HB

Mmm…Xanax

I’ve always wanted to try Xanax coz the 2mg bars just looks so sexy.
Thus, I decided to go shopping for some Xanax today. It’s a relatively
short acting benzodiazepine. Xanax is the same drug that Noelle Bush
(the niece of the current United States president George Bush) was
arrested for because she tried to pass off a fraudulent prescription
[cnn.com]. The first pharmacy I went to regarded me with suspicion when
I asked for Xanax. They didn’t want to sell it without a prescription
and told me to get some at the clinic instead. I got a general feeling
of not being welcome the moment I mentioned Xanax.

The second pharmacy I went to was more accommodating. They didn’t
know what Xanax was and asked me to write down the name of a piece of
paper. I wrote down Xanax, Alzoram (the Malaysian generic brand name)
and Alprazolam (the chemical name). The old lady there asked his son to
read the paper and he instantly recognized Alprazolam. He told the old
lady it’s sleeping pills (?) asked where it’s kept.

She said they have some at the back and he went over to rummage
about under a cabinet. I was feeling hopeful at this point, I didn’t
even get asked for my prescription script. He didn’t find any at the
back and rummaged about some more in a box of Handiplast (the st
bandage). He came out with a stack of blister packs tied together with
a rubber band from the box of Handiplast. Don’t ask me why it was kept
there, I was puzzled too.

Xanax/alprazolam/0.25mg

The old lady asked me who the medication was for and I made up a
cock and bull story about doing an exhibition about benzodiazepines for
my university and I was going to stick one pill on a piece of manila
card. I don’t know if she actually believed that story (I had the
feeling she didn’t from the look on her face) but there was not
questions asked after that. I got the impression that this is a “no
questions asked” pharmacy if you catch my drift. The guy came back at
this point and asked me how many blister packs I wanted. I examined one
of the blister pack and saw that it’s brand name Xanax pills with each
tablet containing 0.25 mg of alprazolam. I was hoping that they carry
the beautiful 2 mg pills, but oh well, this will work perfectly well
too. There were 10 tablets in the blister pack, which comes to 2.5 mg.

I decided to just go for one blister pack and it was sold to me, for
RM7 (A$3.50). This is the brand name Xanax (alprazolam) marketed by
Upjohn pharmaceuticals (the old name, they have since merged with
Pharmacia). On a side note, I’ve read in the newspapers that being
caught with possession of Xanax pills without a prescription carries a
RM2000 fine and/or a 2 year jail. Someone who was caught with 24 pills
got that sentence recently. They were credited as “upjohn” pills
though, which further illustrates that mainstream journalism has their
heads planted firmly up their ass when reporting on technical or drug
issues. Upjohn is a pharmaceuticals company, not a drug name.

Upjohn 29/single score at back

Trip Report

Substance name: Alprazolam (Xanax)
Street names: Z-bars, bars, Upjohn (in Malaysia)
Dosage: 2.5 mg (10 x 0.25 mg) taken orally in a mixture of
powder, broken off bits and whole pills. The pills seem rather crumbly
and some broke into pieces as soon as I pressed it from the blister
pack. I do not have any tolerance to benzodiazepines.
Usual recreational dosage for people with no benzodiazepine tolerance: 1-2 mg
Pills: White oval pills with Upjohn 29 imprinted on one side and
a single score on the other side. The pills have beveled edges. Each
pill contains 0.25 mg of alprazolam. They come in a blister pack
containing 10 pills for a total of 2.5 mg, if you eat them all.

T+ 0:00
I took all 10 pills at 11:00 pm sharp. The pills are in a mixture of
powder, bits of tablets and whole tablets. This was because the pills
are either very brittle or this is old stock so they break easily. The
tablets tasted like powdered mint (without any hint of sweetness) at
first and very bitter when i washed it down with water.
T+ 0:05
noticed some clumsiness and a heaviness in the head and a general feeling of being mildly stoned only 5 minutes later (!!!)
T+ 0:08
a feeling of not being very sober, but i can’t put my finger on what
exactly gave me this feeling of non-sobriety. i just feel not very
sober. the medical term for this is derealisation i believe.
T+ 0:14
mild nausea. a feeling of numbness in my extremities, especially the
fingers, very much like the feeling you get when you’re starting to get
drunk. Heaviness of the head is present all throughout the time.
T+ 0:18
feeling a kind of “super enhanced sight”. its like i can see every
movement i make is in full frame and with a high framerate. don’t
really know how to explain it besides this. it feels like the start of
a LSD trip visually, everything looks enhanced, colors stand out etc,
but this is very mild. clumsiness did not get any worse. numbness in
extremities still present.
T+ 0:20
a mild euphoria. not like ecstasy euphoria but more like codeine
euphoria. aka stupid euphoria. 🙂 a better word will be contentment.
palms are feeling sweaty, which is peculiar for me since i seldom get
sweaty palms
T+ 0:22
pupils VERY dilated (?!?!?!) even in bright light. looking at myself in
the mirror feels wierd. uneven dilation. my left pupil is more dilated
than the right one.
T+ 0:30
feeling contented and relaxed. not much progression other than that.
feeling slightly disappointed due to high expectations. i’m more of a
fan of “fuck me up” drugs like LSD which provides cool visuals and
wierd trains of thoughts.
T+ 0:40
hmm…feeling slightly sleepy now.
T+ 0:43
er…i’m trying to fight this feeling of being sleepy. it’s getting stronger. heh.
T+ 0:50
i caught myself staring at a half eaten chocolate bar with a bit of
chocolate sticking out in an interesting manner. stop hypnotizing me
dammit.
T+ 1:00
yawn. i’m trying to keep an open mind but it seems that this is all
Xanax has to offer. a feeling of being (very) mildly drunk and
admittedly quite significant relaxation. not much euphoria to speak of.
valium (another benzodiazepine) provides much more euphoria compared to
this.
T+ 1:10
wtf? i feel myself returning to baseline already. baseline = normal (sober) state
T+ 1:15
i still felt slightly clumsy and my body feels heavier than usual when
walking. not much more numbness in the fingers and i’m still feeling
sleepy.
T+ 1:20
noticed some problems with memory. i dropped my cell phone to the floor
earlier and didn’t remember to retrieve it until 30 minutes later.
T+ 1:26
hehehe
walking arond in the dark with my arms swinging freaked me out
considerably. and i thought Xanax was supposed to be prescribed for
anxiety and panic attacks. =D
T+ 1:30
feeling close to baseline now. i suspect i’ll have a nice deep sleep later tonight too. 🙂
T+ 1:40
a nice afterglow can be felt. still feeling contended and happy.
walking still feels a bit strange, but nice. i just noticed that time
passes pretty damn fast on Xanax. i didn’t even notice that nearly 2
hours have passed since i took the pills. hmm…i wonder what i did in
those two hours since it didn’t felt like i did much at all. 🙂
T+ 2:20
i did another time jump. don’t ask me where the past 40 minutes went, coz i seriously don’t know. i wasn’t even doing anything.

Afternotes:
I don’t see the appeal in taking Xanax by itself. It’s basically just a
chill pill, and I’m not into this particular class of drugs. I can see
its value in helping with meth/coke/other stimulant comedowns, but when
taken on its own, it doesn’t have very much to offer. Possible good
combos will be Xanax + alcohol (be careful, a lot of deaths has been
attributed to this combination) and Xanax + cannabis (the sedative
effects will probably provide a nice synergy). Personally, I feel
Valium (diazepam) would be a much better alternative if you like
benzodiazepines. Valium actually gives pretty good euphoria when taken
in recreational doses. An interesting thing with Xanax is time seems to
go much faster. It’s almost as if time jumps forward. One minute you
look at the clock and it’s 2:15 am. You feel that only a minute has
passed but next time you look, the time is already 2:45 am and you’re
left scratching your head about what happened during the last 30
minutes coz you don’t remember doing anything at all. Huh? It happened
a lot of times during the trip too. Very bizarre.

Caution:
Being in possession of prescription drugs without a prescription could be against the law in your country.

Additional info site:
Always follow a doctor’s instructions when taking prescription medications like Xanax. Deviate from doctor’s orders and take more of the said drugs, and you might find yourself addicted to prescribed drugs in no time.