Toronto to host internation marijuana expo

I was going to go but I forgot about it until this morning, then after I got into the car to drive down, I forgot where it was being held. I hate when that happens.

Marco Renda, who is organizing the expo, said he expects well over 30,000 visitors, including many from the United States and Europe.

Marijuana will not be available at the expo, although registered medical users are welcome to bring cannabis to smoke in a marijuana vaporization room, he said. Vaporization is a process in which hot air is pushed through a chamber containing marijuana. That air is then pushed into a separate chamber, and then inhaled. "Vaporization is a way of using cannabis in a healthier mode because there's no combustion," said Renda, who is a registered grower of marijuana. He is also a registered user of the drug, which he uses to mitigate symptoms of hepatitis C.

"Less than two per cent of the licensed cannabis card holders in Canada actually buy the medicine from the government," he said, adding that many users get the drug from so-called compassion clubs. He said government investment in the growth of medical marijuana is inadequate. As of June 2009, there are just over 4,000 registered medical marijuana users in the country.

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The evil weed is de-criminalized in Canada for small amounts for personal use, but IMO it should be made available through government outlets. It would add huge amounts of money to the public coffers and would probably reduce some of the carnage associated with alcohol abuse as I believe many drinkers would opt for pot, instead.

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Humber College to International Space Station: Do you copy?

Four community college students from Toronto contacted the space station through a hand-built apparatus, making them the first college-level students in the world to do so. It took them more than a year and a half to build the transceiver with many setbacks along the way, but in the end, the successful contact was so overwhelming that one of the students broke down and cried.

A number of the campus students spoke with U.S. astronaut Sandra Magnus for about ten minutes while she hurtled through space at 27,000 kilometres per hour.

The students' professor called his students' accomplishment the highlight of his career.

In a strange coincidence, I have a personal connection to this story. I happen to have attended Humber College when I was a youth. It's a small world, isn't it? Even when you're talking to someone out in space.

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