People just call it "Oz," but the completely pleasing, attractive, and well-designed pot shop in Fremont is actually called Oz., standing for "ounce." Sort of. The lovely storeowners tried to name it just Oz, as in The Wizard of, but were told by authorities that the association would be too much of a lure for innocent children.

They did keep the Yellow Brick Road in their logo.

Oz. is pretty great, whatever you call it. It feels a little like the Babeland of pot shops. You know, like a fun, actually boutique retail store, where the displays are prepared with care by somebody with a design background, rather than a dank place recently vacated by a dude in a robe and his lizard.

There's lots of pretty, sparkly equipment, from aerospace grinders to a mini jet torch (it looks something like a beautiful weapon) to monkey pipes to little glass elephant pipes ($13!). There are super-refined bongs that remind me of beakers, along with the usual bulby/spotty '70s bongs.

Rather than a diner-style plastic menu, all the varieties of oils, joints, flower, and what-have-you are listed in color-coded rows of clipboards covering on the walls like a large-scale marijuana periodic table. Science! On each of the clipboards, there's a full description of the product, from effects (Sour Tsunami brings on the "relaxed, happy, uplifting, sleepy" times) to THC content (which the owners would like to remind you does not really mean that much in terms of affecting your experience, and is no way to go about buying your pot). The periodic table is good reading. Oz. is a store for readers. It's also next to an Episcopal bookstore—"An independent, ecumenical place!"—where you may find such also-relaxing/uplifting titles as When a Lie Is Not a Sin. It is not a sin, for instance, to pretend that Oz. is wizardy. JEN GRAVES