GROWING POT COULD RESULT IN YOUR JOINT BEING BLOWN TO HELL

The city's first attempt to blow up a marijuana grow house on Mary
Jane Street was successful in the sense that the unsafe building has
been wiped off the face of the Earth.

This is a good lesson to those who still think smoking pot is funny.

However the collateral damage from the window-rattling explosion -
I'm referring to the two adjacent houses, a mailbox, two hydro poles,
a city works van and a dog house that were also obliterated - shows
the city still needs to make adjustments in the force of the charge.

The sight of a frail old woman getting off the bus with her single
bag of groceries and shuffling up to a smoking pit where her white
and green bungalow used to stand was distressing for those who had
gathered to watch the grow-op next door blasted to bits.

It really dampened what was supposed to be a festive, community event.

Fortunately, the house on the other side was a rental and if there
were tenants at home when the building flew off its foundation,
nobody of substance has come forward to complain.

A cross-eyed Siamese cat discovered across town on top of the Benner
Street water tower is believed to have been launched from the rental house.

An empty bird cage hanging high in a maple tree three blocks away may
also have been propelled skyward in the over-enthusiastic blast.

The idea of blowing up grow-ops is essentially a municipal
cost-cutting measure. After being used for indoor agriculture, these
properties are often unfit for human habitation because of mould,
pesticide residue and Jimi Hendrix posters.

It costs the city more in staff time to bring these grow-op houses up
to building code than to simply blow them to smithereens.

And a big bang sends a strong message to drug dealers who often
neglect these pot houses, letting dandelions flourish on front lawns
and leaving sidewalks unshovelled for months.

But the level of the explosive demolition clearly needs tweaking.

The plan was to cause an implosion in which the walls of the target
house fold inwards and the roof floats down like a big bird into a dusty nest.

With no demolition experts on staff, the city turned to the Culture
and Heritage Department, which has been studying the city's built
heritage closely.

Department director Wade Bullcalf recommended using a barrel of vinyl
chloride from the contaminated recreation complex site as an explosive.

But in a test blast on a house owing three months of back taxes, a
full barrel proved a little too destructive.

The monster blast, heard as far away as Bolsover, left a crater the
size of an open pit mine, which you can still see looking west from Wal-Mart.

Fortunately, the test house, the original farmhouse on Harvie
Settlement Road was isolated. And wiping every living thing off the
landscape saved the developer working in the area the trouble.

Still, in more densely populated areas, it was obvious a barrel of
vinyl chloride was over the top.

On Mary Jane Street, the city used four coffee tins of vinyl
chloride, one at each corner of the marijuana house.

Still way too much punch.

"Next time we'll try cans of decaf," said Bullcalf, his face
blackened with soot.

Although the city will no doubt face lawsuits for accidentally
blowing up two houses, there is some good news.

The hospital, which is always looking for houses to knock down for
parking, has agreed to buy the three rubble strewn lots, which are
only a block away from the emergency entrance.

"It all turned out for the best," said Bullcalf.

"But I'm sure The Packet will find something negative."