Snow Capped Mountains

Snow is not falling on the beaches as much as it used to according to the Miami Herald. Capitalizing on the research findings by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Substance Abuse at the hard-to-believe-its-a-real-college-with-the-silly-name Nova Southeastern University, Floridians don't want to keep paying high prices for low-quality blow. Um, duh! Still, Miami's partiers are also turning to prescription pills instead of nose candy.

And now, a blockquote from the Miami New Times 2005 series on the Miami cocaine trade for some historical perspective:

"The amount of money produced by Miami's coke industry in the Eighties was unlike anything ever seen in the nation's history. So much cash was pouring into town from the wholesale and retail sectors of the trade that its sheer bulk presented logistical problems for the banks enthusiastically and unquestioningly accepting it. The U.S. Treasury Department made a couple of startling calculations: A full-size suitcase stuffed with twenty-dollar bills could hold roughly a half-million dollars, yet many millions were being deposited every day. How to count it all? Also this: Analysis indicated that, in 1978 and 1979, the United States' entire currency surplus could be ascribed to Miami-area banks."

“The cocaine trade became synonymous with the city through pop culture. In 1983, Scarface immortalized the glamour and danger of the criminal business through Al Pacino's character Tony Montana, whose violent takeover of a Miami cartel turned him into a cult hero. Miami Vice, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1989, made a hero of a white sport-coated Don Johnson as he battled drug criminals funded by the big-money cartels. Later, the 2006 documentary Cocaine Cowboys became a runaway hit as it rehashed the coke scene's over-the-top glamour and violence. Crime novels by Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiaasen, set among the Miami underworld, also helped popularize the scene."

Even at $40 per gram for an inferior product, people are turning to the increasingly (medically) legal marijuana and prescriptives for their buzz in Florida. But in Colorado, they're still skiing.

A routine traffic stop led to the discovery of 220 pounds of cocaine, which is worth about $10 million on the street. Don't ask how I know that. Mark Bailey and Lisa Calderon were arrested in Pueblo after a patrol officer was tipped about a car making an illegal lane change on Interstate 25. What is an illegal lane change, and how big does it need to be to get someone to tip off a cop? Like switching across 5 lanes...in reverse?

The highway, about 115 miles south of Denver, has long been a drug-smuggling corridor, and Bailey's revoked driver's license didn't help. had been revoked. When the officer noticed that the back of the car appeared to be weighed down, a drug-sniffing dog was brought to the scene. A search of the trunk uncovered four black duffel bags stuffed with bricks of cocaine.

It seems like a bummer to think of the dull, subdued Colorado locale as home to the next wave of coke parties. Miami really had the beach / weather / half-naked sluts thing going to help that party vibe.