“He said people who take this batch of white fluff LSD see the bio-dome”. Naturally I was quite curious what this presumed deranged college student hippie drug addict drop out was suggesting exactly. I wasn’t privy to the conversation or an optical evaluation of the speaker but Peter knew the guy through a friend and had visited him at his apartment somewhere in the student ghetto on the east side of UF campus. I believe he lived in in ******* apartment complex if I remember correctly. “What’s white fluff?". “Its a type of LSD cook/batch that has been going around the since the 60’s or 70’s its supposed to still be the same formula/method of making it” Peter told me. I was suspicious. The first LSD I had taken was blue and it had a lightening bolt on it. This was just a simple white piece of hard and thick paper with no perforated sections. I was looking at a rectangle aprox. one inch long and ¼ of an inch wide. After looking at it for some time I did notice there were very faint gray lines which formed squares along the small rectangle. Everything I was looking at and listening to at that moment promoted less and less confidence that what I was holding in my amazing hand contained any LSD.
I didn’t say anything immediately. My mind was beginning to drift towards notions of swindlers tricks, motivated college student-drug-addicts desperate for more money saying anything to get more money to feed their mysterious addictions. ‘This guy didn’t even bother making a design or anything he just sold poor Peter a small strip of white paper for $20.00. In 1996 a piece of thick white paper cost approximately $0.01 - $0.5 and this swindler sold Peter about %0.001 of a sheet. It looked like it could have been used for wedding or graduation invitations; my mom had paper like this for crafts and stuff. I don’t know what I said but I politely told Peter I believed, it was a possibility, that he got totally screwed by this drug addict college hippie character. I brought up the lack of perforations, the missing artwork, tall tails of a bio dome sighting and the name, which he probably made up on the spot. I was day dreaming about selling small white pieces of paper, with designs on them, as LSD. At $5.00 a dose I could make quite a bit of money selling construction paper as LSD doses, but then what. My mind became overloaded when attending to the matter of selling people fake drugs and what it would look like from a practical point of view. It seemed to me that my victims would surely figure it out eventually. My brain stopped and focused on this aspect plus the subsequent potential outcomes which caused the scenes and scenarios in my mind to descend into an uncomfortable chaos, negative vibes flashed and splashed with visions of violence. There were many factors to consider and I wasn’t feeling comfortable with the outcomes of the make-believe scenes. I decided against selling small pieces of paper as LSD to unsuspecting buyers.
We had seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas staring Johnny Depp a few weeks prior at the Movie Theatre’s on Windmeadows Blvd close to Archer Rd. We were skipping school and as I remember we smoked a fairly large joint before watching what was to be one of my favorite movies. We enjoyed the movie so much that we didn’t leave the theater when it ended. Instead we went to the men’s bathroom, had some puff’s of a cigarette, then went into a different showing which had begun 20 minutes prior We sat there and watched the entire movie again. Based solely on the fact that I had taken LSD a few times and seen Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, I was feeling as though I knew more than most on the subject of LSD or ‘acid’ as we often called it. Armed with the information I had at the time, you wouldn’t have caught me buying strips of paper for $20 called ‘Fluff’. I wouldn’t havre fallen for flights of fancy foolish biodome siting story bullshit.
If Peter bought fake acid or if he did not was on the forefront of my mind as we drove around town in his well kept and very cherished 1981 black Saab. Peter’s black 1984 Saab always smelled of cheap oily air fresheners which were meant to overpower the smell of cigarettes which had made its way into the fabric and cushions of his beloved automobile. The air conditioning didn’t work and was never going to work. We didn’t really care that Peter’s car was hot as a desert inside or that the stereo should have been replaced years prior. The feeling of freedom and adulthood overpowered any objections to being slightly uncomfortable. It was midday in July. Without looking at a historical calender for weather I can safely state the conditions were miserable ; hot & humid with the bright sun bursting its heat over us as we drove around in a 2 door black car with the windows down. The sun was vivid and bright which over exposed objects outside.
We were going to several Publix supermarkets in Gainesville to steal packs of marlboro and Camel cigarettes so we would have enough for the long trip to Black Mountain, North Carolina. We weren’t out on a random crime spree, 4 packs of Camel Lights and 4 packs of Marlboro Reds was our goal and we were already half way there. We were willing to pay full price for the much sought after sinful smokes and would have preferred buying them legally to stealing but because of our age, we weren’t allowed and therefore had to steal them. Quite frankly we had no choice.
When Imma and I would goto the Gainesville Mall which sat where Lowe’s now sits off NW 13th St, one could smell the odor of 2nd hand smoke when walking in. To this day, if I smell the right combination of mist from an indoor water fountain that has been treated slightly with chlorine, combined with the distant smell of a cigarette as it wisps through the air, it immediately brings me back to being a very small boy, walking around a dark almost pitch black Gainesville Mall. I used to love throwing penny’s into those indoor fountains. I remember how I felt when I looked at the glimmering colored lights and small streams of water that shot out of the mysterious penny-ponds. As I recall, every public place smelled like cigarettes when I was child. Years later, when working at the University of Florida from 2003-2008, I would occasionally step foot in an old office or hallway on campus and immediately recognize the smell of old stale smoke left over from the 1980’s and 90’s from when people smoked everywhere including inside restaurants.
In 1996 when one walked into Publix or any supermarket in America, there were packs of Cigarette displays placed on the counters at the customer service department and sometimes at every register too. They were not behind the counter and anyone walking by could take as many packs as they wanted for when they checked out. It was possible to buy the cigarettes at the customer service counter but it wasn’t a requirement. Often times customers would inform the cashier who would inform the bag boy who would inform the customer service representative who would give the bag boy the cigarettes so he could bring them to the cashier who would then ring them up. Usually the displays were Marlboro and Camel. What I would do is go into a Publix and begin shopping. I would shop in a genuine manner making sure to play things as cool and as real as possible. After I had done some shopping I would organiclly and natrually breeze near by the customer service dept and casually toss 2-3 packs of smokes in the grocery cart. Its worth mentioning I did not wear the clothes I normally wore when I would do this. I would make sure to wear what I wore to church on Sundays which today I would describe as a business casual look. As I would continue to fake shop, slowly and diligently making my way down one isle at at in an effort to not forget any of my groceries, I would quickly place a pack of cigarettes into the waste-ban of my boxers so they were situated above the line of my pants waste but below the line of my boxers. One by one I would place each pack into its hiding place as I continued to select groceries for the cart. Many may be shocked to learn I did not buy the groceries nor did I return them to the shelves. I would eventually leave the cart somewhere and make my way towards the exit.
Every step of the way I had a story or an excuse for what I was doing or had done. The cigarettes were for my mother or father who I was shopping with and ‘they’re right over there, or they were a second ago, I’ll go find them now’… I had done this routine well over 20 times and never once had I been approached by an employee or found out in any way. I was getting good at stealing packs of cigarettes.
We were at our last Publixl which was and still is located on NW 43rd street and NW 16th ave in Gainesville. This was referred to as the 'millhopper' Publix as 43rd street used to be referred to as "Millhopper" road. This title was offically given to NW 53rd Ave as it is the road which goes directly passed Devil's Mill-hopper Sinkhole state park. The publix located on the corner of 43rd St. and 53rd. Ave (aka Millhopper road), less than 1/2 mile from Devil's Millhopper sinkhole, was referred to as the 'Hunters Crossing' Publix and was the closest publix to our houses. This was a more recently constructed publix and at the time it had opened 1-2 years prior. I stole cigarettes from Hunters Crossing and Millhopper publix's most frequently as they were the two closest ones.
The majority of my life I had been going to Mill hopper publix and before that I vaguely remember going to a small supermarket off NW 6th Ave which I believe was called Wards supermarket ****. Wards and the Millhopper publix had a machine that customers could put peanuts in. What came out after you turned it on was fresh ground peanut butter. This device and the one that ground up coffee beans were two of my favorite stops due to my love of peanut butter and my love of the smell of coffee beans, especially of the freshly ground variety.
When I passed by the steadfast & historic peanut grinder in Millhopper publix that day I felt guilt and shame. For a brief second I saw myself sitting in a shopping cart as a young child while my mom puts peanuts into the grinder. I couldn't recall the last time I had used or wanted to use freshly ground peanut butter. I still enjoyed a good peanut butter and honey sandwhich fairly frequently but the peanut butter at our home was and had been for some time, in glass jars. I couldn't recall when the switch had been made or why and within seconds I genuinely have cared less. There were more important things to focus on. A woman who had worked at Millhopper Publix since I was in diapers was saying a brief waving hello. She didn't even know my name or I hers but I knew she would be sad and disappointed if she knew about the packs of Marlboro Reds and Camel Lights I had stuffed in my boxers. She didn't suspect a thing and I didn't give her anything to suspect. Yes indeed. I was becoming quite good at stealing cigarettes and in the back of my mind thoughts were beginning to take form on the subject of making this a regular thing, something I could turn into a unique hustle to make money.
I was walking back to the heat tempered Saab, playing things cool and smiling at Peter. We had done it! I had in my posession the last 3 packs we needed. I was almost to the Saab when I heard a man behind me say "stop right there". I knew the man's voice. My heart sank as its beatings per minute increased quickly. It was a rival
