The Coffee Joint, the first establishment to hold a cannabis consumption license in Denver, is now the second pot lounge business to apply for a state social consumption license.

Colorado Springs social lounge Studio A64 successfully applied for a social consumption license at the state Marijuana Enforcement Division office three hours before Coffee Joint owners Rita Tsalyuk and Kirill Merkulov could beat them to it.

Studio A64 could not be reached for comment, but Tsalyuk and Merkulov say the opportunity to apply for a state license is a big step for all cannabis businesses. "This is bigger than us. It's just a bigger step in the industry," Tsalyuk explains. "It opens the door to do something different and plan ahead for the next year."

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A group of Colorado researchers recently studied how cannabis use affects athletes and found a possible role between the plant and pain management.

The study, "Cannabis use in active athletes: Behaviors related to subjective effects," looked at cannabis use patterns and its effects in a community-based sample of adult athletes. According to the study's authors, there had been no previous academic research done on cannabis use's subjective effects for adult athletes.

"There was not a lot of research on how weed helps," explains Dr. Joanna Zeiger, one of the researchers who conducted the study for Canna Research Group. "Athletes typically don't sleep well and are anxious, so we wanted to see what percentage of them use cannabis, their patterns of use, and what the effects are."

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DENVER - Serenity Christensen, 14, is too young to set foot in one of Colorado's many marijuana shops, but she was able to spot a business opportunity in legal weed. She is a Girl Scout, and this year, she and her mother decided to sell their cookies outside a dispensary. "Good business," Serenity said.

But on the other side of Denver, legalization has turned another high school student, David Perez, against the warehouselike marijuana cultivations now clustered around his neighborhood. He said their skunky aroma often smacks him in the face when he walks out his front door.

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Voters in Denver, a city at the forefront of the widening national debate over legalizing marijuana, have become the first in the nation to effectively decriminalize another recreational drug: hallucinogenic mushrooms.

The local ballot measure did not quite legalize the mushrooms that contain psilocybin, a naturally occurring psychedelic compound. State and federal regulations would have to change to accomplish that.

But the measure made the possession, use or cultivation of the mushrooms by people aged 21 or older the lowest-priority crime for law enforcement in the city of Denver and Denver County. Arrests and prosecutions, already fairly rare, would all but disappear.

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