Three Days With A Big Celebrity...Oops, I Mean RockStar!!
May 19, 2023 8:28:52 GMT -5
Fossilman, RickB, and 36 more like this
Post by jasoninsd on May 19, 2023 8:28:52 GMT -5
He'll probably want to shoot me for titling the thread this way...but he's back home now, so I feel kind of safe! LOL
I was truly lucky enough to spend this last Sunday through Tuesday with an amazing individual! Rob (Jugglerguy ) a.k.a. Michigan Rocks on YouTube made a long journey of rockhounding through numerous states and ended his trip with three days here in South Dakota!
Rob had contacted me awhile back asking about some locations to hound here in the area. Well...I couldn't leave it with just providing some information about places to see, so I offered to take him out and about and also invited him to stay here at the house! We made plans for him to do just that! It did get a little scary when I had a couple job interviews prior to him coming out...and one of the places wouldn't have allowed me to take the time off! So, I had to tell Rob things were completely up in the air. Thankfully, though I did get a job offer from a place which had no issues with me taking the time off. Whew! Plans could actually be cemented in place!! Rob was VERY understanding about the possibility of me cancelling...but I was sick about it...thankfully it worked out!
I got a text from Rob Sunday morning saying he'd be at my house somewhere around 12:37pm. I wished he could have narrowed the time down a bit more! LOL - He was wanting to stop in Spearfish (about an hour or so away) for Mass on Sunday morning, then would be "over in a jif"! Well, my nerves and excitement just seemed to be exponentially increasing as time went by, and I was peeking out the blinds every 23.6 seconds once 12:30 rolled around! LOL
Finally, a gorgeous looking red Jeep pulled into the driveway! I thought it looked mighty clean for as much rockhounding as he said he'd been doing...compared to my purple and "mud brown" spotted truck that I use! LOL
After some chit-chat about what we were going to do, we got some of his stuff inside (along with a bunch of fossils he and his wife had collected especially for me!), then loaded our gear into "Purple" and headed out! It had been raining cats and dogs for three days prior to him showing up...which unfortunately took Railroad Buttes out of the equation as there would have been no way we could have maneuvered our vehicles on the slippery gumbo mud. So, I had talked to my contact (my father-in-law), who had gotten ahold of a landowner down by Fairburn, and gotten us permission to hound on his property. The property contained a "gravel pit" along with the dug out hillsides where he had been excavating the layer of river rock under the topsoil.
We got down to the Fairburn area, and once we got onto the road going into Fairburn, the road was as slick as snot on a doorknob! Even being in 4-wheel drive wasn't helping much. At one point, Rob said it'd be okay if I slowed down as he wasn't in that much of a hurry! I took that as a pretty good subtle hint! LOL - I did stop once to get rid of some of the two pots of coffee I had drank waiting for him, and unwittingly flashed a couple cars going by as I was standing behind the truck. Just thought I'd admit to that! I'm pretty sure Rob ducked down in the truck so he wouldn't be recognized on that one...but he said he'd dropped something as was leaning over looking for it! LOL
After some amazing driving on my part...or probably more accurately some "amazingly lucky" driving, we got to the property. We didn't drive onto the property, but left the truck on the main road and walked in. We spent maybe an hour perusing through one of the rock piles, and making our way around the dig site. We hadn't found much of anything really, except for a few "cool" rocks. We spent the time talking about almost everything under the sun...and maybe a few things over the sun as well! We got to one of the main piles of rock and began scanning the mundane looking rocks in the pile. All of a sudden, Rob saw a rock that was orange. He worked his way up to it and said he thought he'd found one! The "one", being an elusive Fairburn Agate! I made my way over to him and took a look. Sure enough, he absolutely had!!
Now, I have to interject something here! I have taken a BUNCH of people out hounding for Fairburns. Nearly every person I have taken out has found a Fairburn...some didn't...but the vast majority have - and every single time, I'm skunked!. So even though I was unbelievably happy that Rob had found a Fairburn...you know, within about an hour of hounding for the first time in South Dakota, my shoulders slumped a little as I just knew I was going to get skunked again! Heck, some people hound for years without finding a Fairburn, and Rob had done it lickity-split!
So, we spend several minutes oohing and aahing over his amazing find, then as he's taking pictures of his find, I make my way around the pile to continue what I figured to be a fruitless search. Except the heavens were going to have mercy on me!! It was maybe ten minutes after Rob found his, and about 30 feet away, I found what would be the biggest Fairburn I've found to date!
You may be wondering why I posted three pictures of my Fairburn and only one of Rob's...it's because I'm telling the story! LOL - When I picked up the rock, the banding was face-down, so I didn't know it was a Fairburn when I picked it up. When I turned it over, I know I uttered a gasp as my heart went up into my throat and was beating 90mph! I looked over at Rob and I'm pretty sure he could tell what I'd found...mainly because of the bug-eyed expression on my face and my inability to form an actually coherent word! LOL
We kept poking around the property for another couple hours, but didn't find any other rocks to match the Fairburns, so we decided to call it for the day! Of course there was continual discussion (dare I say "playful banter") as to whose Fairburn was nicer. Rob's stance was his was more colorful...and my stance was mine was bigger. That's not usually a characteristic I can say is in my favor...but in this case, I said it every chance I got! LOL
We made it back in time for the short-ribs my wife had made to still be hot! My wife had been excited to cook for Rob's visit...she really was. So, Sunday was ribs, Monday night was Mexican (smothered burritos), and Tuesday was lasagna. I think we may have tested Rob's Scoville Scale tolerance with the burritos...but he said they were just fine...through teary eyes...which I thought it was neat to see him get so emotional about those burritos! LOL
We went out again on Monday to search for Fairburns on another private property down by Fairburn, but it turns out the key word was "search"...as we didn't find any. Tuesday we flipped a coin to see whether we'd go to Teepee Canyon or go out in search of Rose Quartz in the Black Hills. Quartz got the coin-toss, so we did go out looking. Again, we did nothing more than "look" for Rose Quartz, as we never did end up finding any!
I do have to mention that on Monday, we had gone to The Rock Shed as Rob had never met Shawn in person! We got to The Rock Shed shortly after they opened that morning. Shawn was all smiles when he saw Rob pulling up! We got to talk with Shawn for a bit, then went inside and met up with Janelle (Shawn's wife), and Stephanie (Shawn's daughter) who both work there. I think Janelle pointed Rob out to every customer who was at the shop that morning. I wasn't sure if I was going to have to switch my role from "side-kick" to bodyguard to protect the "rock star" that was on the property! LOL - Shawn gave us a really fun tour of the place while Rob filmed for one of his videos. Heck, Shawn even pulled a huge Fairburn out of the case. It had been sitting there for years with no buyers, so Shawn decided to cut it while we were there! I do believe that will make the director's cut in Rob's video!
I can't say enough what a pleasure it was to get to know Rob over those three days! He is truly one of those "good souls"...a man of faith and intelligence. I can truly say I'm blessed to be able to call him a friend. A long-distance one...but still a friend!
That's right! We were "twins" wearing our Rock Tumbling Hobby forum t-shirts!
(*I was laughing so hard because it was late on the last night and we had just had my wife take about 30 pictures of us - hoping to get one good one! - on the other couch. After my wife handed me the phone, I looked at the pictures and she had caught herself in the mirror above the other couch in every one of them. So, we had to do them all over because she photo-bombed us! LOL)
I was truly lucky enough to spend this last Sunday through Tuesday with an amazing individual! Rob (Jugglerguy ) a.k.a. Michigan Rocks on YouTube made a long journey of rockhounding through numerous states and ended his trip with three days here in South Dakota!
Rob had contacted me awhile back asking about some locations to hound here in the area. Well...I couldn't leave it with just providing some information about places to see, so I offered to take him out and about and also invited him to stay here at the house! We made plans for him to do just that! It did get a little scary when I had a couple job interviews prior to him coming out...and one of the places wouldn't have allowed me to take the time off! So, I had to tell Rob things were completely up in the air. Thankfully, though I did get a job offer from a place which had no issues with me taking the time off. Whew! Plans could actually be cemented in place!! Rob was VERY understanding about the possibility of me cancelling...but I was sick about it...thankfully it worked out!
I got a text from Rob Sunday morning saying he'd be at my house somewhere around 12:37pm. I wished he could have narrowed the time down a bit more! LOL - He was wanting to stop in Spearfish (about an hour or so away) for Mass on Sunday morning, then would be "over in a jif"! Well, my nerves and excitement just seemed to be exponentially increasing as time went by, and I was peeking out the blinds every 23.6 seconds once 12:30 rolled around! LOL
Finally, a gorgeous looking red Jeep pulled into the driveway! I thought it looked mighty clean for as much rockhounding as he said he'd been doing...compared to my purple and "mud brown" spotted truck that I use! LOL
After some chit-chat about what we were going to do, we got some of his stuff inside (along with a bunch of fossils he and his wife had collected especially for me!), then loaded our gear into "Purple" and headed out! It had been raining cats and dogs for three days prior to him showing up...which unfortunately took Railroad Buttes out of the equation as there would have been no way we could have maneuvered our vehicles on the slippery gumbo mud. So, I had talked to my contact (my father-in-law), who had gotten ahold of a landowner down by Fairburn, and gotten us permission to hound on his property. The property contained a "gravel pit" along with the dug out hillsides where he had been excavating the layer of river rock under the topsoil.
We got down to the Fairburn area, and once we got onto the road going into Fairburn, the road was as slick as snot on a doorknob! Even being in 4-wheel drive wasn't helping much. At one point, Rob said it'd be okay if I slowed down as he wasn't in that much of a hurry! I took that as a pretty good subtle hint! LOL - I did stop once to get rid of some of the two pots of coffee I had drank waiting for him, and unwittingly flashed a couple cars going by as I was standing behind the truck. Just thought I'd admit to that! I'm pretty sure Rob ducked down in the truck so he wouldn't be recognized on that one...but he said he'd dropped something as was leaning over looking for it! LOL
After some amazing driving on my part...or probably more accurately some "amazingly lucky" driving, we got to the property. We didn't drive onto the property, but left the truck on the main road and walked in. We spent maybe an hour perusing through one of the rock piles, and making our way around the dig site. We hadn't found much of anything really, except for a few "cool" rocks. We spent the time talking about almost everything under the sun...and maybe a few things over the sun as well! We got to one of the main piles of rock and began scanning the mundane looking rocks in the pile. All of a sudden, Rob saw a rock that was orange. He worked his way up to it and said he thought he'd found one! The "one", being an elusive Fairburn Agate! I made my way over to him and took a look. Sure enough, he absolutely had!!
Now, I have to interject something here! I have taken a BUNCH of people out hounding for Fairburns. Nearly every person I have taken out has found a Fairburn...some didn't...but the vast majority have - and every single time, I'm skunked!. So even though I was unbelievably happy that Rob had found a Fairburn...you know, within about an hour of hounding for the first time in South Dakota, my shoulders slumped a little as I just knew I was going to get skunked again! Heck, some people hound for years without finding a Fairburn, and Rob had done it lickity-split!
So, we spend several minutes oohing and aahing over his amazing find, then as he's taking pictures of his find, I make my way around the pile to continue what I figured to be a fruitless search. Except the heavens were going to have mercy on me!! It was maybe ten minutes after Rob found his, and about 30 feet away, I found what would be the biggest Fairburn I've found to date!
You may be wondering why I posted three pictures of my Fairburn and only one of Rob's...it's because I'm telling the story! LOL - When I picked up the rock, the banding was face-down, so I didn't know it was a Fairburn when I picked it up. When I turned it over, I know I uttered a gasp as my heart went up into my throat and was beating 90mph! I looked over at Rob and I'm pretty sure he could tell what I'd found...mainly because of the bug-eyed expression on my face and my inability to form an actually coherent word! LOL
We kept poking around the property for another couple hours, but didn't find any other rocks to match the Fairburns, so we decided to call it for the day! Of course there was continual discussion (dare I say "playful banter") as to whose Fairburn was nicer. Rob's stance was his was more colorful...and my stance was mine was bigger. That's not usually a characteristic I can say is in my favor...but in this case, I said it every chance I got! LOL
We made it back in time for the short-ribs my wife had made to still be hot! My wife had been excited to cook for Rob's visit...she really was. So, Sunday was ribs, Monday night was Mexican (smothered burritos), and Tuesday was lasagna. I think we may have tested Rob's Scoville Scale tolerance with the burritos...but he said they were just fine...through teary eyes...which I thought it was neat to see him get so emotional about those burritos! LOL
We went out again on Monday to search for Fairburns on another private property down by Fairburn, but it turns out the key word was "search"...as we didn't find any. Tuesday we flipped a coin to see whether we'd go to Teepee Canyon or go out in search of Rose Quartz in the Black Hills. Quartz got the coin-toss, so we did go out looking. Again, we did nothing more than "look" for Rose Quartz, as we never did end up finding any!
I do have to mention that on Monday, we had gone to The Rock Shed as Rob had never met Shawn in person! We got to The Rock Shed shortly after they opened that morning. Shawn was all smiles when he saw Rob pulling up! We got to talk with Shawn for a bit, then went inside and met up with Janelle (Shawn's wife), and Stephanie (Shawn's daughter) who both work there. I think Janelle pointed Rob out to every customer who was at the shop that morning. I wasn't sure if I was going to have to switch my role from "side-kick" to bodyguard to protect the "rock star" that was on the property! LOL - Shawn gave us a really fun tour of the place while Rob filmed for one of his videos. Heck, Shawn even pulled a huge Fairburn out of the case. It had been sitting there for years with no buyers, so Shawn decided to cut it while we were there! I do believe that will make the director's cut in Rob's video!
I can't say enough what a pleasure it was to get to know Rob over those three days! He is truly one of those "good souls"...a man of faith and intelligence. I can truly say I'm blessed to be able to call him a friend. A long-distance one...but still a friend!
That's right! We were "twins" wearing our Rock Tumbling Hobby forum t-shirts!
(*I was laughing so hard because it was late on the last night and we had just had my wife take about 30 pictures of us - hoping to get one good one! - on the other couch. After my wife handed me the phone, I looked at the pictures and she had caught herself in the mirror above the other couch in every one of them. So, we had to do them all over because she photo-bombed us! LOL)