[Rockhounds] Numbering Specimens (WAS: Paint)

[John Siebel]

Thanks to all for your input on this!  I'd address you all individually, but 
I don't need to clog the list.

Kreigh Wrote:
> If you had started numbering specimens when you started collecting they 
> would roughly be in a time sequence.

Actually, I started collecting when I was about 9 years-old, then gave it up 
when I was old enough to chase girls. Unfortunately, I caught one. Her 
mother (my ex mother-in-law, "Squirrelly Shirley") threw that collection out 
(including a pristine Mazon Creek fern...ARRG!)

I got back into collecting in a serious way when Julie and I took a roadtrip 
up to Michigan while I was working in Illinois. So I'm over my personal 
gridlock. It's clear to me that the honor of #0001 goes to (tada!) a 6" x 2" 
sheet of native copper from a mine dump near Houghton, Keweenaw Peninsula, 
MI. First runner up is a 10" diameter vug of quartz crystals from Mill Creek 
Quarry in OR. Now that I'm over the hump, the rest is just a matter of 
time...lots of it.

As an aside - I'm enjoying the heck out this process as I relive the 
experience of each collecting trip and the, "Whoa! Julie look at this!" that 
each specimen brings to mind. That's the joy I get out of this avocation.

Thanks again to all - John