Pot Stop, which opened this last 4/20, was one of the few existing medical marijuana retailers in Seattle to secure a recreational cannabis license. Though they're no longer selling pot exclusively to patients, their wealth of knowledge didn't disappear overnight, and they're a great option for medically minded cannabis consumers.

As Jeremy Lange, their store manager, puts it, "We're just trying to do everything we can to make patients as comfortable as they can be. All of our employees are medical marijuana employees from our past business, so we still have that empathy and knowledge and understanding that people are looking for." Though current state law is pretty tight in regards to dispensing medical advice on cannabis, and medically appropriate products are notoriously scarce right now, they're still making their best effort to have quality medicine on hand, and they still know a thing or two about what one might smoke to assuage back pain.

They're located, funnily enough, down the block from Seattle City Council member Mike O'Brien's house, and are apparently on quite good terms with him and the other neighbors. When the shop first moved into the neighborhood, O'Brien and other neighbors were wary, Lange said, but the shop went out of its way to win them over. So, in addition to being a great neighborhood pot shop, they're a small part of the reason that our city council is so cannabis-friendly.

I'm also a huge fan of their green-and-white vintage VW bus parked outside, and their proximity to Vif wine | coffee, which is a great place to go if you get the munchies. TOBIAS COUGHLIN-BOGUE