Consider the scarab: The Grass Guide’s unlikely mascot

A dung beetle may seem, to some, an odd choice as the face of a cannabis travel guide. After all, we are in the business of telling stories and making beautiful things, unlike our mascot, the scarab whose sole occupation appears to be the Sisyphean task of tirelessly rolling a ball of shit around the desert.

Upon further consideration, though, this tiny wanderer is far more than a common poop parader.

“So, yeah, that’s how shit rolls. Sometimes inspiration comes at you from unexpected places.”

If you want to know how the scarab became our mascot you’ll have to go way back more than 4,000 years to Ancient Egypt. At the time, the dung beetle was gaining in popularity as a visual representation of Khepri, the sun god. As the mythology has it, Khepri would descend into the afterlife every evening as the sun dipped below the horizon and spend his nights wandering around the other side. He would reemerge the next morning, reincarnated, often represented as a dung beetle. The scarab, with its ball of dung (used as a food source and refuge for unhatched eggs) was a reflection of Khepri, rolling the sun into the horizon, through the afterlife, and back again. For Ancient Egyptians the scarab was a symbol of transformation and renewal, discovery and exploration.

They got a lot wrong about scarabs -- most notably, that they were capable of spontaneous generation, springing forth from semen-filled turds -- but they recognized them for the magnificent and adept travelers that they are. We now know that dung beetles follow the sun by day, and the Milky Way by night, navigating with the sky as their guide.

We started The Grass Guide with curiosity and exploration as our founding principles and we’ve come to see the scarab as a symbol of those principles. Like the scarab, we intend to take you to unknown places, to encourage transformation and renewal, and shed some light on the wild world of weed.

While we have no intention of leading y’all into the afterlife or posting dung-rolling tutorials to YouTube, we will bring you reviews of the best cannabis experiences, dispensaries, and products, and the scarab will be your guide. Like the Michelin star, The Grass Guide’s beetle will stand as a symbol of quality and excellence, a designation of distinction for cannabis connoisseurs.

So, yeah, that’s how shit rolls. Sometimes inspiration comes at you from unexpected places. You just have to open your eyes to see it.