THE QUARTER-SACK PRINCESS

The Calm Before the Storm
It’s eight days, seven finalists, three wild cards, 80°F and SPF 30 scheduled for Negril, Jamaica, and here we are on Day 1. Or, as Bobby Black would like to describe it, “Staff Arrives at Hotel.” Bobby’s printed up an itinerary for staff, filmmakers, girls and hotel desk clerks in order to avoid any possible repeat of last year’s free-for-all. While 2007’s pageant was fun, and all the photo shoots, booze cruises, and bikini changes were ultimately accomplished, things were always at least an hour behind schedule.

In preparation for our next day greeting 2008’s contestant arrivals, Bobby, Pot Star, our filmmakers and myself decide to shed our winter coats and hit the warm sands of the Negril beach, hoping to whisk ourselves to sleep by overdosing on sweet Jamaican rum and spicy Jamaican ganja in hammocks by the sea.

“I might be the first hippie pinup girl.” —Janis Joplin
The girls arrive today, so we enjoy an extra few minutes of sleeping to the sounds of the ocean, something that Sharper Image has still not been able to re-create. We have our morning (now afternoon) debriefing at the hotel’s cozy beach bar. We’re staying at For Real, the most fuchsia, most chill, most cheap–Red Stripe–laden hotel on the beach. All of the contestants, staff and package buyers stay at For Real during the pageant, making it something of a stoner community rather than a booked lodging. We prepare for the arrivals with a heavy rotation of piña coladas, strawberry daiquiris and dirty bananas (with chocolate), all the while rolling joints of the fresh Pineapple cola that’s entered in this year’s Negril Cup. We’ve learned the etiquette of dealing with travel-weary ladies from last year’s event—now we’ve factored in time for plane delays and canceled, rescheduled and rebooked flights. We know they’ll be tired and excited from traveling all day, so we thought it would be best to just give them a bunch of Jamaica’s best pot and let them do some judging.

As the girls arrive, we introduce them to Bobby’s suite, a.k.a. Ground Zero—the meeting place, information desk and lost-and-found of the trip, all rolled into one gigantic, sandy beach patio.

Sarah, Miss HIGH TIMES 2007, arrives first. Before she can say her patented catchphrase—“I need a doobie”—we thrust a grinder, some papers and the skunky Lemon Lady strain in her hand. She’s on the other side of the pageant this year—the no-pressure side, where rolling your own joints may feel like a downgrade, but then you never have to wait for one to be rolled. Sarah seems to have adjusted to our blue-collar antics just fine.

Most of the girls have landed and settled into their tropical attire, joining us at Ground Zero. The introductions begin, and I meet the first contingent of possible new HIGH TIMES family members: tattooed, Canadian Katie; California craft girl Lisa; the Sunshine State’s Jacquelyne; beautiful Southern belle Kimberly; high-energy Aum; and New York’s finest, Sativa. Nicole hasn’t made it out of Texas yet: Her flights are creating more of a stir than these six girls on the beach. We celebrate her anticipated arrival (as well as the three absent wild cards) with some Red Stripe and Bob Marley, and by naming the rest of the strains for the Negril Cup, to be awarded the same night as the next Miss HIGH TIMES is crowned. There are five strains to choose from in all: the already-mentioned Pineapple and Lemon Lady, Bumbaberry, Stinky Goodness and Earth Mother. The girls smoke up, try on their new hemp bikinis and then retire to the hot tubs and beds around For Real. Tomorrow is their first day of photos, and they all want to look well rested.

Bobby, Pot Star and I are showing signs of sunburn. Seven dirty bananas deep, the questions of why I wasn’t running for the crown stopped short.