[Rockhounds] Mineral Parables

[Lawrence Rush]

Not much happening on the list...time for a little humor (?)

MINERAL PUNS and PARABLES





King Ozymandias of Assyria was running low on cash after years of war with 
the Hittites. His last great possession was a Star Ruby from India, the most 
valuable Ruby in the world. Desperate, he went to Croesus, the pawnbroker, 
to ask for a loan.



Croesus said "I'll give you 100,000 Dinars for it."



"But I paid a million Dinars for it", the King protested. "Don't you know 
who I am? I am the King!"



Croesus replied, "When you wish to pawn a Star, it makes no difference who 
you are."



_______________________________________________________



In Mexico in the 1700's, the owners of the Zacatecas Silver mines hired 
local couriers to deliver their platy silver to Mexico City for smelting. 
One such courier didn't show up at Mexico City after a long time, so the 
owner sent trackers out to find out what happened to him. When the trackers 
returned and reported to the owner, they had only one thing to tell him.



"He who has the plates is lost!"







Two collectors went into a closed quarry on a Sunday afternoon for some 
illegal collecting. They had no luck, and feeling frustrated and angry, they 
broke into the quarry office and stole all of the toilets and urinals, 
leaving no clues. The police came on Monday and investigated the crime and 
left with no arrests. The quarry manager then had to tell his staff, "We 
have absolutely nothing to go on!"







The head witch doctor of a South American jungle tribe was trying to cure 
one of his tribal members of constipation. After trying all of the 
traditional medicines with no success, in desperation he ground up some fern 
fossils he was keeping for

his most critical cases, and gave it to this patient. After a week, the 
patient returned, and the witch doctor asked him how it worked. The man 
looked him straight in the eye and said,



"Doc, with fronds like this, who needs enemas!"





At a brick-making pit in old Colorado, the foreman used to use a stone 
outside his office to determine if the weather was good enough to mine the 
raw material. If the stone had snow on it, it was too cold. If the stone was 
hot and dry, it was good for mining. If the stone was wet with rain, it was 
not. Which naturally led to the expression:



You should make Clay while the Sunstone shines!





At the lead mine in Kansas, miners had to carry their ore up the steep adits 
by hand. They were paid by the number of containers of Galena they brought 
out each day. It was a hard job, and they had to be careful not to lose 
their loads while climbing. No doubt this is where the saying came from..



Lead men don't spill pails!





Most people don't know that the Apache Indians were amateur mineralogists. 
One such Brave liked to keep beds in the teepees made out of locally 
collected stone. In one teepee, a squaw slept on a bed of Hypersthene. And 
in two other teepees, squaws slept on beds of Siderite. It happened that all 
3 had papooses at about the same time, two had boys, and one had twin boys.



This goes to prove the theorem...



The squaw of the Hypersthene is equal to the sons of the squaws of the other 
two Siderites!





Please don't reprint without permission...Larry Rush