“It’s a shame the government had to make everything so complicated and expensive. People should be allowed to grow the plant.”

Poinsettias and marijuana are potted plants that flower. “Transferrable skills” was the phrase Douglas used to nail the job and also the phrase he used at the border.

Here’s another one: in the same week the new medical marijuana regulations took effect, the RCMP confiscated a shipment of Tweed marijuana and held it for nearly two months. It seems that while one arm of the federal government was crowing about the birth of a new industry, another arm was looking at the product of this new industry and saying, “It’s pot, right?”

And then there’s this two-worldscolliding story from Sandy Lyton about that information package sent out by Health Canada.

When Lyton read his package, he found advice on the best way to destroy a marijuana plant (before the injunction, all existing medical marijuana was to be destroyed by March 31). The best way to get rid of a pot stash, according to the federal government, was to throw it in your curbside trash after first soaking it in water and cat litter. “Cat litter?” I asked.

“It’s because of the smell,” Lyton explained. “The cat litter takes away the smell of the marijuana. I tell you, Health Canada may be the only ones in the world who worry about a thing like that.”

He falls silent for a moment before adding, “Maybe if I had a cat.” Back at the old chocolate factory (and there are indeed numerous reminders of when this place was a Hershey’s plant, including cast-iron chocolate moulds hanging near photos of pot plants — munchie jokes are too easy), Rifici is answering questions about the rocky start to Canada’s new medical marijuana laws