyrics for yourself and it's clear they're talking about love but it isn't for a woman. The same is true for "Crystal Ship" by The Doors as that one was about drugs too but it was crafty and that sneaked past a whole lot of people. Just as with "Spoonful," I didn't realize until some time after what they really said.
I'm not sure how influential these lyrics really were since that kind of deep drug abuse was in the deepest underculture where most really didn't want to go, if we even knew it existed. There's no waffling on culpability as my only purpose is to relate my experience and you can make of it what you will.
"Spoonful"
Note: the transcription of the lyrics has multiple relatively-simple errors so maybe that task was done by someone for whom English is a second language.
Could fill spoons full of diamonds,
Could fill spoons full of gold.
Just a little spoon of your precious love
Will satisfy my soul.
Men lies about it.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies about it.
Everything's a-fightin' about the spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Could fill spoons full of coffee,
Could fill spoons full of tea.
Just a little spoon of your precious love;
Is that enough for me?
Men lies about it.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies about it.
Everything's a-fightin' about the spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Could fill spoons full of water,
Save them from the desert sands.
But a little spoon of your forty-five
Saved you from another man.
Men lies.
Some of them cries about it.
Some of them dies.
Everything's a-fightin' about it.
Everything's a-cryin' about it.
Everything's a-diein' about it.
Everything's a-cryin' about it.
Everything's a-liein' about it.
Little old, little old spoonfull.
Die'n about it
Cryin about it
That spoon, that spoon
Little old, little old spoonfull
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
That spoon, that spoon, that spoonfull.
Everything's a-diein' about it.
3 comments:
Funny how these lyrics escaped you back then. The bands do need yo accept some form of culpability as they romanticized heroin.
Carfentanyl has been around along time. And it takes far more Narcan to repress it.
Many think that is why so many of b tje Chechnya hostages died when tje Rissians used it to subdue the bad guys. They were supposed to have used an aerosal form but did not have enough narcan to save everyone.
It is the reason ODs are so high in this epidemic.
Lyrics really don't penetrate too much and I can't even remember my own, never could.
I guess carfentanyl must have been invented way back but I had never heard of street abuse until fairly recently and the report just now said 10,000 times more powerful than morphine. The user has almost no chance of surviving or at least not for long.
It may be that songs which go on about the miseries some addict in the band is experiencing I seriously do anything useful toward telling anyone not to use it or just leaving that evil subject alone. I strongly suspect they add a dark drama which may be attractive to an individual on a hurt with life for some reason.
I don't mean to whitewash anything and it was a surprise to me when I remembered "Spoonful" and it's also a surprise why a song like "White Rabbit" I regarded as more about trips than anything else. I still do think that but I knew those lyrics while most didn't register. I don't have such a good explanation for that.
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