While First Lady Nancy Reagan was exhorting us turkeys to Just Say No,
daughter Patti wrote, “my mother was a pill-popping Quaalude shrew.”
As a gaggle of rugged individualists, some fellow travelers pick stimulants.
Starbucks, CVS and shrinks offer caffeine, diet capsules, and Ritalin variants.
Then IMHO, there’s Lockean ecstasy vs. Hobbes’ hell — MDMA for joyous
afternoons with you, or squalid meth abuse — folks choose their crutches.
Speaking as a currently licensed physician, both stories really begin with
phenethylamine, the molecular skeleton on which amphetamine is based:
MDMA and methamphetamine are elaborations, with small structural
shifts significantly changing binding affinity, permeability plus longevity.
Methamphetamine’s formula is C10H15N, MDMA’s is C11H15NO2 —
thus essentially MDMA has an extra carbon plus two extra oxygens.
Methamphetamine MDMA
From Forum Grouch: “X is the lamest drug I’ve ever used…it’s for peeps
scared of speed, acid, shrooms, The Jaguar, Special K, coke, herion (sic).
there’s not enough of anything that’s in there, to get me off off off off!
what a joke! 20-30 bucks a pill for what? … We’re loyal crystal smoking addicts.”
From Speedfreak Emeritus: “Here’s my impression of meth vs MDMA.
They’re both phone. But when taken, they both have realistic promises.
Methamphetamine makes me feel powerful, potent, hung, virile,
superior, capable, strong, attractive, energetic and truly validated.
MDMA made me feel compassionate, loving, caring, gentle, friendly,
in-touch in-tune. I ADMIT it’s MUCH easier to quit X than speed.”
What boosters d’ya employ — chardonnay, chocolate (brownies), entheogens,
other exogenous chemicals, endorphin byproducts of meditation, exercise, sex?