The Smell of Meth

Yesterday, I learned what meth smells like.

I was on my way from my car up to the feed store when a red SUV whips into the parking lot, nearly running me over.  She parked stupid and I walked past her into the store.  I'm in the store, explaining the near death experience to my friend the cashier when the gal comes in.  I step aside because she's obviously in a hurry, but she's only looking for the bathroom.

Once she's in the ladies' room, my friend tells me she thinks the gal is on meth.  (Apparently, my friend sees a lot of meth heads at the feed store, coming in to use the bathroom.)  Anyway, we go back to chatting and then the gal comes out of the bathroom, grabs a jumbo bag of 'for people'* sunflower seeds and slaps them on the counter in front of me.  As my friend is ringing her up, I start smelling this gag-worthy chemical odor.  And then the super-twitchy gal starts talking about this accident her husband was in just up the road when all I want her to do it leave.  (Although I did ask her where 'up the road' the accident was because I was headed in that direction, but it was off on a side road.  Yay.)

Anyway, she finally tears out of there and I ask my friend "is that what meth smells like?'  She nods.  Gross.  It was like 'bad home perm' mixed with nail polish remover mixed with 'I haven't bathed'.  The sad thing was this gal was dressed nice and looked nice, she drove a nice car... You never know, I guess.

By the time I got up the highway, I could see the blue lights flashing up the side road where the accident occurred.  If I could smell her, the cops should be able to smell her and do something.  But probably not.

From what I've been told, meth is a big problem around here.  I did encounter a meth head once before.  She looked like she'd crawled up out of the depths of Middle Earth.  But she didn't stink of chemicals.  Maybe that meant she was a user and the gal yesterday was a manufacturer.  Who knows.

I'm continually confused about people doing drugs.  I mean, I understand that once you're hooked, you're hooked, but who the hell would do meth the first time?  Is it like 'oh, please, let me try some of that highly addictive shit with the weird ass mix of chemicals in it you cooked up in your trailer'?  Might as well just shoot yourself in the head, the results are the same in the long run.  Feh.

Your brain is your only means of survival.  Why would you mess with that?

Jus' sayin'.

*Not to be confused with the 40 lb bag of sunflower seeds they sell as bird feed.