Michael Johnson on RAW's memorable trips

A belladonna plant (Creative Commons photo, source). 

Michael Johnson has a new Substack issue out, "Robert Anton Wilson: Two Formative Drug Trips," with the usual careful research you expect when Michael writes about RAW. Here is a good observation:

"There seems something paradoxical about drug writing: reading about Bad Trips often seems more interesting than reading about Good Trips. Hey, I want all of your trips to be good ones: emotional breakthroughs, sudden realizations that change your life for the better, the feeling of being connected with everyone, every living thing, the biosphere, and the universe, all that really Good Stuff. But it’s at times not gripping reading. Bad trips very often, I find, make for a cracking good read. I read and I think of a line from DFW: well…here’s a supposedly fun thing I’ll never have to do. (He said “never do again” but ya know?)"

As I remark in the comments, the link Michael provides to an R.U. Sirius bad trip has some pretty memorable lines, e.g. when the hospital authorities look at his fake IDs: "Since the admission authorities knew I wasn't Ho Chi Minh, they figured the other ID must be the correct one. I was admitted as Frank Zappa." Also: "The arrival of the ambulance got the attention of my parents."