I don't know Seattle well, but would like to.  I've been there just once, for three days in 1990 with my former girlfriend.  I was impressed by the city's beauty, its vibrant culture, its activism, and the community feel of its neighborhoods.  Along with Boeing and Microsoft, Seattle boasts major centers for training yoga teachers and wholistic health practitioners.
         Seattle also has many microbreweries and coffee houses, as strong coffee  and clean, fresh, strong beer are favorite and sometimes habitual indulgences of many from the hip, cool, creative, and intellectual classes.  Seattle's own Starbucks Company is an espresso ambassador to the masses, showing the nation that there's  a taste and a jolt beyond Yuban and Maxwell House.  Caffeine is now the only drug that remains socially acceptable in nearly all circumstances.
         The most fun I ever had in a bar was in Seattle at a place called the "Blue Moon Saloon" near the University of Washington.  It was a big place, old and interesting and loaded with memorabilia; I was told it was a registered historic landmark.  Although she had (for mostly good reasons) wanted to strangle me earlier in the day, my girlfriend and I had a blast there on a Sunday night, the regular Grateful Dead night.  The place was crowded with a friendly, diverse, boisterous group.  We sat at the bar and drank fresh Yakima hard ciders.  A guy sporting sunglasses and a very long straight beard stood in the corner for hours, sipping a long neck Budweiser and observing the scene.  A "regular" told me this fellow was famous, a member of the band ZZ Top, and that he came to the Blue Moon frequently because no one bothered him there.
         We talked and joked a lot with one of the bartenders, a woman who
flawlessly engineered all the tape selections while entertaining us and filling seemingly thousands of pints and pitchers with a multitude of microbrews.  She had seriously good live tapes, including a version of the song "Morning Dew" that was emblazoned into my soul that evening.  After midnight, many of us started dancing and didn't stop till they closed the place at 2:15 or so.
         Earlier, while talking with the bartender, we had traded happy vignettes from
Grateful Dead show experiences.  She told us she was excitedly preparing to go on tour in Europe and see the Dead in many cities there.  She was looking forward to the ready availability of "soft drugs" (marijuana) in Amsterdam.  She and I lamented together about the suppression of cannabis in the U.S., and agreed on the dubious advantages of the drug alcohol:  it's cheap, it's strong, and it's legal.
         Many people went to Dead shows completely "straight."  Dancing with friendly folks for hours to great music is the cleanest, healthiest fun I know.  If you dance long enough, and if the songs are powerful enough, it can become a profoundly creative, spiritual experience--an experience of unity that we crave from deep within, and that we desperately need more people to tap into if we are to reestablish peace with the natural world and survive into the future.
         Some people use drugs to "jump start" such experiences.  The intentions are often good, and it may sometimes work, but the "side effects" can cause extreme problems.  "Soft" drug or no, pot can be incredibly addictive for some people, and can rule a person's life.  Others, however, can "take it or leave it."  Having and utilizing the ability to "leave it" appears to be the key by which some people can occasionally use a drug and not have a problem.  I don't have this ability, so haven't touched any of it for several years--except for my daily fixes of black tea and a dose of coffee once or twice a week.
         With all the hype about the "War on Drugs," we should remember that legal
cigarettes and alcohol kill far, far more people than all illegal drugs combined.  If to these "legal" fatalities we add the deaths caused by adverse reactions to pharmaceutical drugs, then the severe individual tragedies from illegal drugs are a mere drop in the bucket of the true overall drug problem.  The American Medical Association recently acknowledged that adverse reaction to pharmaceutical drugs is one of the top ten causes of death in the U.S.--right up there with diabetes and cancer.
         We should be wary of the term "side effects," as this phrase seems to imply that these are weaker than the desired effects, when in fact they may be potent indeed.  There are no "side effects"--there are just effects, some of which you may want, some you don't.
         Many people absolutely need their prescription medications.  Still, I think it's pretty clear that our medical system has gone way overboard in prescribing powerful drugs.  Hopefully, the current movement toward promoting "wellness" will address this drug problem.
         The reflexive acts of patients expecting and doctors writing prescriptions betrays our culture of the "quick fix."  If our highly respected doctors order drugs for so many health problems large and small, is it surprising when people take alcohol or other quick fixes if they think they don't feel good enough?
         Groups such as "The Partnership For A Drug Free America" focus on illegal drugs and have received substantial donations from alcohol, tobacco, and pharmaceutical companies.  A cynic might think that these business interests simply hope to squelch their competition.  If we are going to have a "War on Drugs," we shouldn't play favorities.  An honest, sensible "battle strategy" would start by attacking the drugs that do the most damage:  cigarettes and alcohol, in that order.
         So, back to the Blue Moon Saloon in Seattle.  Would it have been less fun if we had skipped the hard cider and just danced our heads off the entire evening?  Certainly not; it would have been even better.