LSZ

 Age: 25

Weight: 130 lbs

Dosage: 300 µg sublingual

Setting: Around the city

 

*You can skip the chem talk if you want. The paragraph after that outlines the setting and intentions for the day, and per usual, a tl;dr explanation at the end.*

Preface:

LSZ at first glance seems like a really arbitrary way to modify the LSD molecule- a structure completely out of left field, where in place of the diethyl “horns” of the LSD molecule, there is an azetidide group, a tense ring structure that is rarely seen in any bioactive molecules. Upon closer inspection however, it is clear that this azetidide is just formed by tying those diethyl horns into a square shape with a carbon bridge. The extra methyl groups that are left over help pull the ring apart a little to stabilize it. It’s a brilliant design! This makes a very LSD-like molecule suddenly have a constrained structure, susceptible to stereochemistry, whereas in LSD, the diethyl horns are free to rotate and move as they desire. Truly intuitive and brilliant design courtesy of the legendary David E Nichols. So this lends the obvious question- how does this compare to LSD?

The LSZ tabs were professionally made, one side of the paper bearing the molecular structure, the other with the substance name clearly labeled, dosed at 150 µg apiece. I opted to take two. It was the first warm day of the year, a 70-degree March day, so of course I had to be outside. I set out in the late afternoon, intending to spend most of the trip just walking around the city, watching the throngs of people enjoy this first respite from a bitter winter. I would weather the potential bodyload of the come up at home before setting out. I had no other plans or obligations for the day.

One last thing to note is that I received my first shot of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine 2 days before this experience. This first shot did give me some side effects, primarily fatigue. I found it extremely difficult to arouse and get out of bed, and at times felt exceptionally exhausted. Once I was fully awake and in motion though, I felt okay.

 

T0:00- Dose taken sublingually, as 2 tabs.

 

T0:20- First notes- feeling a bit stimulated and nauseous, something is making itself apparent. A restlessness in my bones. I am still just lying in my bed at this point.

 

T0:35- I decide it’s time to disembark, I chew down and swallow the rest of the tabs and prepare my bag for a long walk. I put on a bit of makeup, save for sweeping bold winged eyeliner, put on clothes that make me feel comfortable that may still keep me warm after sunset, and then set out. By the time I’m ready to leave, familiar feelings begin to creep in, pulses of energy down my limbs, a sense of heat rising from me, a fuzzy numbness in my extremities, a queasy uneasiness, still subtle but it’s clear that all will grow in time.

 

T0:45- Stepping outside is a shock, the sun seems brighter than it should and it feels like my stride is off kilter. A soft warmth proliferates across my skin like an encroaching mold. When I stop to wait for traffic, there is a definite queasy lysergamide come up, a distinct mental and physical rush shooting down my bones, a welling unease, a stimulation deeper than my bones, and a sense of being fully luminous in golden prismatic light. A level of stimulation somewhere between a tryptamine and a phenethylamine. All still subtle, but all still diagnostic for this class of drug.

 

T0:50- Stop by the market nearby to buy a bit of ginger root. The interaction is a bit disorienting but I am still lucid enough to appear normal. This can help settle my stomach. Waves of pulsing sensations of various temperature and texture tickle up my body and wash through me. I am still fully lucid, just adorned with flares of effects. The intensity is definitely accelerating as I walk to my destination- a park by the river. I am hot and sweaty and the entire sky seems like it is flickering with gently shifting hues. At this point the stimulation of the trip has completely overrode the lingering fatigue from my vaccine.

 

T1:00- Open eyed visuals begin to present, muted but clear and apparent before me. They are not laden with prismatic radiant color, but seem to immerse into the surrounding environment. It is like everything has added depth and texture, increased contrast manifesting into swirling pulsing interlocking forms, always shifting into new intricate and perfectly placed forms, but all of this in subtle bas-relief, against the sky, against the mottled sidewalk. It is a slight alteration, one that quickly fades when my attention turns elsewhere.

 

T1:20- I stop for a breather in a small park. I overdressed today and am hot and sweaty and need water. I am definitely tripping significantly now, to where the world around me no longer feels fully accessible. I am a creature simply out here to sense and navigate. Plenty of other people linger around, I pray they pay me no heed.  Sounds are reverberating around me, random snippets of passing conversation amplified and echoing in my head. My whole body feels a bit numb, I’m so sweaty and woozy, but it is overall a pleasant sensation. A certain nausea is also building however, which threatens to only grow in caliber. I can’t help but smile at the glory of the sun’s fire, all these people enjoying its warmth, I am content, if a bit uncomfortable. All I can think about is how weird everything around me seems, as if my sense of what’s normal has been hard-reset. It’s all strange, but I grow used to that, and in that, it all soon becomes normal. I can live with that. I get up and press onwards. Visuals increase in depth, in swirling interlocking motion, in fractally bordered intensity, though still colorless, still a shallow relief hewn into the surface of the sky.

 

T1:40- I’ve made it to my destination, a park/walking trail that snakes along the bank of one of the rivers that flows through the city I live in. As it is the first warm day of the year, people are out in droves, pandemic be damned. Many people are jogging or biking, while others are having picnics in the grass. It is hard to find a place to sit down and gather my thoughts before proceeding onwards. I am nauseous, it has been building and washing over me, bound to a rising turbulent warmth in my extremities. I need to sit down and I need a bit of weed to take the edge off.

I find an unoccupied bench and sink into it. I close my eyes for a second and I am flashed with a pensive phantasm of color. With my eyes open, the visuals are subtle and slight, not too colorful but with lots of morphing depth. But there are people all around me, it’s hard for me to stare at things and really absorb myself into what I am experiencing. I sneak a quick hit of cannabis from my one hitter; a passerby remarks on the cloud of cannabis smoke and feeling self-conscious, I get up and leave.

 

T2:00- I find another place to stop walking, this time a bit off the trail and a bit more secluded. I feel like I can actually take a deep breath and close my eyes and unwind in peace here. A wave of psychedelic heat crashes down on me as I stop moving, a great twisting and writhing weight from sinews of energy, immense in its stature yet at the same time ethereal and ephemeral.

I smoke a bit more cannabis and eat a chunk of raw ginger to assuage the nausea, and it definitely helps. The visuals at this point are subtle, but all-consuming, no matter where I look or how I look at it I can just barely sense their presence, even if it isn’t kaleidoscopic explosions of colors and fractals, or clearly defined self-transforming patterns. There is defined relief pressed into every surface, deepened textures and slight chroma-shifts, but they only appear if I seek them out, content to mind their own business in my garden of senses otherwise. In the blue sky and the clouds and the sun-dappled surface of the river some of the contrasted textures begin to interweave and form patterns, but they are fleeting and near-indistinct, perhaps reminiscent of meso-American art if the artisan had not really set out with a particular plan and gave up halfway through.

When I close my eyes I am greeted by a spinning symmetrical kaleidoscopic landscape of pulsing radiating forms and colors, like an inkblot driven by furious golden light. The fringes of these patterns give way to a wildfire of radiant fractals, their fringes crackling with electricity. It’s exciting, interesting, but merely a visual display that doesn’t invite me in to a deeper altered consciousness. Perhaps a part of me is still on guard as I am still in public and don’t want to fully surrender myself to that world, no matter how enticing.

Everything still has a sense of rising, building, growing in intensity. Things may just be beginning to level off but it still feels like there’s more fuel for this fire to consume.

 

T2:15- I get up and continue walking. Having tried to immerse myself in the experience before this, I decide now to immerse myself more in my surroundings. There are so many people everywhere, like the towering buildings around me are pulsing and beating out their life force to take in their essential doses of fresh air and sunlight in little joyous swarms. People sit in circles and socialize, people of all varieties, all sizes and shapes and ages and colors and styles, some blend in, others stand out with outlandish fashion and mannerisms. I am just another odd looking person in this mass, adorned with makeup, perhaps wearing too much dark clothing for such a sunny day, skulking alone through a river of people in their brightly colored fitness wear. I come to an obstruction, where construction is being done on a bridge above the trail. With no detour provided, the innovative river of people has simply torn down the fences and blazed through own trail through what was an active construction site. Unstoppable spirit.

So many people seemed like odd characters, intentionally placed in my solipsistic path for my consideration and confusion- an old lady costumed in stark pink Sunday wear, clad in more makeup than even me, prominently reading a book alone on a bench titled “Maybe You Should Talk to Someone”. Various gaggles of androgynous people similar to me with dyed hair and tattoos all of whom seemed vaguely familiar. A little man with wild dreads and a toothy smile soaring by on a bike, both arms occupied with holding aloft an enormous amplifier like Atlas, blasting music at a high velocity, another shirtless man on a bike who seemed to pass by several different times on this short walk, dancing hands free to the top indie-pop radio hits of the early 2010s. A colorful day with colorful people that made me glad to be where I was, a sense of satisfaction in the strangeness of my surroundings, in how as they coalesced it all became quite normal, a new world for a new day.

I didn’t stop walking or take any more breaks, I had a destination in mind at this point, a little stretch of the trail where it branches along closer to the river, where it is more wooded and secluded and crumbling piers and overhanging tree trunks allow one to relax and splay themselves out over the water and look out over the Western skyline and the setting sun with a bit of privacy. 

 

T2:30- I have reached my spot, a specific tree trunk that reaches out over the riverbank, its shape perfect for accepting a languid human body. I splay myself out on its branches and relax under the gaze of the setting sun, smoking a bit more cannabis. I have a beautiful view of the Western skyline standing over me, the buildings silhouetted in the sinking sun, their inner lights beginning to twinkle on. Various people occasionally pass by but don’t seem to notice me, leaving me comfortable in a sense of solitude. My thoughts now flow freely, a steady chain of association free to run its course like a river, unimpeded by my conscious meddling. They dance around thoughts of what I wish to follow in the scope of a career, in the scope of longer-term life goals, in the scope of building and progressing my various practices and areas of knowledge into some sort of professional reputation. Terribly mundane but pressing stuff. I fantasize about aspirations, about achieving fame, widespread well regard, a good reputation, pride and recognition, it’s a lovely self-supplied self-indulgent dopamine rush.

It's hard to type notes on my phone, it’s hard to precisely control my fingers. They feel warm and numb and aren’t fully responding to my commands. There are patterns gently forming on my hands, like embossments in my skin, shifting gently with color. There are swirling fractals forming pareidoilic shapes in the bark of the tree around me and in the sky, subtle but clearly discernible. There’s a lasting, molded, warmth to the visuals, as though they have been simmered and baked into my optic nerves, that they have arisen from a steady and gradual application of energy. When I close my eyes there are spinning zooming networks of fractals, crackling with energy like neurons. I get restless eventually so I get up and keep on walking, not sure where exactly I’m headed.

 

T2:50- As I’m walking along I decide to poke my head into another spot along the riverbank. I tap my pocket to make sure I have everything, when I notice- I have lost my treasured pocketknife, the same one that had always been clipped to my pocket every day of the last 3 years. It had been everywhere with me and had a nice bit of wear and patina rubbed into it from heavy use. Honestly it didn’t have the best steel and was quite blunt, but it was sentimental to me and if I was to replace it soon I would’ve liked it to have had a more graceful sendoff. My mind becomes obsessively and singularly consumed with the task of retracing my steps and relocating it. I am on a mission, I trudge forward (er…backwards rather) without pause or without stopping for a breath.

I first stop by the overhanging tree where I was lounging- it would follow that it would easily slide out of the pocket of my splayed out body. I mistake the tree for another one however, one occupied with a person sitting at its base minding their own business. I interrupt them to ask if they’ve seen a pocketknife- in retrospect an odd thing to hear from a masked lone stranger in a secluded place. The person seems nonplussed and nonthreatened and even lets me come down to take a quick look before I realize I’m looking in the wrong place entirely. This interaction is incredibly awkward and fills me with an upwelling of intense anxiety that soon chases me from the spot. I find the right tree and search the area thoroughly to no avail. Where else? Perhaps where I sat down earlier to peel and eat some ginger root?

I beeline for this spot, not stopping once. I pass by groups of people I recognize- perhaps they recognize me too and think it odd that I pass them again. Maybe I am overthinking this- I am consumed by an obsessive anxiety and a fearful sense of dread. I was once a being enjoying the sunny day, basking in the glory my surroundings, and now I am a storm of nerves bearing down on the path before me, quaking in its own precipitation of sweat. How much simply losing a sentimental little object can set me off-kilter! After about 15 minutes of walking I reach my destination and to my dismay see no sign of my treasured trinket. I dejectedly make one more fast, streamlined walk back to the tree to look one more time, though it is getting dark now and soon any further searching will be entirely hopeless. I pass by the same people yet again, assuming myself to appear stranger with each pass.

No sign of it here. I accept that it is lost, that someone else probably picked it up by now, and this acceptance brings me a measure of relief. I’m hungry at this point, and exhausted from the ceaseless pacing. I set out for home, defeated.

 

T3:18- Begin my walk down the large central avenue of the city to the central subway station, my thoughts have mostly moved on from my dear knife, a small tarnish in an otherwise wondrous and beautiful day. The sun is fully set now and the night grows noticeably colder. I stop for a breather in an open park in the heart of the city, once a vibrant urban space with privacy, shelter, and seating, but it was renovated into a bare empty panopticon to cut down on ‘nuisance’ elements. It’s depressing how what was once a gathering and socializing space is now just a flat concrete expanse with no interesting features save for some cheap furniture where I can stop to rest for a few minutes. It seems it can serve no function beyond this.

I descend into the tangle of tunnels in the center of the city that head to various public transportation hubs, my senses on guard as there has been a rash of violent incidents in these stations in recent times. It isn’t too late at night however and the station is well populated, so I let my guard down. The subway arrives just as I reach the platform, which always feels like a blessing. I feel like an odd broken being in the mess of other masked figures crowded onto this box, sweaty and flustered and exhausted, a fish out of its water. There are gentle patterns forming in the myriad mottled and patterned surfaces on the inside of the subway car. I check my emails to pass the time.

Today two pertinent employment opportunities have presented themselves, in both areas I am interested in pursuing as a career and academic. It is exciting, it is the first glimmer of light after months and months of useless stagnation, where I spent every day of my unemployed life getting high and reveling in my own indolence and sloth. I finally feel like I am doing something and going somewhere with my life. It feels undeserved, as, like I said, I have not actually worked towards this at all. Both opportunities happened to just seemingly fall on my lap, all I did to earn it was do a lot of drugs and keep myself alive. I don’t deserve to be rewarded for my behavior, what does this teach me? Oh well, I am glad the future is finally looking bright. This elation carries me home from the subway, a fun and delighted walk fantasizing about potential futures. The experience has melded into an emotional aspect primarily, the visual and other sensory effects have largely passed into a distinct psychedelic headspace.

 

T4:20- I’m home, tired and very hungry. I put some instant rice and beans on the stove, adorning it with strands of saffron and fresh-crushed annatto seeds in a tea infuser. I am sweaty and pop the windows open and drag a heavy chair into our empty kitchen to rest while I keep an eye on the stove. Most of the house has been emptied and packed up for renovations, everything is in disarray. I put on some music and the sounds reverberate and echo a lot, sounding tinny and constrained, yet voluminous and rich. It’s an odd effect that didn’t really present at any other point of the experience with any other sounds.

I open my laptop and respond to emails and messages I’ve been neglecting while I was out. I feel perfectly lucid in conversation and writing, there is none of the overthinking or overanalyzing that sometimes hinders effective communication when I’m tripping. Each word feels carefully chosen and fully effective, there is a distinct intentionality to all of my actions that lets them flow freely.

 

T5:30- My dinner is done now. I’m home alone, so I opt to just sit in my chair with a potholder on my lap and eat out of the pot with a spoon. I am hungry and don’t plan on leaving leftovers. I spit out my gum, and this brings to the forefront that there is a lasting stimulation still coursing through my nerves, manifesting as bruxism and muscle tension, still raging and burning, but I also feel tranquil and relaxed. I’m smoking a bowl of cannabis by an open window there’s a gentle breeze through the budding cherry blossom in the backyard, there’s ambient noise of my neighbors in their respective back yards enjoying the balmy night as it cools down, this is the sweet life, things are good and I feel an uplifted mood. The food is warm and delicious and filling my empty tummy with something dense and hearty is an excellent sensation.

 

T6:00- Effects seem to be leveling off. Sensory effects have mostly fizzled out while cognitive and emotional effects come to the forefront, blossoming into a neat plateau.

I am thinking about how nice it would be to take a benzo when I’m fully down and bliss out into that, but the schedule I’m keeping doesn’t allow for it.

 

T6:20- I have fallen into a reading hole based around reading about Alzheimer’s disease and the project “Everywhere at the End of Time” by The Caretaker, a series of concept albums that sonically captures the progression of the disease, from the onset to death. This is driven in part by talking to my partner about their grandmother, who is in the later stages of the disease.

It is a terrifying and heart wrenching thing to consider. Memories are so important to me, and the thought of having them decay and degrade until they are nothing is demoralizing and crushing. The inevitability of the disease, how it is truly incurable and how its unstoppable progression can only be slowed, never ceased, the world of loneliness and isolation and confusion that the victim falls into, until the world around them grows unrecognizable and the person they once were grows unrecognizable to peers, the terror of entering a lonely realm, never to return, only getting lonelier as one progresses further and further, until one forgets what loneliness even is. The terror of being caught in a thick impenetrable fog, or an unilluminable darkness, of not being able to turn back or turn any way, of not being able to communicate with the outside world the depth of this darkness because it has all but disappeared, a living body slipping into the shadows. The horror and sadness of it brings me to tears. What does one do against such a powerful fate? All I can think about is the sense of dread that would consume me were I in that situation, a dread fading to nothing, not a quiet peace, but an incomprehensible, raging nothing.

 

T7:20- Transitioned onto a new hyperfocus, this time reading papers on the study of the psychedelic pharmacophore, on new research that has elucidated the exact configuration of the 5HT2A receptor as it receives a psychedelic compound that triggers it into activity. This is super exciting research that is wondrous to read about, the potential for delving into further fascinating compounds is endless. I begin dreaming of this renaissance in psychedelic science, how bounds have been made in the field that would unimaginable 20 or even 10 years ago. I begin to think that someday perhaps I may even be able to contribute to that field. It is self indulgent fantasy, but it feels good, all feels right. Aside from this distinctly psychedelic freeflow of thought and association and a stimulated focus on whatever I’m reading, and a distinct embedding in my memory of my experience, I am certainly in the midst of a steady downturn in all noticeable effects.

 

T8:40- Almost back to baseline it seems, the only effects that remain are stimulation, a buzzing in my limbs.

 

T10:00- Back to baseline entirely by this point.

 

Conclusion: LSZ ticks all the boxes for a lysergamide- a degree of stimulation, a long duration, cognitive and emotional enhancement, and standard fare sensory effects. Like any lysergamide, it too bears subtle differences from its compatriots. It should scratch the itch for anyone seeking such an experience. It is not quite as insightful, deep, introspective, or intense as LSD, its effects stack up similarly to the whole suite of LSD-like analogues and purported prodrugs. What sets it apart? The visual character is unique, a hewn relief that cooks in from my surroundings, forming organically with little pattern or reason, they are simply there and matter-of fact, never forceful, not particularly engrossing. Lucidity was a key feature of the experience, paired nicely with a certain sense of tranquility and calm, bolstered by a bubbly and optimistic euphoria. This is an enjoyable drug by any measure, it may not offer the depths of LSD but will offer a nice way to spend a nice day. Though I was alone for most of the experience it could absolutely be a sociable drug. I am not sure what a higher dose would present, but in how the different effects presented in proportion to one another I imagine it would get confusing and disorienting before it reached a place of deep introspection and engrossing detachment. It lacks push, or any sort of rush. Overall, something light, something delightful, an experience that cooks into the mind and keeps the user afloat on a raft of warm emotions.