Marijuana stinks. Well, to me, it smells like paradise, but you know what I mean. And it’s one of those smells that most of us are born loving, like bacon or coffee, so in a way, it’s sacrilegious to cover it up. But I get it. Your living situation might not let you blow smoke wherever you want, and at least one person a day comes into our Durango dispensary to ask about ways to mask cannabis’s funk, so this week, I decided to write about it.

First off, please don’t do that dumb thing where you light a ton of incense and shove a towel under the door; you might as well also put a sign on the door that says, “I’m totally smoking pot in here.” I mean, the towel/incense route might get you by occasionally, but it’s not a long-term fix. So, as my first tip, don’t smoke in a box like your bedroom. Go outside. Sit on the roof. Open the window and stick your head out. If you want to throw the towel into the mix, do it, but ventilation and fresh air are the keys.

As my next tip, if lighting a plant on fire and standing in the smoke is too stinky for you, try an edible because there’s obviously no fire involved, or a vape pen. With a cannabis vaporizer pen, the ceramic atomizer (or wick system) inside essentially boils the THC oil, so a vapor is created as opposed to smoke. Vapors don’t cling or linger like smoke, so the minimal smell that exists doesn’t linger. For real, when it comes to “smoking,” there’s nothing more discrete than vaping.

That being said, let’s say you’re dead-set on smoking flower and avoiding the smell; you need to make a “sploof.” Step one: take a cardboard tube (like an empty toilet paper or paper towel tube) and fill it full of dryer sheets. In a pinch, you can spray perfume on toilet paper and use it to stuff the tube. Next, take a single dryer sheet and cover one end of the tube, and tape it in place (or secure it to the tube with a hair tie). Now all you have to do is take a hit and blow it through the tube (please blow through the end that isn’t covered with a dryer sheet). The smoke will travel through all the dryer sheets inside your sploof and the scent will be filtered out. These things work exceedingly well. In fact, they also sell commercial sploofs like the Smoke Buddy that use replaceable charcoal filters to eliminate smells, and that beats a bunch of burning incense any day.

But what about hiding the smell of unsmoked flower? Is that the question you really wanted me to answer? The only reason I ask is that quite a few of our customers come in here looking for “smell-proof bags,” which isn’t something we sell. I’d image that at least one of the people who’ve asked me was looking for a smell-proof bag so they could ship their pot home or bring it on the plane, but please, DON’T DO THIS. They’ll find it, and it’s illegal. For one, dogs can smell anything, and there’s no such thing as a smell-proof bag that’s also x-ray proof, so you simply shouldn’t risk it. Ever. However, if you have a roommate who sniffs around your room like a bloodhound looking for your stash when you’re gone, or if you’re unlucky enough to still live with your parents after turning 21, you might have a legitimate reason to hide the smell of your fresh flower, so I’ll talk about it.

The trendiest way to do this is with a Skunk Bag, which is a “smell-proof” backpack or small bag with built-in charcoal filtration devices. But the problem with these things is that they all have a branded skunk emblem embroidered on the bag, and if you’re trying to hide your pot from a roommate that knows about skunk bags, that little emblem will make your stash obvious. So, instead of spending tons of money online for a smell-proof bag, just use a mason jar. They’re cheap, you probably have a few in your kitchen right now, and glass is always the best thing in which to store your pot. Just keep it out of the sun (and away from prying eyes), and your pot will stay fresh and not stink all at the same time.

Lastly, please remember that we become desensitized to smells pretty quickly. Just about every customer who walks into our dispensary compliments how fragrant our store is, but it always takes me a second to figure out what they’re talking about—if you spend eight hours in a room full of pot, you stop smelling the pot. So, if you get high in a room and sit there for a while, it’ll stop smelling to you, but anyone who walks in will know exactly what you’ve been doing. Keep it ventilated, use a sploof, and keep your pot in a sealed mason jar; you’ll be good to go. Or, if you’re like me and you like to keep the smell loud and proud, come see us at 208 Parker Avenue and take a sniff of what we have to offer (so long as you’re over 21 with a valid I.D.) because We’re Your Best Buds!

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