It’s no secret that Willie Nelson is the definition of a weed connoisseur.

Hell, I’m not even sure if Ol’ Shotgun Willie can even remember the last time he wasn’t stoned off his arse. We’re talking about a guy who can smoke Snoop Dogg under the table, and the rapper even has a guy he pays more than $50,000 a year to follow him around and roll blunts for him.

Needless to say, he is, and always has been, a major advocate for smoking the devil’s lettuce, and he’s not too afraid to share either.

I was listening to some early 2000s country music today, and forgot about this old hidden gem of a song by Toby Keith, called “Weed With Willie.” It’s pretty much about how Toby got so zooted with Willie one night, that he completely forgot how to function.

Now you may be wondering if this actually happened, or if Toby made an assumption and wrote one helluva fairy tale about it.

With that being said, I’m here to set the record straight:

It did indeed happen, and here’s the proof.

I was digging through the vaults after hearing the song, and discovered this old gem of an interview of Toby back in 2009, where he discussed the first (and last) time he ever smoked with Willie, and how it inspired him to write the song.

Story has it, Keith was in Vegas for Charles Barkley’s birthday party. While he was there, he played a few songs with Willie on stage of his show that night, and Willie asked him to stick around for a little while after the show.

Keith continued:

“Willie’s got that real chronic, medicinal stuff. I’ve never smoked much pot in my life, it’s not my high… we set down and he starts rolling one up, so when in Rome, you know? We burn one, and I couldn’t even function.

It was like, the most hardcore weed that I’d ever had, and I’d only hit it like three or four times, and unlike Bill Clinton I did inhale.

I stood up and said ‘Man it’s time for me to go,’ he was just looking at me and I remember my ears were burning, my head’s throbbing, I was breathing different, and he was sitting there grinning at me.

He knew he got me right. I said I had to go and he says ‘Good timing.’ So I had a car take me to my room, I missed the whole Charles Barkley thing, I went down to sleep.”

So there you have it. That’s the story of the night that Willie Nelson sent Toby Keith to Mars for free, and birthed the song “Weed With Willie.”

Check out the full video here: