That joint? It's all in the name of research

Reporting from Amsterdam — Franco bullwhips a 25-foot-long plastic bag through the air, snapping it behind him, sending the tail sailing over his head. The bag looks like a balloon-animal anaconda and he's the half-magician / half-matador who makes it dance. He's certainly got the crowd's attention. They watch as the plastic snake grows in length, slowly filling with smoky mist, the freshly vaporized essence of the 2008 and current Cannabis Cup winner, Super Lemon Haze.

Franco is one of the legendary Strain Hunters, an A-team of globe-trotting cannabis breeders who seek out rare landrace strains of marijuana. They've made expeditions to Malawi and India searching for pure plant genetics, marijuana strains unaffected by hybridization or cross-pollination. If it was a tomato, we'd call it heirloom.

When Franco swings the bag in my direction I don't refuse. Smoking a Cup winner with Franco is like playing catch with Manny Ramirez or kicking a soccer ball with David Beckham. It's an experience.

You wouldn't know it to look at me but I'm not just hanging out here in Amsterdam. I'm writing.

It's a common mistake non-writers make, confusing the physical act of typing with writing, and writers do sometimes sit at the keyboard, but that's just a small part of the job. Think about it. An athlete trains and practices before he or she competes, a chef will shop for the freshest items before deciding what to cook, an architect will study building sites before beginning a design. Writers write about people, and to understand what makes people tick, to get inside their emotional lives -- to write, really -- writers need to engage with the world.

Kerouac hit the road, Hemingway hit the bottle and Dorothy Parker hit the mattress. Me? I'm hitting the Super Lemon Haze.

For the last three years, I've wrestled with my fourth novel, a story set in the world of high-grade marijuana cultivation. It's a unique subculture of underground botanists, farmers, ganjaficionados and seed geneticists who endeavor to discover, develop and refine distinctive strains. The gap between excellent and mediocre is wide, and the stakes are high. The very best marijuana gets entered in the Cannabis Cup -- an event that takes place in this city every November. If you are good enough or lucky enough to win, you have the most valuable pot in the world. The seeds of a Cup winner are worth millions, the marijuana is worth even more. It is the Super Bowl of the marijuana world.