Interview with DudeGrowsWeed

Q: Hi there, @DudeGrowsWeed. How are you feeling? What are you up to today?
A: I'm feeling much better these days, thanks for asking. Today I'm working on updating my diaries, watching some TV and playing some guitar. Oh, and I might be smoking here and there too ;)

Q: Tell us a bit about yourself. Where are you from? How old are you? What do you do for living? Family, pets? What's your dream?
A: Originally I'm from New York. But I've lived in Virginia, Florida, Tennessee and currently I'm living in Vermont. I just turned 50 in the spring (still can't believe that). I work for a software company providing tech support. I'm married with 2 sons and a parakeet. My dream would be to grow cannabis for a living, I'd love to start a small cannabis farm specializing in high quality flower, similar to craft brewers in the beer industry.

Q: Do you sell weed or grow for personal use only? What are your absolute favorites?
A: Personal use only, I never sell. Sometimes I'll give or trade with friends, but I'm not interested in selling - at least not on a personal level. If things change, I'd love to have my own farm and sell to dispensaries. But I'm not interested in participating in the black market.

Q: How and why did you start going weed? Please tell us about your first try.
A: I started growing weed because I wanted to spend less on buying weed and also wanted to stop depending on unreliable dealers. My first try was back in the early 90's. I didn't have any idea what I was doing and bought whatever I could find at the local Home Depot (lights, containers, soil, etc.). There was not a lot of material available at that time on growing weed. I read as many High Times articles as I could, but was more or less clueless. I grew bag seeds, most of the seedlings died, but a few survived. However, after about a month we started noticing a helicopter flying low and hovering near our house every afternoon. Fearing they were some kind of law enforcement we killed all of the surviving plants and shut down the operation all together.

Q. What do you think about GrowDiaries? Why do you find it useful? What should we improve? Have you met any members offline?
A: I love Grow Diaries! This is my favorite social media'esque site!! Overall, the vibe from the other members is very positive. I find Grow Diaries super useful. Before I actually joined GD myself, I did lots or research on strains as well as growing equipment. Now, I find it great to be able to look back at my diaries and evaluate, what went right, what went wrong, how I might be able to improve next time, etc…. As far as improving GD, I'll talk about the GOM contest and grower questions/answers specifically. I think when grow questions with answers go without a best answer selected for a week the diary owner should be notified and prompted to select a best answer. If after 2 weeks there is still not a best answer selected, the best answer should be automatically selected based on the number of likes the available answers have received. I have a few friends who also grow, but have not met anyone in person from Grow Diaries yet. I am open to it. Any growers in the Southern Vermont area should feel free to hit me up.

Q: Who are the growers you are looking up to? Who's your favorite canna celebrity?
A: Growers I look up to here would have to include @Hawkbo, @PharmaZ, and @Tryhard. Their plants always look gorgeous. @SpinnerGrow and @Athos are also impressive, they crushed it in last months GOM contest. Favorite canna celebrities would include Tommy Chong, Ed Rosenthal, as well as the Dude and Scotty Real from the Dude Grows show (no relation btw).

Q: How far is the world from global legalization?
A: Its still farther away than I would like. I hope if the US can finally accept that there are tons of benefits and move cannabis from Schedule 1 to Schedule 2, the rest of the world would follow (or maybe the US will follow the rest of the world).

Q: How do you see future of GrowDiaries?
A: Hopefully GrowDiaries continues to be a positive place where growers can share their experiences and help one another. I'd hate to see it become another outlet for venting frustrations and negativity like Facebook, Twitter, etc…

Q: Who should we interview next? Any final words?
A: If you have not interviewed @PharmaZ yet, I'd recommend interviewing him. @SpinnerGrow and/or @Athos would be other good candidates. For my final words I'd just like to say thank you to everyone here in the GD family for all of the kind comments and PM's I received after my accident. It really helped me get through a difficult time.