OC JEMM is the monthly medical marijuana magazine for Orange County! OC JEMM is available for free at all medical marijuana dispensaries and clinics throughout the O.C., Long Beach, and South East L.A. On the stands now!

Scheduled for Saturday May 15^th on the boardwalk at Venice Beach, Greenerfest is a free concert festival calling attention to environmentally-friendly products, green technologies, and sustainable living. Festival organizers emphasize the importance of developing a robust industrial hemp industry as an essential part of future environmental policy, as humanity weans itself from fossil fuels and other nonrenewable resources. Greenerfest features a lineup of high-profile musical performers and will also stream live on the web.

Although festival organizers argue that environmental and health consciousness “must include” industrial hemp, Greenerfest will otherwise largely avoid the subject of marijuana use (leaving that to Hempfest and other events to tackle). Instead, Greenerfest describes itself as “a family day of fun, reaching out to mainstream society and media to present them with renewable alternatives to petrochemicals, coal and deforestation for paper and timber needs.”

The folks behind Greenerfest take issue with the fact that, though many corporations claim they’re “going green,” they have not significantly changed the way they do business. Objecting to this “greenwash,” festival organizers nonetheless insist that Greenerfest is an “evolutionary” event, and not a protest.

Hosted by Vivian McPeak (Seattle Hempfest Director) and writer-futurist George Clayton Johnson (Star Trek, Twilight Zone), Greenerfest has invited musical guests Layzie Bone of Bone Thugs N Harmony, Mitch Margo (The Tokens), Todd Wolfe (Sheryl Crowe), and other local performers and speakers. Also on hand will be representatives from solar, healthy food, and other “green” technology industries.

The day’s event wraps up with a “GREENMAN PARTY” – to which everyone is invited to dress and paint themselves in green, with gifts and prizes going to the “zaniest green characters.”

For more info: http://greenerfest.com/

This is your spider on marijuana

Spiderman fans already know that spider silk is both strong and pliant, able to stretch without breaking.  Now scientists at MIT’s engineering department have revealed that, when spider silk is combined with a weak material, the resulting compound is strong and flexible.

The scientists’ end goal is to be able to mimic the unique crystal structure of spider silk and synthetically create new, stretchy-yet-tough materials out of ordinary ones. Researchers have proposed using hemp as one of the base materials with which this new substance could be combined.

A word to the wise, though: Please keep your spiders sober, at least while they’re working. The photo shows the half-assed web that one spider spun after NASA scientists gave it marijuana. (Though it’s much better than the spiderwebs made under the influences of caffeine and sleeping pills!)

Check out more mile-high spiderwebs here.