Suggestions from the Masses
2) Speaking from experience, I know that while tripping even looking at a piece of graph paper can entertain for hours, but I was hoping I could help create a mood at this Acid-Test that would help heighten the experience. I already have the music - the Orb, possibly Pink Floyd, maybe some techno if we feel really energetic... but I was wondering what sort of visuals and toys would be great (and really cheap, too). I already have Fractint as a possibility, as well as a number of computer screen-drawers such as O-My-God. I also know from experience that TV can be a really jarring experience, but I was thinking maybe there might be something that I could rent that would flip some lids, like a David Lynch film or something. Remember, the keyword is cheap, household, etc.... Replies: ---- cheap toys? we got a whole closet of them...k-mart is a mecca of fun.. here's just a quick list-- 64 box of crayons and big sheets of paper finger paitns slime kaledioscopes dragon lenses pinwheels bubbles tinfoil (crinkle it up and see what the wrinkles form) sponge cubes painted with fluorescent paint books of optical illusions a ball of yarn unravelled (fun to get tangeld up in) whipped cream (fun to stick your fingers in) shiny junk jewelry patterned clothing (paisely, tie dye, etc) black light bulb [bubbles worked well, so did crayons. We got flourescent markers and crayons and went nuts (he had brought a flourescent lamp)] food is important too....you get the munchies and it's fun to play with-- [One of my friends couldn't taste a thing, while the other was going nuts over the bubbles in a glass of Sprite.] music-- the orb is good [YES YES YES YES!!!] klf-- chill out [Not bad, it's good when you're coming down] anything by negativeland [A little rough for us; too choppy] soundtrack to the last temptation of christ (passion by peter gabriel) childhood records- mr rogers, sesame street,e tc movies-- depending on your attention span...this weekend i nearly went edgyand whiny because fantasia was sooooo long the grinch who stole x-mas the mind's eye-- a video availiable at raedio shack and blockbuster taht is computer generated graphics [Mind's Eye was GREAT!!! It's a nonstop medley of computer video images; not talking heads going on and on about their new piece of SGI equipment. Very flowing, lots of movement, which was great.] tapes of collected very old cartoons (ones from the 50s are great) [Ren and Stimpy was SCARY.] [As usual.] children's movies don't get the wall or anything depressing or that has death...everyone will be very upset ---- My advice: Avoid Pink Floyd No, I'm not flaming the music. I like the music. However, I find much of it to be quite depressing. Not the type of thing to screw with on acid. ---- My main advice would be to make it less a pre-planned, psych. lab type of experience. If they feel like going outside, get 'em up to Tilden Park to look at the stars. Or just turn the lights off and let them focus on their own thoughts; if you're bombarded with sensory input, you often don't have the focus to make the kind of intellectual insights that are the real value of an acid trip. Also, don't make it too serious. The oddest things can be deleriously funny on acid. I once spent a half an hour dosed with friends listening to a muzak station on the radio and cackling hilariously. All those saccharine trivializations of rock songs (Stairway to Heaven) seem so much more absurd. ---- Toys: K-Mart has, in the party section, six packs of various fun things for kids. Most of them make good trip toys as well. My favorite is a set of different lenses that look like dragonfly eyes etc, and make multiple images. Another fun thing is diffraction glasses. You look goofy, but there are neat effects you can see with them while tripping. Rentals: Two recommendations, _The Mind's Eye_ (should be able to get from blockbuster) and _Fantasia_. I also have some Psychic TV videos, but they are hard to find and expensive. Computer stuff: Fractint is good, but can get boring, because it's so complex and you have to do lots of stuff to make it look interesting. Something simpler, like the Satori portion of After Dark (a screen saver) would be better. Music: the KLF is excellent, especially things like _Chill Out_. Other ambient house (like the Orb) would be good. The newest Orb single is excellent trip music, but will run you over $20, since it's an import. [The Blue Room is BEAUTIFUL. Towers of Dub seemed as little too choppy for us. Acid house and more creative Techno (Orbital, Give Peace a Dance Vol. 2 and 3, Hypnotone's album) worked great.] ---- A cheap toy that's a guaranteed winner: Get a bowl, fill it half full or so with corn starch or potato starch; add water until the starch is all wet, but don't make it too watery. This makes a VERY weird substance that will freak you out cold sober. Give it to your pals when they start to peak, and they won't believe it. [Didn't get to try this.] ---- Let me see... _The Mind's Eye_ is a computer animation video that you can get at Radio Shack (ack!), which a lot of my friends tripped to last semester. I was high on life at the time (:-) but it was really cool. Other toys that I like: candles, mini-maglights (a type of flashlight, indispensible), kaleidoscopes, koosh-balls, any sort of stone with intricate patterns, Fractint (now that you mentioned it, it is great, but have the .gifs ready, generating on the fly is too slow for me), bubbles, especially the huge ones. Of course, you never know what some people will like. That same night, I had people feeling my hair, and going nuts over a cafeteria style cup. HMMMM... My personal favorite though, is nature. Trees, shrubs, the sky, stars, flowers... get outside if there is a nice (harmless) environment to wander though. School is great for me, we have 6 campuses together, and a few of them are beautiful. Write back with any other responses you get, or the results of your friends' trips. Oh, one awesome piece of listening - Negativeland! Truly bizarre, take my word on it. Designed with LSD in mind I would believe. Not really music, just sound effects with weird dialogs, if I remember right. Check it out! ---- Have yet to try LSD, but if you're looking for mind-fucking movies, then definitely Lynch's Eraserhead is a major idea. Or Jacob's LAdder. [I wasn't EVEN going to try this. I've seen Jacob's Ladder. You don't need to be on anything to get the wind knocked out of you by this film.] [Thumbs down!] ---- Don't rent a David Lynch film. While I am a D.L. fan, I do not reccomend him on acid. I watched Wild at Heart while coming down, and the violence really bothered me. [Agreed. And basically trying to follow ANY plot becomes difficult.] ---- Set and setting. Your main job, I think, will be taking care of all the details that your friends will be too preoccupied to think about. Or rather, you don't want them thinking about the grand plan behind the stereo wiring... Keep the atmosphere safe. Turn the phone off, or the answering machine on "destroy" mode. Clean the bathroom. Don't turn on bright lights-- candles are good. Choose music that your trippers like, first of all. I would tend to choose calmer, more "textural" music-- Eno instead of the Buzzcocks, the Orb instead of whistley techno. Be careful about the emotional tone of the music. Your friends are going to be very suggestible & emotionally open. Some fun cheap toys: a black light and fluorescent crayons marbles, especially the big clear kind glow-sticks kaleidoscopes Fischer-Price letter magnets a Scrabble set... try playing in the early stages Expensive toys: plasma globe Visual stuff: Max Ernst's "Frottages" spirals op-art patterns We have a book of 3D mazes which is also fun. Animals are fun. Definitely coax the cat in to get fussed over, if a cat lives in the house you'll be using. Some friends with snakes & lizards once trotted them out to get looked at. If lizards don't make your friends nervous, they might enjoy the patterns on the skin. [My animals were afraid of _us_. Oh well :] If the neighbors aren't going to get annoyed, and you have access to musical instruments, let them bang around on them. A guitar with a phaser or flanger is fun. Fractint is probably a good idea. If you have access to a color Macintosh, the After Dark module "Satori" is astounding. I'm told that Sonic the Hedgehog is also a lot of fun. [Fractint was amazing. Color-cycling for an hour.] Video/TV/movies: I've never been interested in watching tv, though people tell me that they get into MTV. Fractal videos *are* fun, though. Todd Rundgren's "GrokGazer". And if any of you are wealthy enough to have a video camera, video feedback is fun. We had one with a "NOT" button, that inverted the color. Beautiful chaotic patterns... which we wisely taped for future viewing. ---- You'll discover why those grotesque tye-dye shirts are soooo popular :-) Seriously, art books with abstract patterns are very fun. [yes, and simple, black and white illustrations were just as cool, if not more, than real busy photos] --- Fractint is _great_ to look at. Great! I've never tripped, but I showed a friend that program when she was tripping, and she didn't want me to trun it off. Even the next day, she wanted to see it. Anything that catches your eye is a good idea. Anything that looks as if it might spin is good. Mirrors are good, but that can make a half bad trip into hell ("My skin! What's cralwing all over my skin!"). [The other two, like most people, have a self-esteem on the low side, and looking in a mirror didn't help that] Also, one of the _best_ thinks around is a poster by Susan Sendon Buleat (sp last name), Go to your local magik/spiritual/occult store and ask for her, and you'll get a poster. $5 max. great stuff. Her stuff looks like a person, but, wait, is she an eagle? Or a tiger? Her eyes look like a at, but her nose and forhead look like a bird! But she's a woman! Wait a sec! :-) ---- Fractint is just great. On the other hand, you probably won't have the attention span to watch a film... unless you were just planning it as a backdrop. But David Lynch? You said you have a novice among you - do you really want to play with paranoia? I think Dennis Hopper would be a bit much. ---- GO OUTSIDE! Toys and music are fun, but I think that's something to be reserved later, when the trip has been going on for a long time. I love being outside, parks are especially nice, but if these people are novices I think avoiding crowds is a good thing. Just remember to tell them that really, no one will know. (You always think that people know you're tripping but they don't) Also, if one person took it, and it lasted for only 4 and a half hours w/o vis auls (this was one hit?) then 1 and a half or 2 is definately my recommendation. If there's any nervous moments, tell them that it's really nothing to worry about. The key is that you HAVE control. If you want to look at your hand and it appears swollen and wierd and nnot your own, you could be frightened, but if you choose to look at it and realize how amazing it is (think of everything th at your hand can do) then, suddenly, nothing is frightning..... Anyway....have a good time! BTW some toys are quite entertaining! Prisms especially. Sometimes kalidiscopes too. ---- One of my favorites id to listen to Surrealistic Pillow -- That Jefferson Airplane 1969 sound was made for acid. Also, old Frank Zappa (We're Only in it for the Money (original mix please)). Note that I was 8 when this stuff was coming out, but it's superior trip music. Those with true cerebral fortitude can try Captain Beefheart's Trout Mask Replica -- I never understood the words to this album until I dropped and heard it. Visual toy to die for: This kept a roomful of people happy for about 5 hours one time (but it was a considerable dose -- mega visual). We had a hanging lamp in the middle of the room -- from a long cord we hung one of those round multio-faceted cut-glass baubles. Then just at the center where it was hung we put a lit candle. When we swung the crystal in a circle we could wath 4 or 5 little balls chasing each other around a glowing central sun. When the facets made prismatic flashes, the remained hanging in the air before our fried retinas, so that the ball(s) seemed to be following a bright track with rainbow speckles. Have fun -- trippers can be amusing companions. Then again, one of my favorites is just to sit in the dark with "special music" your cortex can construct a pretty good atmosphere all on its own. ---- Try video games! Flight Simulator is great while tripping, but on a less technical note the advanced "Space Invaders"-type games can amuse for hours. A movie I find relaxing, visually stimulating, and enjoyable, on or off acid, is "Yellow Submarine" by the Beatles. You get the feeling the Beatles deliberately wrote much of the animation for their tripping buddies in the real world, all the way from the Blue Meanies to PepperLand. Your local video rental place should have it. As for toys, since LSD enhances the senses (or at least distorts them) use of simple toys with wild designs and textures works great for tripping. I suggest: Koosh Balls, kalediscopes (the real kind, though the computer kind works too), rubber balls, orange concentrate eaten WITHOUT dilution, lightsticks, Christmas tree lights, strobe lights; anything with a strange texture, wild pattern, or weird light. $5 will get you enough trip toys in any variety store for a 12-hour trip, and be sure to stop by the grocery store for interesting foods! ---- A personal favorite of mine is camping. If you're not in the mood for work, just make it real low-impact (bring a longburning fireplace log, water, food, lawn chairs, etc). I've had some incredible experiences sitting by the campfire listening to music and staring into the flames... Incidently, I almost always prefer the outdoors for tripping, whether camping or not. Walls get me down :) Mostly great recommendations. The acid test itself could have been better, but there were two main things wrong: when two of the four trippers cancelled, it put a damper on the rest of us; and all three of us decided we liked tripping with lotsa people around. Secondly, we were going into this expecting the drug to be the main focus of our entertainment, whereas we should have just tried to focus on doing something else really actively, and letting the drug just alter our experience of that other activity. Also, I have a small 10mw laser, so my friend decided to rent a fog machine to see how it looked. It looked WONDERFUL, especially when we played around with this crystal candlestick holder in the laser beam, causing all these insane angles. GREAT stuff. (I was always manning the laser so they would try to look up into the tube or anything ...) Again, thank you all for the suggestions!!! Brian ============================================================================= From: A. Haigh Newsgroups: alt.drugs Subject: Re: Ways to improve LSD trip Date: 2 Jan 1995 09:33:02 GMT Have sex. Eat mushrooms. Smoke dope. Crack some poppers. Perform some ritual magick (careful with this one ;). Watch some hard-core. Watch some grass growing. Listen to Pink Floyd/Enigma/MOZART!!!. Do any and all of the above in combination or seperately. Enjoy. @:|---- ============================================================================= From: J. Carlson Newsgroups: alt.drugs Subject: Re: Ways to improve LSD trip Date: 2 Jan 1995 Personally, I just like to sit alone in a completely dark room. -- Stimpy ============================================================================= Newsgroups: alt.drugs From: M.E. jackson Subject: trip tricks Date: Mon, 9 Jan 1995 1. Carry on a normal conversation with someone. while you are talking, stop making any noise, but keep moving your lips (mouthing what you would say normally). see how long it takes them to catch on. lf they ask you if you are doing it, completely deny it. act confused, and then tell them they must be tripping pretty hard to be blocking out what you are saying. Lots of fun for a first timer. 2. This is a pretty neat trick for people who are stoned, and it works even when you aren't on anything. tell someone that they are going to go through the floor. have them lie down on the floor face down, with their arms above their head. then pick up their arms so that they are stretched out and you are holding their upper body off the floor with their arms. tell them to relax and hang their head down, and keep their eyes closed. hold them like this for 10-20 seconds, and then VERY slowly lower their upper body back on to the floor the whole time saying that their arms are going to go right through the floor. this seriously feels like your arms pass right through the ground, and is trippy as hell. 3. Another funny thing to do is flick water onto a person, and see how long it takes them to realize it. just do a drop or two at a time. anybody else have any fun ideas? by the way, these things are intended for the trippers benefit, and if it bugs them or freaks them out, don't do it. the point here is not to fuck with their head in a malignant way, but to have some fun. have fun. ============================================================================= From: phem@ozemail.com.au (peter hem) Newsgroups: alt.drugs Subject: Suggestion for trippers. Date: 2 Mar 1995 09:06:02 GMT Message-ID: <3j41pq$58r@oznet03.ozemail.com.au> I have a suggestion for trippers. Go to a video store and hire a documentary about arctic and antartic wildlife, specifically penguins and seals. The penguins can be upto a metre tall. They swim around under the ice, and then suddenly spring up through a hole in the ice, into the air and eventually land on the ice. Penguins slide along on their bellies, using their wings [flippers] to push them along. They reach amazing speeds. :) The seals are huge. They can be upto two metres tall [males] and are exceedingly overweight. When two males compete for females they stand up to their full height, and smash their heads together as hard as possible. Maybe you don't agree with me, but just watching this antics while in the middle of a trip is most amusing. :) Give it a try, it's more fun than it perhaps sounds. Also, you might like to smoke some pot, to enhance the trip and make the video all the more amusing. Have fun.. ============================================================================= Newsgroups: alt.drugs From: D. Palmer Subject: Re: Suggestion for trippers. Date: Sat, 4 Mar 1995 05:43:19 GMT turn the tv to a channel where nothing is being broadcasted, at the high end of the uhf spectrum, ideally. turn the sound off. watch the static. put on side one of "happy trails" by quicksilver mesenger service. concentrate on the tv, nothing else. if you've been exposed to tv all your life, as most people have, your subconcious mind is programmed to expect to see some coherent image when it looks at a tv screen. it is trained to connect tv images to real-life phenomena. so if you look at the static long, it takes on images. after fooling your brain long enough---a few seconds, really---you begin to see color images, in bright colors in fact. i recall seeing an american flag with a parade of brilliant stars, perfect lines of world war one soldiers running with their bayonetts and then being shot all in perfectly organized lines, and images of spaceships travelling the universe. you can do this easily while tripping, but even while really stoned you can do it as well, if your subconcious mind is programmed sufficiently. --dave ============================================================================= From: Anonymous Newsgroups: alt.drugs Subject: Re: Ways to improve LSD trip Date: Tue, 3 Jan 95 13:59:41 -0500 Once I gave Pop Rocks(you know, those little candy deals that seem to pop inside your mouth) to a friend who was tripping. He said that the pops were more like little explosions in his head that echoed a lot. So there you go, cheap thrills. mike ============================================================================= movies: Ace Ventura Airplane Akira. Alice In Wonderland Alien Altered States Angel Heart Apocalypse Now Army Of Darkness Attack of the Killer Tomatos Bad Taste Midnight Express Bakara Battle Beyond the Stars Bedknobs and Broomsticks Blade Runner Blue Velvet Blues Brothers Boy and His Dog,A Brazill Breakfast Club,The Caddy Shack Cat In The Hat,The CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY; Charlie Brown cartoon Cheech and Chongs videos... Clockwork Orange Crow,The Dark Crystal,The Dazed and Confused Dead Alive (Brain Dead) Dead Ringers Diabolique DOLOMITE Doors,The Dr. Caligulari Dragonslayer Dumb and Dumber DUNE El Topo Eraserhead Evil Dead Falling Down Fantasia Fast Times at Ridgemont High Felix The Cat video. Fievel Goes West Fish Called Wanda,A flatliners Forbidden Planet Frank Zappa's 200 Motels fritz the cat Gift(Jane's Addiction) gremlins GROOVE TUBE Heavenly Creatures HEAVY METAL. Holy Mountain,The Images of Chaos In the Mouth of Madness Invaders from Mars Jacob's Ladder Jesus Christ Superstar Jurassic Park Knack,The Koyaanisqatsi Last Temptation Of Christ,The LAST UNICORN, THE Legend of The Overfiend I, II Liquid Skye Man Bites Dog MASK,THE Metropolis Minds Eye I & II Monkees movie,The Monty Pythons The Holy Grail My fair lady Mystery Science Theater 3000 Naked Lunch National Geographics Predators of the wild Natural Born Killers Nightmare Before Xmas,The Nosferatu Pink Flamingos pheonix and the dragon Pink Floyd, Live at Pompeii Point!,The Powaqqatsi Preditor Pulp Fiction Repo Man Rocky Horror Picture Show Scanners serpent and the rainbow,The Slaughterhouse Five Space Oddesy 2001 Star Wars (trilogy) Stargate Terminator I, II Testsuo this is spinal tap THX-1138 Toys Tron True Romance U.H.F. with "Weird Al" Unbearable Lightness of Being videos of the 5-D stereograms WALL,THE Wild Bunch,The Willy Wonka Wings of Desire Wizards XANADU Yellow Submarine ============================================================================= From: Lusus Newsgroups: alt.drugs.psychedelics Subject: Re: Trip essentials Date: 3 Nov 1995 01:29:41 GMT Even better yet, Glowsticks. The little plastic tubes with the funny liquid that you bend and they glow. Attach it to a string and play with that. Cigarettes. Even if you don't smoke, the ember in a dark room is amazing. The Lusus ============================================================================= From: D. Myrick Newsgroups: alt.drugs.psychedelics Subject: Re: Trip essentials Date: Sat, 04 Nov 95 03:59:28 GMT > I was wondering if any of you know of any good trip-games or toys. I'm > planning an acid test with a few experienced and a few un-expies, and need > mild trip material for the greens and some heavy visual articles for myself > and the like. Please post, many thanks. Uhhh, those transparent pens with glitter in them and flourecent stars are great under a black light along with flourecent tempra paints, crayons, chalks, oils and body soaps. For an added effect, use the above on mirrors or each other! Defraction gratings either held up to a HeNe or Argon laser beam is great (no you cannot look into the beam or fly for that matter). At local novelty shops you can find that sticky stuff that if you put it between your fingers and rub, smoke will appear to come from your hands. How about gluing a cow eye to your forhead? :-) Strobe lights are ok as long as no one is eptileptic (however it's spelled). Giant screen TV playing old 60's music video's and trip movies. Isao Tomita music playing in the background then when everyone peaks turn the music off and everyone will still think they are listening to music all through the trip. Tell everyone a little after they peak that your lawn needs to be mowed and take turns mowing! (I did this and lawn mowing on acid IS a trip!!!)(just make sure it's not summertime with a bunch of hornets, wasps, spiders etc. if you know what I mean). Go to a fireworks and/or laser show!!! (Especialy Epcot Center at Disney World since the entire show is a trip to start with). Things not to do for trip games, toys, activities: Never drive while under any influence other than your own natural self. Never watch Pink Floyd's "The Wall" and expect to be uplifted and energetic. Never jack with fire while frying unless you are outside and in a grassless field. (I'm a licenced pyrotech and we used to have pyro parties where we would bring all the fireworks that didn't go off in our public shows, fix them up or make our own and shoot them off while heavily frying). Never leave a plunger in a toilet. Never ask, "Do you smell shit" after someone comes out of the bathroom while tripping. Never smear chocolate on someone's body after they take a shit while tripping unless they are aware you did it. Always have plenty of toilet paper (I know I am on this shit thing but my biggest fear on acid is to take a shit in my pants or take an intentional shit and get it all over me and be so fucked up that it's a major task to pay attention long enough to get it all off). Never think it's cute taking a guy's ciggarette out of his hand while he's frying or he will be running around your house scared shitless that he dropped his ciggarrette on your furniture or carpet, thus starting a fire. Never carve a smoked Thanksgiving turkey or I promise you will see maggots. (for that matter try to stay away from knives since I've seen so many people carve their own flesh while tripping since it doesn't SEEM to hurt). No, you cannot light a light bulb by sticking your dick in a light socket while holding a bulb in your mouth. Never trip around kids. (Kids have enough problems without having to be around a bunch of idiots on acid as roll models). Yes, there might be a little part of God in all of us but that doesn't mean you are Jesus Christ. The big jelly worms that sneak around the corners of your furniture and laugh are there for your enjoyment, they are your friends not BIG MAGGOTS. Never give large doses of acid to assholes or bullys since it's a waste and they are much more annoying while fried. (though you might be able to kick their ass finnaly :-) ) Never, ever, look at or even talk about scorpions while tripping. Always take a test hit first to check it's potency since the last thing you want to do is take a large dose then realize that you were not the "king of acid" or "tripmaster" you though you were and lead everyone to beleive. Never answer the phone while tripping since it's usualy going to be bad news and you won't be able to understand a damn thing they are saying anyhow, you will make no sense to them, you will become paranoid as shit that they will send the cops over and you will pause and keep saying "huh?" alot. If you start to see peacocks hop around the room, bounce off your head, the ceiling has giant pimples, gnomes start to peak out and tease you and your arms stretch out through walls then a few miles down the street while they are changing liquid chrystal colors, then it's a sure sign that it's not a good time to make up with your parents, especialy don't start philosphical conversations with them about God, politics etc. or you will be locked up for life.