Finding myself in a position of having too much money, and too little to lose, I parted way with a few reds and met up with a delicious little number dubbed by myself as “Hornet”. 4-HO-MET, or 4-hydroxy-N-methyl-N-ethyltryptamine – a tasty little chemical string that is synthesized into psilocin – the chemical found in naturally occuring mushrooms of the psilocybin variety. My experience/s with this chemical are as follows:
Monday, 17th May 2010: Deliverance.
4pm – Open package containing sample, eyeball about 20mg, lick finger, stick into powder, then straight into the mouth. Blech, bitter disgusting fucking shit. Washed down with some coca-cola it really sticks around for 15-20 minutes. Licking my lips it remains around my mouth and in my ‘stache a little. Effects creep up slowly, excitement grows, however effects are quite mute and only barely noticeable. The computer monitor is breathing almost. Eyesight is cloudy, like I’ve taken an excessive amount of codeine. I don’t feel particularly lively, but I am quite happy and alert.
6pm, I lick my finger and poke it back into the sample and consume another 7-15mg. Rapid onset bolsters first dose, but barely. I get a little giggly with this. Monitor continues to breathe. I notice this even after I come down off the drug, and it’s 8 hours later.
Verdict: Drug seems non-potent. I wonder if it’s because I constantly dose myself with Tramadol, a known 5ht (serotonin) agonist, and norepinepherine reuptake inhibitor. It’s then and there I decide to abstain from taking tramadol, to observe the effects of the ‘Hornet’.
Wednesday, 19th May 2010:
Once again, around 6pm, I lick my finger and dip it into the sample. Unsure of dose, probably 10-20mg or so. Decide to order precision scale set online. Bitterness like the first time, yet somehow worse makes me gag. I wash the chemicals down with a good litre or so of coca-cola. Tongue is a little numb on the tip. A whole lot of nothing happens this time, apart from codeine-like vision haze. I consider taking more, but don’t. Remaining chem is about 1/3rd of what I had to start off with. Decide to wait til the weekend to take the last dose in one hit.
Saturday, 23rd May, 2010: Still Stings, These Shattered Nerves
Well, 3rd day of my experience, and by far the most remarkable. This day the chemical opened my mind to its true nature – the hornets sting. Tonight was the night I was going to take my largest single dose of Hornet, and I just so happened to be going to a poker night with some mates. At this point in time I’ve been awake for nearly 34 hours, kept stimulated by large doses of caffeineated energy drinks, and a somewhat unhappy stomach.
6:25pm – My friend messages to tell me he’ll be picking me up at 7. Cool I think, I have about an hour til the drug kicks in, so I might aswell take it, and then take a shit before I go out. I swallow a precautionary 10mg metaclopramide (for anti-nausea, and possibly anti-emetic qualities as needed – little did I realise that this would increase my gut problems). I up-end the sample bag onto my hand, and tap every last mg out. I lick the powder which is even more bitter than before. It takes several licks to get all the powder off my hands, each horrible bitter lick aided by a swig of Coca-Cola. I then tear the bag apart and lick the plastic clean of powder. This I remark to someone online, must look very desperate, however, I wished to just get as much of the chemical into me as possible. Swigging the rest of the bottle of Coke, I say farewell to my internet friends, and head to the toilet for a pre-night-out shit.
6:35pm – Sitting on the toilet emptying my stomach out, I sit with a crossword puzzle in a magazine, and start to resume where I left off with it last time. About 4-5 minutes into my shit, I start feeling my vision is getting heavy, and as I did not think the Hornet would be taking effect yet, I put it down to tiredness, exhaustion and caffeine intake. 4-5 crossword answers put in, and I start to notice my mental acuity decreasing, and my ability to fill spaces with synonyms becomes reasonably difficult. The crossword is starting to warp a little bit like if I was starting to get a migraine headache with a heavy visual aura.
6:40pm – Looking around me, the walls start to get more orange under the reasonably dim light. I hear the sound of indian instruments, possibly filtering in from a background source (I believe a TV in another room was on). The walls are starting to spin, throb, bleed, and blend together. At this point I begin to mentally talk to myself – Am I fatigued and passing out? Am I getting a migraine? ….Could the Hornet actually be kicking in? No, I tell myself, Don’t be silly. But the effects remain. I look at my watch. Normal. The only thing that isn’t spinning and changing. I stare at it, and see the minute had very slightly move every few seconds. Fuck. I am definitely starting to trip. And only after 20 minutes? What the fuck is going on? I start to try and hurry myself up a bit. The walls are starting to really blot, like fresh ink running over parchment. This is one thing I get as a first-onset symptom of LSD, and this is how I know it is most definitely the drug.
6:50pm – I finish up, and unsteadily, uncomfortably stand up. Automation takes hold, and I flush the toilet, spray deodouriser, and exit the toilet. I walk into the bathroom and turn on the tap. Leaning forward I look into my own eyes. My pupils are dilated so much that there is barely any of the iris showing, the pupil is just about the entire centre of the eye. This is not particularly surprising to me, and I wash my hands and stiff-legged walk into the livingroom. The TV is on, Funniest Home Videos plays on it, and the dining room light is on, but there is no one around. I take several paces up and down the living area and thru the kitchen, stopping to peer outside and down the driveway. The house feels very comforting, and much like I feel when I visit my grandparents house – a sense of warm familiarity. I am reminded of family Christmas.
6:55pm – I walk outside and under the cover of the pergola. There is reasonably windy showers expected, and I pace back and forth under the pergola, while feeling very shamanistic and almost at one with the earth and nature. I walk around the side of the house and into my room, and sit at my computer to report that the drug had kicked in to a friend online. I sit down and I start to hear a high-pitched, fast-sped giggling, like chipmunks talking. I also hear high pitched twanging music, which resonates after about every noise I hear. My computer monitor is a mess of colours like looking at it with a beaded curtain in the way, the chat window swirls and breathes. Surprisingly I can still manage to communicate online. My keyboard muscle memory remains, nearly unchallenged. My glasses become a window of which my monitor becomes another windows through. In the peripheral of my vision I see the characters from the original series of Star Trek – posing as if on the front of a DVD boxset. If I focus, I see only what is actually there – the top right is a tissue box if focussed, but Uhura in peripheral. I remark this to my friend who finds it absolutely fucking hilarious.
7.04pm – My friend calls me – He’s out the front. I stumble outside to walk around the house, and practically lose vision, as the light turns to dark very quickly. I walk blind for a few steps and my vision slowly returns to me, all at once (yes – slowly all at once. Very fucking weird). I walk under the pergola and thru the living room, then out the front door, locking it behind me. I walk unsteadily to my friends car and open the door and sit. “Sup man” he says “Dude. I am fucking tripping. Absolutely tripping” is the first thing I say. “good thing I’m driving then” he says “Fuck yeah.” says I. we proceed on our way.
7:08pm – We cruise down the street and I babble something about hornet and tripping balls. Out the windscreen all I see is a colourful mass of swirling, moving dark pastels as the rain and fog mist the windscreen. My friend asks me where another friend we’re picking up lives. I reply autonomously, yet unsure of what I was saying. Turned out to be correct, and we end up outside said friends place. He gets in, says what’s up, says he has a present for us, and hands us both a Rockstar Cola. I tell him I have a present for him – I hand him a Romeo Y Julieta No. 1 cigar I meant to give him at Christmas.I tell him what I’ve taken, and he says I’ll probably only want to go one round in poker. He mentions something about getting fucked up on weed (I think).
7:12pm – I lose track of conversation for a moment as the drug takes a hold of my concentration. Outside the window the streaming colour mass is fascinating. I snap back to conversation when personal limits of alcohol consumption are mentioned. Certain people are named and shamed as saying they can drink far more than they actually can. My friend asks me how much alcohol I could put down in one sitting “back in [my] good old days” (2 years ago or so now). I say about 1500mL of spirit (40%/80proof) on a good night. easily 1 litre, and then some, I tell them. The debate other peoples ability to consume alcohol in such high volumes. Conversation switches to how Friend 2 went at the pub the previous night. Titties were mentioned. Fascination for me switched to what I was seeing as the car went around the round-about we had made it to.
7:15pm – I unsteadily drag myself out of the car, holding my can of Rockstar Cola. I remember I forgot my 4-pack of V energy drinks and mention it. I make my way unsteadily towards the house. Standing outside the garage door, Friend 2 starts imitating an humourous accent, through which my other 2 friends who are setup with the poker equipment respond to. The garage door is opened (which knocks over a table leaning against it, beaning Friend3 on the head – which I don’t see, luckily or I probably would have laughed hard). I walk in and stand next to Friend 4 who is sitting down. I am slightly confused at this point, and finding normal comprehension of words and social interaction more challenging. I sit down between Friend 3 and 4, and exclaim “I am so unbelievably Fucking high right now. You have no idea.”, this elicits laughter and an exclaimation from Friend 3 that “yeah man, you look fucked.”
7:20pm – We’re all settled in for a game of poker and I’m having trouble comprehending what people are even saying. As their mouths move, it seems a second, phantom-like mouth is ghosting their real mouth, and is out of synch with their actual mouth. I am a little giggly at this stage, and start to laugh somewhat uncontrollably for no reason. This creates a kind of “lets see how much we can make him laugh” game by my friends, which, while annoying and frustrating on LSD, was actually kind of enjoyable on Hornet. I chuckle and compose myself. Friend 1 owes me for a cigar I purchased for him, and he buys me in for the first round and hands me the change over the table. Automation takes over for this task.
7:25pm – Cards are dealt and I’m told to play my bet. I am confused as what to do, however my mind is still reasonably coherent. I remember the rules of the game and which chips are which. I place my bet and play my hand reasonably well. Strong visuals make the world seem like it is shifting in front of itself – existing objects start to ghost other objects. The table throbs. The cards bleed into the fabric. My brain is nearly on another plain of existence.
8:00pm – Lost track of time. I play cards reasonably decently, however I bet somewhat non-characteristically. I sip my Rockstar cola every now and then, which Friend 3 helpfully opened for me after he saw me staring at it. Friend 3 and 4 continually make references to how fucked up I seem, and that they will be violating me sexually should I pass out. I assure them I’m not taking a drug which will make me tired, and to instead violate Friend 2 after he passes out from bourbon and weed. I end up wit hthe dealer chip, and have to deal the deck. I actually manage to not fuck it up. Effects of the drug seem to have plateaud very nicely at this stage.
8:15pm (approx) – I decide I need to take a piss, and decide to do so outside. It is raining quite heavily and I am determined not to give a shit. I walk straight out into the rain and start pissing up against a shed, not realising how soaked im getting. I finish up and walk back, drying my glasses on the way. I get back and I’m apparently drenched. Everyone laughs and comments how fucked up I must be. I’m totally nonchalant about it, and I’m not feeling heat or cold at the time. Now am I feeling my usually aching back. I continue to sip my drink and play poker (almost).
My mind wanders heavily during this stage, and I end up zoning out quite a bit, thinking about life, existence, the universe, and certain people I hold dear to me. Friends, family, and others. Humanity, and its ability to live like a bacteria. Right strains of bacteria go on to continue their existence and to evolve, whereby the stragglers of humanity branch out – the rednecks, hillbillies, and other degenerates, exploring and colonising the most uninhabitable shitholes on the planet, doing so just to continue their existence, and spread themselves onto the next generation. Facts of life, drug use, chemical reactions on my brain become very surreal, as if this may be the clear conscious, and my sober self the troubled, unrealistic person. I think about death. I think it’d probably suck, but at the moment I am very much alive. I wish for clarity, but then I quickly stop the thought, and instead embrace the trip.
9:00pm – By this stage I’m out at poker. Friend 4 put me all-in. It was for the best, I had no idea what the fuck was going on anymore. I stare at my watch. It’s still real. 9:00 on the dot. Still set to singapore date. all is normal. Brain wanders incredibly, vastly contemplating all the other above mentioned things. I get asked if I’m ok. “What?” I reply after a long pause. Friend 3 remarks that its rude, and I should say excuse me. At the time I can not properly distinguish if he’s joking or serious. I lapse back into deep thought
9:05pm – About 30 minutes later…oh wait, it was less than 5 minutes. I zone out thinking and snap back to my watch. 5 Minutes. Really? Seemed I was out for 30. I take my focus off the watch. The game continues on in front of me. Friend 2 is out of the game also, his pipe ready for the smoking. I zone out again
9:15pm – Around 10pm….no wait – its still only 9:15? what the fuck? How could I have so many thoughts in just 10 minutes? I am amazed. Observable time is dramatically slowed down. Living time is sped up. Confusion is very slowly starting to clear up around this point. I think I’m on the comedown. Visuals still persist but are becoming more muted. Psychological effects are still in gear.
9:45pm – Observable time returns slowly to normal around this point. Total mental haze clears up a very slight amount. Thought about humans being extremely complex animals begins to circulate in my head. I think of humans forming relationships with members of the opposite sex, and how the pursuit in life is still so basically and instinctually drive, even when some humans choose to pursue other feats, the human drive is to ultimately reproduce, or to atleast simulate reproduction. The man who deludes himself is only fighting the very core that he is built upon. I think about how a relationship would effect me at this time, and I start to think about certain people on a slightly deeper level. I become slightly lonely and begin to miss certain people. I wonder what they’re up to, and how I am suddenly very interested in whatever they have to say. This troubles me slightly as I realise my instincts are still at my thought basis. I decide this is probably not going to change. I miss cetain people more.
10:30pm – The effect of the drug is definitely wearing down quite a bit now. There is only residual mental cloudyness. Visual effects are all but gone, but slightly persistant. Visual bleeding still occuring slightly, as is objects breathing. I am feeling like taking a little tramadol to up my serotonin so I can shift back to normality a little quicker
10:45pm – I excuse myself to take a crap, as my stomach has been churning the whole time I’ve been tripping. “seeya in 30 minutes” comes the chorus back. I stand up and stumble a little, unsteady on my feet, and I make my way into the house. Passing a couple of people lounging, I say hi, and get hassled by the stupid dog, which yaps at me until I get to the toilet and close the door. As I’m sitting there I look at the tiles, and notice they seem to have a pattern on them which looks very 3-dimensional. I sit and think a bit more about life and stare at my watch. Time moves extremely fast, and by 11:15 I decide I had better get the fuck out.
11:20pm – I walk back through the house, and into the garage where the poker game is still going. I’m asked if I’m ok, of which I am, and then I take a glass and have a few coca colas. This is about where my memory cuts off as it took me a good two weeks to write this article. However, I must say that 4-HO-MET is a very fun, and extraordinary drug. I would recommend it to anyone (except those with possible underlying mental issues)
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