CompuServe Messages

Best person to talk to about this is Michael Sternberg (he shows up in the section 6 of vendor fairly often). He's a "fossil freak", if you'll allow me. :^) Me, I live within ten miles of a location where Tyrannosaurs and Stegosaurs and etc can (and have been) dug out; I can collect fossils that have turned hollow, and are filled with beautiful spears of apatite crystals, a golden yellow mineral. So I don't buy them, in general… also, my particular "niche" of the mineral hobby is to collect natural crystal forms of minerals; nature has provided some of the most beautiful geometric and color combinations I've ever seen in minerals. My collection is strictly done for beauty. I don't lable the minerals (though I know what they are, I really don't use the knowledge except to make me better at finding them) and I certainly don't use them for any iditotic purposes like "charms" or any of this new-age dromedary feces. If you want to know some places to collect, head for a bookstore and see if you can locate a copy of "Earth Treasures" by Allan W. Eckert. It's a four volume set, covering every county in every state in the continental US – sites are clearly marked and it's a very easy book/set to use. ISBN numbers are: v1 – 0-06-096101-5 v2 – 0-06-096131-7 v3 – 0-06-096177-5 v4 – 0-06-096178-3 v1=ne quadrant, v2=se quad, v3=nw quad, v4=sw quad.