Absinthe: anyone besides me try it? or mix with opiates?

[slugbone]

i know its more available in europe. here in the states you have to order online and have it shipped across the pond going thru customs. i have several bottles and if you can get past the liqorice taste it can get you pretty messed up.

anyone ever use it and visit the "Green Fairy"? if so has the wormwood done anything good for you. i have not yet tried it instead of vodka etc...in a stinky tea recipie, but since i have a couple of bottles gathering dust what do you think?

[karmacoma]

yes, i've tried some before. in the czech republic it was fairly easy to get. i say fairly because the trick is knowing what to buy. there is so much fake stuff going around that you really have to know what you're doing before you buy - especially if you're going through ordering it from the internet.

the time i had some real stuff it was quite different from just drinking. there were some unmistakable psychadelic effects. it was also a little more speedy than just alcohol.

also, there is a certain way it's supposed to be drunk, involving a spoon, sugar and fire. i don't know if that's necessary to catalyze the psychadelic stuff, but the only time i had real absinthe it was done this way. i've also had it a couple of times here - when friends brought some back from euro vacations. each time i tried it here, it was either fake or very weak absinthe.

[chemboy7]

Most Absinthe you find now-a-days is just high proof bullshit with oil of wormwood added to it. If you want real Absinthe, talk to this guy, it's expensive as hell but well worth it.

P.S. If your Absinthe isn't louching (turning from clear to milky green) when you add ice or get it cold, it's not real Absinthe.

http://www.sebor-absinth.com/

[chemboy7]

also, there is a certain way it's supposed to be drunk, involving a spoon, sugar and fire. i don't know if that's necessary to catalyze the psychadelic stuff, but the only time i had real absinthe it was done this way. i've also had it a couple of times here - when friends brought some back from euro vacations. each time i tried it here, it was either fake or very weak absinthe.

What I believe your talking about Karma is the act of putting a sugar cube on a special spoon with holes in it and putting drops of Laudunum on it and setting it afire to drip into your glass.

[karmacoma]

yes, that may well have been it. actually, i didn't do it. there was this crazy old man, who was very practiced in the art, who did the whole thing for me. he also drank most of the bottle, but his company was well worth it.

[caesee]

i have had absinthe many a times throughout europe and 1 time in the states, which was some bullshit. The best I have ever had, the only one that was 100% real was in rotterdam..

[Tiamat]

I have the great fortune to travel through Amsterdam twice a year on my way to and from my in-laws' home in Cairo, Egypt. We pick up absinthe coming and going, its legal to bring a certain amount back into the US with you (the usual liquor allowance). On the other end, liquor isn't illegal in Egypt but the stuff made there is nasty and can leave you very sick, and imported is available only for tourists at unbelievably high prices. For this reason (I think) the Egyptians use the Merry Iguana by the truckload as their drug of choice. Hence, whenever we bring the absinthe my father-in-law always dissolves a lump of hash in it and circles the moons of jupiter for a few hours. And nothing cements family relations like getting wasted with the old FIL.

With or w/o the MJ absinthe is different than a regular drunk... its a sipping kind of a thing, but brings on a nice warm glow every time. For me its sort of like a low-grade mushroom trip. Back in the time of Toulouse-Latrec and his wormwood informed artwork they would dissolve opium in with absinthe. Those were the days! The drug Laudanum isn't made out of absinthe -- its opium mixed with pure grain alcohol, but they used alot of that too. Mmmm.... Laudanum. Anyhoo, I'm also curious if anyone has used absinthe in their PT too - I can't imagine it could make it taste any more or less foul, but I wondered too if it would help or hurt the overall results.

[Paregoric Kid]

good stuff, I like it. bought a few pounds of wormwood a few years ago to see what it was all about. tried a few different kinds too. there's a brand sold in canada from turkey that is real, there's one in the US that uses a different type of wormwood, southern wormwood (contains thujone), it is a local form of absinthe popular in New Orleans, and there are many different authentic european brands of absinthe. then there is also pastis which is similar but without the wormwood.

[jacky]

pernod is the original recipe sans the wormwood oil, to recreate pretty much the original recipe take 1/3 a millilitre of absinthe oil, drop that into a thimble of everclear, and once the oil is evenly absorbed into the solvent, dump that in your bottle of pernod,.....voila! pretty much the original recipe, for under 35$.

I make mine 3x the potency of that recipe, just by adding a full millilitre of oil....I also like to use damiana liqueur as a bad ass additive.

I have tried about 10 different bottles from europe...all too damn expensive, and nothing with the kick that I create for about half the price with no waiting.

absinthe is a good occasional buzz. mild though, somewhat sublime, until you drink too much..

[HistoryofMadness]

What is pernod? I may sound ignorant, but I won't apologize.

I'd be interested in making a mix like jacky mentioned, and then maybe using it to make a tincture of laudie... like slug mentioned.

Hey slug if you try it let me know how it goes. I think it would be good.

[insanesteveo]

What is pernod? I may sound ignorant, but I won't apologize.

I'd be interested in making a mix like jacky mentioned, and then maybe using it to make a tincture of laudie... like slug mentioned.

Hey slug if you try it let me know how it goes. I think it would be good.

hmmm, laudunum made with absinthe. just add in some mj liquor and youre fucked.

[Hammilton]

Laudenum is more than opium mixed with alcohol. I believe there's cardamon and cloves too. Patent medicine crap, but it was part of the original mix.

I have a bottle of absinthe from prague in my liquor cabinet, along with the courvoisier, hennesey and $100 a bottle scotch. all very good liquor. If i drank at all I'd have to buy cheap stuff, but since what I have will last me a lifetime, i'm not too strung out for cash.

My absinthe does the whole clouds up thing, and I always do the fire over sugar thing, not exactly how they did it in prague, but not different enough to change anything. All I can tell is that its alcohol. Could there be a little something else? maybe, but more likely than not its placebo. This bottle is almost gone, and I don't think I'll open the other one for a while. It's no more psychedelic than delerium tremens. Ever hear of someone having a bad trip on absinthe? there's a reason.

The only two active ingredients in it- thujone and ethanol- are decidedly not psychedelic. Thujone causes seizure at a high enough dose. below that dose, there's nothing. maybe a little sedation.

Sort of a disapointment since Thujone is just about everywhere; not a forest in the world that doesn't sport trees loaded with the stuff. Whoo! To bad it isn't like DMT. I'd smoke some bark.

[HistoryofMadness]

Laudenum is more than opium mixed with alcohol. I believe there's cardamon and cloves too. Patent medicine crap, but it was part of the original mix.

All I can tell is that its alcohol. Could there be a little something else? maybe, but more likely than not its placebo. It's no more psychedelic than delerium tremens. Ever hear of someone having a bad trip on absinthe? there's a reason.

The only two active ingredients in it- thujone and ethanol- are decidedly not psychedelic. Thujone causes seizure at a high enough dose. below that dose, there's nothing. maybe a little sedation.



Laudenum IS just opium mixed with alcohol. The other shit you mentioned is what's called "inactive ingredients" ... just like you mentioned the 2 only 'active' ingredients in absinthe. Which brings me to my second comment:

There are a lot of questions unanswered about the psychoactivity of absinthe. There is verifiable proof that long-term use causes hallucinations, and lots of evidence that wormwood is a psychoactive convulsant. In other words, you may have to drink more than one cheap bottle from a tourist trap to get the effects. Or you could increase the amount that's in the absinthe.

There is scientific evidence that proves when alcohol and cocaine are mixed in the liver, a third different intoxicant is created that multiplies the effects of both. Because absinthe is illegal in the states, experiments like this have not been performed. Some suggest thujone is somehow related to THC (I read that somewhere who knows)...

What I find interesting is that according to Dr. Duke, the master of chemicals in nature, wormwood also has tannin (sp?) in it, which is considered a psychotropic.

So in short, the jury's still out, and no one has settled this issue... you sounded pretty sure of yourself, do you have any new scientific data from your experiment to share and solve the issue once and for all?

Yes, I'm busting your balls, but that's because it frustrates me to no end to see an unfounded claim like yours that is so matter-of-fact... I'd like to see more of your 'research' or evidence if you still think you're right.

[freedomclub]

My buddy had a bottle and he claimed it took many, many shots to get hallucinatory effects. Like I'd guess you'd have to be a professional drunk, ya know like all the old authors/artists were?

[Paregoric Kid]

wormwood is very strange. I've had altered vision under it's influence. shakey vision. it's very strange. the theory that thujone and thc are related is outdated and has been since disproven. it is now believed that thujone is a GABA antagonist. (caffeine is also one, some sites claim taking caffeine with absinthe increases it's effects)

[HistoryofMadness]

the theory that thujone and thc are related is outdated and has been since disproven.

Well, I'm not sure anyone can say that.

I'm not trying to prove anybody wrong, I'm only introducing reasonable doubt to anyone's claim that there are definitive conclusions being drawn about absinthe. It just hasn't been studied enough.

"In the most recent study Meschler and Howlett from Saint Lois University School of Medicine showed that indeed thujone have low affinity binding to cannabinoid receptors, but still has no cannabimimetic effect (Meschler and Howlett 1999)."
http://sulcus.berkeley.edu/mcb/165_001/papers/manuscripts/_877.html

Then it goes on to list other drugs that thujone may have similar effects on the brain.

Thujone is classified as a convulsant poison, and it is structurally similar to menthol, a-pinene, eucalyptol and to the “business end” of THC.
http://www.fiu.edu/orgs/chemistry/Chung.htm

And:
http://www.phc.vcu.edu/Feature/oldfeature/thuj/thujone.html
http://www.absinth.com/links/faq.html

And I'm sure someone could quote just as many studies that say the opposite. I'm not trying to prove anybody wrong, I'm only introducing reasonable doubt to anyone's claim that there are definitive scientific conclusions being drawn about absinthe. It just hasn't been studied enough.

There's also some suggestion that different types of wormwood may have different effects, and that not only should absinthe be studied, but it should be determined how different strains of wormwood can produce different effects...

[Paregoric Kid]

originally I was going to add in my last post that thujone only has a very weak ability to bind to the cannibinoid receptors. however, it's ability to barely bind to the cannibinoid receptors in a lab setting does not mean that it's responsible for it's psychoactive effects. thc can bind to mu opioid receptors but that does not mean it's ability to bind at the opioid receptors are responsible for it's high.
I mean read the one study you posted "showed that indeed thujone have low affinity binding to cannabinoid receptors, but still has no cannabimimetic effect (Meschler and Howlett 1999)."
you might want to read this paper: Thujone Gamma-Aminobutyric acid type A receptor modulation and metabolic detoxification. Hold K.,Sirisoma N., Ikeda T., Narahashi T. and Casida J. (2000).

[HistoryofMadness]

originally I was going to add in my last post that thujone only has a very weak ability to bind to the cannibinoid receptors. however, it's ability to barely bind to the cannibinoid receptors in a lab setting does not mean that it's responsible for it's psychoactive effects. thc can bind to mu opioid receptors but that does not mean it's ability to bind at the opioid receptors are responsible for it's high.
you might want to read this paper: Thujone Gamma-Aminobutyric acid type A receptor modulation and metabolic detoxification. Hold K.,Sirisoma N., Ikeda T., Narahashi T. and Casida J. (2000).
That fact (its activity at the receptor isn't responsible for the high) is included in my quote: "In the most recent study Meschler and Howlett from Saint Lois University School of Medicine showed that indeed thujone have low affinity binding to cannabinoid receptors, but still has no cannabimimetic effect"

The point is that they are related. You suggested they are not.

We are both splitting hairs, here, and like I said earlier, my point is only that there isn't much known about absinthe and what if any effects it has, simply because its (a) not standardized from test to test, (b) most recipes tested apparently are from new, not old, recipes, and (c) the fact that its illegal limits scientific testing.

--edit-- I made this post before your edit. I'm sure you'll make other changes, but my point remains that there is much to be learned, and not much in the way of conclusive evidence.

[Paregoric Kid]

thc easily binds to cannibinoid receptors, thujone only very weakly binds to them. when thc binds to the receptors you get high, when thujone tries to you don't feel stoned.
all I'm saying is that it's possible weak effects at that receptor are not responsible for the high and in this respect they are not similar.
the only similarity they share are the fact that they are both terpenoids.
I didn't mean to say they share no relation, but that they are not similar in that they do not produce the same effects through the same receptors.

[Hammilton]

There have been plenty of studies done on Thujone. Thujone and alcohol, I'm not sure. Alcohol alone produced hallucinations used for a long enough time, but I don't think anyone would make the claim that delerium tremens are psychedelic. There was a study, I believe I read it in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, but it might have been in PubMed, I'll have to do more looking. It was human studies of Thujone alone in the body (human) that showed very few affects until doses much higher than are contained in entire bottles. Another one in rats used 3-6 times the by-weight doses in humans over the course of days or weeks showed no results that would indicate a psychedelic and eventually produced convulsions.

I'll find the source of the human trials. I've drank quite a bit of absinthe, both home-made and factory made in Prague.

About Paragoric, I don't know if we can definitively say that the other ingredients had no effect, but I will say that the ingredients list in the US Pharmacopoeia from the late 1800's included a few other herbs. I know that herbs often have psychoactive contituents- especially ones that turn into something else inside the body like Myristicin and supposedly beta-asarone (i doubt this one converts to anything in peoples).

The main not-opium and not-alcohol ingredient in it is camphor, and even the basic definition is "a camphorated tincture of opium" Does camphor have psychoactive properties? It seems likely, I know that it's used for heart conditions and to relieve fatigue. Its also used in toothache medicine as an aneasthetic because it disrupts nerve conduction.

the Wikipedia entry I just found has a couple other notes on it, which I'll quote below.

A form of anti-itch gel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antipruritic) currently on the market uses camphor as its active ingredient (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_ingredient). It is also used in medicine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicine).
Camphor is readily absorbed through the skin and produces a feeling of cooling similar to that of menthol (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menthol) and acts as slight local anesthetic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anesthetic) and antimicrobial (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antimicrobial) substance. It may also be administered orally in small quantities (50 mg) for minor heart symptoms and fatigue.
In larger quantities, it is poisonous (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxic) when ingested and can cause seizures, confusion, irritability, and neuromuscular hyperactivity.

[jacky]

yes, camphor has psychoactive qualities...it is listed in the psychoactives encyclopedia.........mainly a mild stimulant. I have heard of doses up to 10 grams!! I would probably start in the 1/4 gram range.

I think saffron is a component of laudanum?

I have been taking a little saffron in increasingly larger quids for a couple of weeks with my daily doses. maybe the herb has a potentiating effect? maybe not.

absinthe is an interesting complex of herbs....absinthe oil or sage leaf oil alone is psychoactive. I used to take it (sage oil/absinthe oil) early in the morning before work when I worked days at a sushi bar, I would just drip the oil in my mouth and brush my teeth, allowing the oil to saturate my gums. for the first 3-4 hours I would be a motor mouth at work...not an uncomfortable stimulation, but definitely a workhorse type of material.
some people just fall asleep on the thujone. I find that it counteracts the somniferic effects of alcohol, and if I am drunk and start drinking it, it feels almost like you are sobering up.

the best effects of absinthe are euphoria, stamina, and at higher doses it has some strange psychoactive type of effects, vivid visualization more than hallucination.
the shitty effects are headache, hangover beyond the alcohol, and a strange smell to the urine.

[JunkYardSaint]

Once, when I was on the road playing with my band, we came across these College students in Dayton Ohio who had a shitload of Absynthe. We had just come from New Orleans where I had seen the Absynthe bars, and after reading the comparisons to morphine I was very eager to try it. I drank two or three glasses and fell off of a two story balcony and landed on my back in the flower garden - unhurt by the way. The next day I was half blind, for the first time in my life I literally saw 'spots'. I've heard of people seeing spots before, but this was the first (and last) time I saw 'spots' with my very own eyes. It was even hard to drive because I kept trying to brake for the 'spots'. Needless to say it was an unforgettable experience.... that I even remember it at all attests to that!!!

[kingdxm]

Wormwood contains a chemical called 3-isothojone, the dominate isomer of wormwood oil. It has antinociceptive(pain-killing)effects, compareable to codeine. I too have heard of thujone being a GABA antagonist, this is a good thing as I will explain:

The stimulatory effects of mu-receptors(which is what we all like about opiates)produces analgesia, euphoria, respiratory depression, miosis, decreased gastrointestinal motility, and physical dependence. Kappa-receptor stimulation also produces analgesia, miosis, respiratory depression, as well as dysphoria and some psychomimetic effects( i.e. depersonalization and/or disorientation ). Anyway the stimulation effects of opiates are the result of "disinhibition" as the release of inhibitory neurotransmitters such as GABA and acetylcholine is blocked. the exact mecanism how opioid agonists cause both inhibitory and stimulatory processes is not well understood.

In my opinion, if one were to take a GABA inhibitor, and an acetylcholine inhibitor it would greatly increase the effects of a opiate. acetylcholine and dopamine work as opposite neurotransmitters in the brain when one is blocked, the other increases it's function. So if you block acetylcholine, an increase in dopamine surges in the brain. They have studied this for years in Parkinson's patients, by giving them L-DOPA(which increases dopamine in the brain) and also by giving them anticholinergic drugs(like scopolamine, as an example) Tropane drugs, like scopolamine, have been shown in many studies to greatly potentiate the effects of narcotics. In other parts of the brain dopamine and GABA act as opposite neurotransmitters in the brain in the same way as dopamine/acetylcholine. I would love to do some experimenting in this area. Prehaps an opiate may not even have to be used if both acetylcholine and GABA could be blocked, interesting!

[Paregoric Kid]

someone should compare the effects of some good absinthe with the new alcoholic energy drinks that contain caffeine.
I've tried a few of the alcoholic energy drinks like Sparks, Rockstar 21, etc.
of course these energy drinks don't contain as much alcohol as the high proof absinthe.

[AWOL]

someone should compare the effects of some good absinthe with the new alcoholic energy drinks that contain caffeine.
I've tried a few of the alcoholic energy drinks like Sparks, Rockstar 21, etc.
of course these energy drinks don't contain as much alcohol as the high proof absinthe. I'm drinking gin and bookoo energy drink (citrus flavor) right now, and it sure tastes a whole lot better than the czeck absinth I've had. :vomit: I didn't personally thing the absinthe did t o much personally. WEll, it got me drunk, yes. I'm drunk now though too.

[nick]

Sorry guys,but absinthe is crap-buy a bottle of vodka.

Hell,my local pub sells absinthe.

[Seedy]

I had a night on absinthe a few years back. Had some shrooms too, needless to say I was very fucked up, in a good way, nice combo but couldn't really tell if it was different to any other strong alcohol mixed with shrooms.

[slugbone]

Sorry guys,but absinthe is crap-buy a bottle of vodka.

Hell,my local pub sells absinthe.

yeah but us dumb americans chasing the green fairy will pay $40 bucks a bottle for it

[nick]

yeah but us dumb americans chasing the green fairy will pay $40 bucks a bottle for it

We all chase the dream bro,but $40 buys a lot of dreams-don't waste your $$ guys.