It’s more than common knowledge among recreational and habitual tokers alike that cooling off the smoke before inhalation makes for a much more enjoyable experience. It is no wonder then why so many stoners have tried to come up with clever and innovative ways to keep their lungs from cashing out after the first rip. I remember as a kid, I rolled joints out of bible paper, constructed hundreds of pipes out of tin foil (fucking disgusting btw), and even carved up a few fruits just to catch a buzz. All of which left my throat and lungs feeling like I just huffed zyklon-B for a week straight. It wasn’t until I was introduced to the cooling effects of bongs, that smoking that shitty brick weed that you get in the south was at least somewhat tolerable. That brought about a whole new smoking era for me and my crew of adolescent pot-heads. We tried them all. 1 footers and 2 footers, plastic, glass and even wood ones that we would carve out in shop class. Clearing a 5 footer for the first time became somewhat of a right of passage among the chiefing elite. All of that was made possible by the fact that cooling the smoke off first prevented me from hacking up fucking scar tissue. Whoever coined the phrase, “It’s not good smoke unless you choke,” is a fucking idiot and should be drug out in the street and beaten. I really thought I had seen it all, single chamber, double chamber, even fucking triple chamber, all with their own percolators (maybe a little overkill, but stoners will be stoners).

Recently, a friend of mine got a glycerin cyclone made by PURE glass. This fucking thing looks beautiful.  A cool new take on the whole process. Instead of filling the chambers with ice, that then melt and leave you vulnerable to sucking bong water into your mouth (which you only have to do once before realizing that that should never fucking happen again), or trying to stuff your whole bong into the freezer (also a pretty shitty idea), PURE makes this bong in two pieces. First the base, (which we will discuss the cons of the base a little later) which has a horizontal chamber with a bunch of holes in which the smoke is broken up and then sucked through the water. Pretty sweet design, at least by the looks of it anyway, (not sure if the science will back it up, but fuck it, it looks cool). The second piece is where the magic happens. It is a detachable glass chamber with a spiral straw running through the middle of it. Surrounding this spiral glass tube is the glycerin material, which is basically the same slime found in store-bought ice packs that your mom uses to “cool off from the heat,” while clinging to her youthful denial that menopause isn’t fucking her world up. This chamber is really easy to detach and will fit in your freezer with little to no problem. I was also surprised at how fast it will freeze back up after each use. One complaint I have about this though is its cryo-lifespan. It will thaw out pretty quick, so if you are planning on smoking out your whole sunday school class, I would advise you to pick up a couple of extra glycerin coils. Nothing worse than a bunch of pissed off bible thumpers blowing hot smoke up your ass.

The bong over all is an awesome addition to anyone’s collection, however there are a few things that I need to warn you about before you invest. The first is the base. It is stable to be set down anywhere, except that the junction where the base meets the bottom of the water chamber is thin as fuck. If you invest the hundreds of dollars and then find out the hard way that that shit will break fairly easy, (as was learned by my friend) you might go through the same hate and discontent that he did, so be careful. Second is the glycerin coil. Being that it is the piece that shares connection with the water chamber and then gets put into the freezer. We also learned the hard way that an ice plug will form if not dried out before freezing, which renders using it until it thaws utterly useless (pretty easy fix, yet still mildly annoying). Third, I need to mention just because. I have been pretty accustomed to using single piece bongs for quite some time, and using a two piece brought yet another challenge to the table. The fact that the stem of the bong detaches so easily can make for a serious breaking hazard, especially if you are as forgetful as some stoners can be. Now anyone who invests in glass pieces to smoke out of should have some idea that its not going to live forever. I have definitely smoked a few pipes to death, where the bowl just fell through during a session (couldn’t really be that mad at that accomplishment), rather than the dozens of others that have fallen out of hands or rolled off table tops (fucking pissed every time). All in all after using this piece I have to applaud PURE on this bong. It was fun to use and got me stoned, I can’t really ask for much more than that. Well… except for maybe lowering the price.