He said he smoked a bowl. In my experience, the time frame is underestimated as is the amount.
A bowl could be a dry glass pipe or it could be a larger water pipe such as a bong. It's a difference in how much plant material is being combusted. Which is also a difference in resin produced and smoke produced at one time.
Really?! Okay, how many people do you know actually smoke a joint, wash their clothes, shower, and deodorize their car right afterwards?
First off, a joint in cigarette paper or tobacco leaf paper (aka blunt) stinks about twice as much as other smoking methods. For one, the oil from the smoke gets all over your fingers as it escapes the cigarette. Second, the process of burning the plant with the paper in it produces a stinkier and stronger smell. Smoking out of a glass pipe doesn't make your hands come into contact with waves of smoke and a larger percentage of the smoke produced goes into your mouth and lungs and then out instead of lingering around. Any kind of cigar or cigarette with MJ in it will smell the worst. I'd bet that a good percentage of people that you catch (a good amount of them teens and young adults) in possession in the field were smoking a joint or blunt in their car. That is the easiest way to catch someone because it stinks the most and lingers longer. And most younger people are smoking a joint because it's easy to carry around and cheap to make. Other smoking devices cost more.
Why can't a person smoke and then take a shower? I know people who take showers after they smoke. Not by habit, just because they were at home relaxing and smoking and then it was time for a shower. You don't need to wash your clothes, you can just change them. It is my experience that when smoking from a pipe, there is no smell ones clothes. I have a very keen nose for it. I have taken my clothes off and let them sit for a couple minutes and then smelled them. They smell like clothes. Again, joints are in a different category. They stink. And also a lot of people that smoke do it in some place other than their car. It's pretty obvious that if you smoke in a small enclosed area with limited airflow that it's gonna stink longer.
Like with people who drink and then chew gum, all you get is minty fresh Budweiser breath. With marijuana you may get the odor of marijuana with a hint of Crest. In some instances it may impede some of the odor, but rarely is all of it gone. Like alcohol, it is not all about the breath. And there are other clues as well.
I have never smelled MJ on someones breath after 15 minutes of consumption. If you catch someone 5 minutes after they smoke then sure you can smell it a little bit. 3 hours later is a different story entirely (not saying the OP was telling the truth when he said 3 hours, just using it as an example).
If you want to say that people who smoke marijuana immediately go into sanitation mode, then go right ahead. if that is true, that is an isolated and small microcosm of that particular subculture and I have yet to read of it or hear about it. If it exists, do tell, as I would be curious to learn more about this behavior.
MJ consumers come in all sizes, colors and genders. Some people do go into sanitation mode because of paranoia (of getting caught) that is real and not just a side effect of the drug. Some people don't. Some people sleep a lot, some people become more productive. Everyone reacts differently to MJ and everyone is an individual with different habits and using the drug doesn't change that.
The people that you catch reeking of MJ is because they are n00bs or not thinking. I'm very confident that I could smoke in the outdoor confines of my backyard from a pipe, or better yet I could eat a cannabis infused food and put in eye drops and you wouldn't be able to tell anything an hour later. Some people less used to THC might act in certain ways that would give you clues as to their impairment. They, unfortunately, are n00bs. I was a n00b once, haha.
Weed produces an oil based smoke that allows the smell to cling to cloth and linger there much longer than other similar smoke may.
Different apparatus will produce more or less of this oily smoke, but if it was eliminated completely the THC which is carried by the oils in the smoke would also be lost.
One factor all of these appliances have in common is that the DO produce smells detectable to an educated and trained nose.
Yes but one needs to be trained in all of the smells. Buds (aka non smoked MJ) smell different than the smoke from combusting those buds. And again, the smell of the smoke will differ significantly depending on how it is being smoked or vaporized. When smoking in a way that doesn't produce tons of excess smoke and there is sufficient airflow, very little of the smell actually clings to your clothes. With time, the smell wears off.