Diamonds in Alberta
I've been telling everyone, but nobody believes me. Then they send me articles that confirm what I already know:
Link: https://edmontonjournal.com/business/local-business/david-staples-new-thinking-in-diamond-exploration-points-to-beautiful-stones-in-alberta
Of course, arguably the best proof would be a mason jar filled with them, but I'll be getting on that soon enough...
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The Valley of No Diamonds
Last week, 3 in a row off, not going to Calgary, off to do some prospecting...
First stop the Valley of No Diamonds. It wasn't supposed to be that, but I'd never been and this is exactly how it panned out. That's a prospecting phrase.
The Valley, wide, the mountain peaks apparently ornamented with Kimberlites but in this valley, wide and unending, there's nothing but limestone cobbles. Boring. Pan after pan after pan, not even a piece of quartz to lend some sparkle, raise false hopes, no indicator minerals to show you you're on the right track, not a hint of garnet, chromite, no heavy igneous rocks, nothing, smoothed limestone river cobbles, pebbles, sand, is all.
The next day, Wild Horse Creek, near Cranbrook, sight of a few gold rushes and home to some large nuggets. A large nugget would be good, the daughter wished for one as her graduation present, who wouldn't? And so this was for her.
And, pan after pan, hour after hour, the river gravels so large that it's hard to get a shovel in, to get a pan full, but nothing's perfect, and while I'm possessed of incredible optimism I know that every square inch of this public claim (Fisherville) has been worked time and time again...
A few flakes, some platinum, which I'd heard rumored was on the creek and now I had proof, and a nugget, heavy, black, nugget of what? I'll have to do some research.
(Couple of samples of quartz, the great indicators for chunky gold. Gonna have to crush these up and see what comes out...)
The final day off, closer to Nelson, an old mine adit I'd found, a small entrance, sloping down at 45 degrees, crouched, creeping inside...
...and perhaps 3 meters in the floor drops away, the light, shining on the far wall, from my angle I can't see the bottom, 100 feet at least, the vein has been mined straight down into the earth and the edge of the abyss is far too precarious to venture any closer, a short exploration then wander outside above, a very promising geology...
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Graduation
Yesterday, the daughter's graduation. A speech by the Class Valedictorian, in which youth assures age that it's completely ready for the Challenges ahead, the much-abused metaphor of life as climbing a mountain by a breathy girl that doesn't sound like she's ever even been outdoors, let alone up a mountain...
An initiation, of sorts, but not at all, not in the least.
Other formalities, introductions, boring recommendations based on other people's "life experience", the voice of experience recommending everyone follow in it's footsteps, the band plays, then the ceremonies begin, diplomas are handed out, watching the graduates cross the stage, shake hands, photo-op, continue off the stage, the mixed applause of the student body - the hoots and hollers from the crowd indicating a social acceptance that will easily be as important as any academic achievement...
It's funny, watching this, you know none of the students yet you recognize them all, churning out of the machine, the personalities, the same as at your own graduation, the same at every graduation, the bigger the class, the bigger the range, the variety, but the people, the individuals, for all their striving to be different are the same as the ones you went to school with, the class clowns, the jocks, the pretty, the handsome, the popular, the bright, the workers and the slackers...
Intermission, the band plays, then the machine resumes coughing up it's pre-approved social product, the machinery of conformity and the indoctrination into 8 and 9 hour workdays complete, averaging not even 15 seconds per student, this is our investment, here, see, this is our reward...
Then, closing ceremony, the Principal shares his own life experience, you can tell he's watched a lot of TED talks on this topic, modeled his own speech after them, only, really, he has nothing to say, no words of enlightenment whatsoever, merely an opportunity to overshare and talk about his own struggles and dreams, drawing tenuous and nonexistent parallels with the student's lives, life will be a challenge, don't give up on your dreams, dream big, there's no TED talk or load of New-Age Chicanery he hasn't bought into and he brings to it a sincerity that even the most gullible would question, "Today is the first day of the rest of your lives..." , it's gagging me and he's not stopping, the cop, she's just standing there, there's been a hostage taking, an entire auditorium, draw your gun, do something, shut this lunatic up..., stare into space, look off at the ceiling, you want to yell at them all that it's bullshit - it's all bullshit, the world's on fire, it doesn't need any more bullshit on the fire it needs a revolution, off with their heads, all of them, start with the Valedictorian, she's "nice", they're all "nice" but it has to be done, start now, quick, before they get away, ...
Finally it ends. The same as your own graduation, only the world has never inched so closely to Armageddon, to extinction, and any starry-eyed imaginings of unmanageable wealth or illustrious career will soon be overtaken by an increasingly grim reality.
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Unboxing Stormy
Yeah, it would have been a lot better done by the sides of Kootenay Lake, with a bit of make-up and some false (or real even!) teeth, a piece of kleenex to wipe my nose and a bit of duct-tape surgery to hold up the saggy bits on my jowls and face. But this Vlogging, it could catch on...
'ResponsiveMedia' plugin by Geoff Hayward.
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