In the bustling heart of New York City, Sarah Silverman, guest host of "The Daily Show," embarked on an exploratory mission, one that would have seemed like a far-fetched daydream in the not-so-distant past. "And I'm back in New York City, where now weed is so legal," she exclaimed, her voice tinged with the same incredulity many New Yorkers likely felt. "They have stores, stores with weed."
The cityscape had evolved; where once the sale of cannabis was a clandestine dance of hushed phone calls and covert hand-offs, now stand storefronts as common and welcoming as a corner deli. Yet, as Silverman discovered, loyalty in the Big Apple is a sturdy ship, not so easily rocked by the waves of change. "Do you guys smoke pot?" she asked a group on the street. "You buy it from the store now, or do you guys still… Are you loyal to your old dealers?"
The transition from the shadowed alleys to the bright storefronts has not been seamless. One interviewee, with a walkie-talkie crackling at his hip, detailed the hybrid state of purchasing pot: part old-school, part brave new world. It was here, in this limbo of legality, that Silverman's comedic edge shone, as she playfully co-opted a walkie to broadcast a mock warning about a colleague's tardiness due to… digestive unrest.
The search for a …