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3 Arrowheads, Tools, and a bunch of rocks

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Found

Published: 08 April 2025

Hits: 201

Actually 5 arrowheads, counting the 2 that Christopher found. 

Monday, cool and rainy, trip out past Balfour with Christopher, do some prospecting up Cedar creek road. Some interesting rocks, promising conditions, but no great finds.

Then back to Balfour where we comb the washout from the ferry landing run off, Chris a few feet ahead of me finds 2 arrowheads, both in relatively great condition: 

I'm annoyed beyond measure, but we keep hunting, going down the beach past the restaurant, the bad neighbor to where the new trailer park will be. And heads-down comb the beach for about 3 hours in the drizzle and rain.

In the end I find a total of 3 arrowheads and a couple of scrapers, tools, and a pile of rocks. Just rocks, interesting to me.

Below:

bottom left, a scraper, green chert, you can see the knapping on the edge. Next to it a yellow-ish spear head, the yellow is a patina that forms on the chert over thousands of years, making it tough to spot (vs the fresher flakes), but to handle it you can feel every divot and knapped edge. No coin for scale but it's about an inch and a half long. I say spear vs arrowhead as it's a little think in the center, not well enough balanced to be fired off from a bow. To the right on the bottom, a fresher point, beside that, a grey arrowhead, again covered in patina, next to that a needle or aul, otherwise, a few other tools, scrapers, flakes, and the assorted rocks that I find interesting and invariably stuff my pockets full of. The pink quartzite "scraper" is a paleo-maybe, no obvious signs of work but I found it a little too conveniently shaped to leave behind. 

Now, getting a taste for the season...

 

2 Boxes of Random

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Found

Published: 05 April 2025

Hits: 239

So, after the previous blog posts at the Library back home where I'm tackling the boxes of random shit problem. 

I unpacked 2 boxes, about as much trauma as I can endure per day.

Finds included: 

• 1 broken antique telephone (sadly it might have broken on my watch, now good only for mixed media parts)
• 1 Medalta Crock-Pot lid
• 2 bottles of lavender essential oil
• 1 bottle of orange essential oil
• 1 bottle of wild oregano essential oil
• 1 sonic denture cleaner, new in box (bought for rocks)
• coloured contacts (searched, not good after 10 years, glad I checked)
• 1 bottle Tylenol
• 2 tweezers, 2 nail clippers
• 1 badger-hair barber brush (for shaving)
• 1 hand-blown glass toothbrush holder...
• 1 razor, disposable
• 5 antique calipers
• 1 bottle linseed oil
• 1 plastic container filled with flints and springs from discarded disposable lighters
• 1 filter for vintage 35 mm camera
• pack of 4 flashbulbs
• 1 thing you look through, stereoscope, modern, plastic, suspect it was meant for watching 3D movies on phone but not sure
• 1/4 tube Polysporin
• 12 empty gel caps, in bottle
• 2 (more!) jars of tiger balm
• 1 temporary tattoo of flowers
• 1 bottle of ink for stamp-pads
• 1 legal embosser/stamp
• container of model paints
• a bunch of the old close-up lenses for phone, cheap, clip on over phone lens

That covers most of it. Now only to open and process the remaining 16 boxes...

The Last of Us

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Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 05 April 2025

Hits: 253

My daughter has a thing for Pedro Pascal, and having heard that I was watching "Temptation Island" - (appalling, but I can see the appeal. Something about a group of idiot couples that want to 'test' the boundaries of their relationships by writhing naked in a hot-tub or pit with 12 hot members of the opposite gender seems appropriately absurd) has recommended I watch "The Last of Us".

Which I did, mostly so you don't have to.

If you're as clueless as I was, it's about a Cordyceps pandemic that turns humankind into flesh-eating zombies. So we go from there, the episodes follow, mostly drivel - a better and more entertaining quality of drivel than "Temptation Island", for sure, but drivel nonetheless. On the plus side it was largely filmed in Calgary and the surrounding areas, if you pay close attention you'll recognize the city, and - I noticed, Calgary looks a lot better when you add 20 years of post-apocalyptic decay. Certainly it's improved the population. 

On the bad side (and here I took great delight in confronting the daughter), well, too many bits of silliness to forgive. Like that the cities are all in complete and utter post-apocalyptic decay and ruin, yet the countryside remains largely pristine. That the gas in 20 years works fine. That power lines and many other bits of infrastructure will remain upstanding. I could go on, and if you were my daughter and I was drunk and raving I'm pretty sure I did.

But - what really annoyed me were the "flashback" episodes, where they attempt to provide emotional depth and backstory to the characters. Like the much-talked about gay relationship between Bill and Frank, well done, for sure, but in no ways relevant to the story at hand, merely a "Woke" interlude to embitter conservatives and pander to a liberal fanbase. The same with Ellie's "Best friend/got bitten" episode. Irrelevant, Woke, and just plain bad storytelling. 

So, overall, 1/10, lightly entertaining, but if you don't have a crush on Pedro Pascal probably not what you're looking for.