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You sit on Papakōlea Beach in Hawaiʻi contemplating your life choices, letting handful of sand spill through your fingers.
Every green grain, #YouFindARock.
Wilson44691 https://twitter.com/mikamckinnon/status/1251436470339923970
Every green grain, #YouFindARock.
Wilson44691 https://twitter.com/mikamckinnon/status/1251436470339923970
You let all but one glassy green grain of sand slip away.
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> Lick
Your tongue delicately dabs the single grain of sand on your fingertip. It’s salty, like everything nearby, coated in a fine salt spray from crashing waves.
Your tongue retreats.
The grain comes with it.
Mm, gritty.
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Your tongue delicately dabs the single grain of sand on your fingertip. It’s salty, like everything nearby, coated in a fine salt spray from crashing waves.
Your tongue retreats.
The grain comes with it.
Mm, gritty.
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You shrug & swallow the errant sand grain, petting the beach with a murmured apology.
> Acquire larger grain
You scout for the rock eroding to create all this sand, and find an olivine-rich tuff ring of welded ash & pyroclastic material from an ancient eruption.
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> Acquire larger grain
You scout for the rock eroding to create all this sand, and find an olivine-rich tuff ring of welded ash & pyroclastic material from an ancient eruption.
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> SMASHY-SMASHY
You smash the mineral. The hard olivine resists your efforts, staying smugly intact.
> Harder!
You don goggles & bust out your trusty rock hammer.
You chip off pieces, the edge breaking in concoidal fracture like glass as you methodically create sand.
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You smash the mineral. The hard olivine resists your efforts, staying smugly intact.
> Harder!
You don goggles & bust out your trusty rock hammer.
You chip off pieces, the edge breaking in concoidal fracture like glass as you methodically create sand.
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> Take
You pocket the olivine. A volcano rumbles. You rub your fingers over the rock, slicing them on the sharp edge you created
Wincing in pain, you recall rock collecting is illegal on most of Hawaiʻi and you don’t have a collection permit
> Reconsider
You replace the rock.
You pocket the olivine. A volcano rumbles. You rub your fingers over the rock, slicing them on the sharp edge you created
Wincing in pain, you recall rock collecting is illegal on most of Hawaiʻi and you don’t have a collection permit
> Reconsider
You replace the rock.
“Er, sorry about that,” you tell the beach, giving it a pat. “And for the sand-eating.”
You head to southeastern Brazil, determined to spend time with volcanoes sleeping since the breakup of Gondwana 180 million years ago
#YouFindARock
Rob Lavinsky / http://iRocks.com
You head to southeastern Brazil, determined to spend time with volcanoes sleeping since the breakup of Gondwana 180 million years ago
#YouFindARock
Rob Lavinsky / http://iRocks.com
“Oooh, juicy!” you whisper in awe as your eyes catch on the perfectly watermelon-coloured gems.
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> Lick
Ignoring all prior warnings about the perils of candy-coloured rocks, you lick the crystal. It tastes like absolutely nothing, too hard to relinquish a single molecule to your salivating. You’re safe.
Your sensitive tongue picks up fine striations on the crystal face.
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Ignoring all prior warnings about the perils of candy-coloured rocks, you lick the crystal. It tastes like absolutely nothing, too hard to relinquish a single molecule to your salivating. You’re safe.
Your sensitive tongue picks up fine striations on the crystal face.
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> Zap
Oooh, the crystal splits the beam into two polarized paths. You can play with this bifringence like an 19th century chemist.
> Zap Zap!
You shine polarized light on the crystal while rotating it. The pale pink shifts to dark red; the greens change tone. Pleochroism!
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Oooh, the crystal splits the beam into two polarized paths. You can play with this bifringence like an 19th century chemist.
> Zap Zap!
You shine polarized light on the crystal while rotating it. The pale pink shifts to dark red; the greens change tone. Pleochroism!
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> Bake at 300°C
The watermelon tourmaline zaps you, generating a voltage when exposed to heat.
> Bake
zap zap. Hehehehe, pyroelectricity is wickedly cool!
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The watermelon tourmaline zaps you, generating a voltage when exposed to heat.
> Bake
zap zap. Hehehehe, pyroelectricity is wickedly cool!
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> Snuggle
“Oooh, who’s a good rock?” you coo while cuddling the prettily-coloured elbaite. “You are! Yes, you are.”
The crystal zaps you gently as you squeeze it with superhuman strength. “Who’s piezoelectric? You are! Yes, you are!” You praise, “Such a good lil crystal!”
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“Oooh, who’s a good rock?” you coo while cuddling the prettily-coloured elbaite. “You are! Yes, you are.”
The crystal zaps you gently as you squeeze it with superhuman strength. “Who’s piezoelectric? You are! Yes, you are!” You praise, “Such a good lil crystal!”
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> Moar lasers?
You drop your laser, the battery popping out and bouncing into a crevice. Before you finish the pro/con list of reaching into dark dens, you realize you have a UV flashlight!
> Blacklight party!
The pink fluoresces violet. The green does nothing.
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You drop your laser, the battery popping out and bouncing into a crevice. Before you finish the pro/con list of reaching into dark dens, you realize you have a UV flashlight!
> Blacklight party!
The pink fluoresces violet. The green does nothing.
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> SMASHY-SMASHY
You pull out your rock hammer and don goggles. “It’s time to smash crystals!” you growl menacingly. “I wanna watch it break”
You swear the tourmaline cowers.
Sunlight catches the crystal, reminding you of the optical games you played together.
You hesitate.
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You pull out your rock hammer and don goggles. “It’s time to smash crystals!” you growl menacingly. “I wanna watch it break”
You swear the tourmaline cowers.
Sunlight catches the crystal, reminding you of the optical games you played together.
You hesitate.
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> Reconsider
You admire how the cluster crystallized in pegmatite with the colour zoning reflecting changes in chemical composition.
“I couldn’t smash you,” you reassure. “At Mohs 7 you’re too hard to break easy, and I know you have concoidal fracture”
> Squeeze
It glows.
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You admire how the cluster crystallized in pegmatite with the colour zoning reflecting changes in chemical composition.
“I couldn’t smash you,” you reassure. “At Mohs 7 you’re too hard to break easy, and I know you have concoidal fracture”
> Squeeze
It glows.
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> Take
You’re at a mining site so have no ethical quandaries. “Love you forever,” you tell the watermelon tourmaline, carefully wrapping it.
As it joins the single grape chalcedony & shard of smashed larimar, you realize this is your first unbroken specimen.
It’s a good rock.
You’re at a mining site so have no ethical quandaries. “Love you forever,” you tell the watermelon tourmaline, carefully wrapping it.
As it joins the single grape chalcedony & shard of smashed larimar, you realize this is your first unbroken specimen.
It’s a good rock.
You skip away happily to the Sugar Loaf Islands in New Zealand.
“Ooh, I wonder what I’ll find here?” you exclaim, poking around the sea caves carved into volcanic rock. Bats take flight overhead, leaving you alone to explore.
Joana Kruse
“Ooh, I wonder what I’ll find here?” you exclaim, poking around the sea caves carved into volcanic rock. Bats take flight overhead, leaving you alone to explore.
Joana Kruse
You stumble, falling to your knees. Now you’re closer you realize the white mineral on the cave floor isn’t sand, but something new and mysterious.
#YouFindARock. It’s almost remarkable for how unremarkable it is.
David Hospital
#YouFindARock. It’s almost remarkable for how unremarkable it is.
David Hospital
“Hmm, how am I going to learn about you?” you ask the lump.
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> Lick
Ignoring side-eye from a remaining bat, you start your investigations by licking the rock.
The soft, malleable mineral dents under the pressure of your tongue. You marvel at the velvety texture while cringing at the sour clay flavour with a hint of guano.
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Ignoring side-eye from a remaining bat, you start your investigations by licking the rock.
The soft, malleable mineral dents under the pressure of your tongue. You marvel at the velvety texture while cringing at the sour clay flavour with a hint of guano.
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> Douse in acid
You dunk a piece in acid, poking it with a stick when you grow bored of waiting. It sloooowwwwly dissolves.
You’re pretty sure it’s Taranakite, the first mineral with a New Zealand type location.
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You dunk a piece in acid, poking it with a stick when you grow bored of waiting. It sloooowwwwly dissolves.
You’re pretty sure it’s Taranakite, the first mineral with a New Zealand type location.
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“You make good rocks with your poop,” you tell the bat. “Although looking at you closer, I suspect you’re a kororā our little blue penguin and this place is properly called Ngā Motu island.”
Turning your attention from biology and decolonizing names, you focus again on geology.
Turning your attention from biology and decolonizing names, you focus again on geology.
> Zap
You unpack a precision X-ray powder diffractometer in this coastal cave, ignoring all the logistical of this plan.
You examine the diffraction pattern closely, reeling back in shock realizing at 9.5nm this is the longest crystallographic axis of any known mineral.
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You unpack a precision X-ray powder diffractometer in this coastal cave, ignoring all the logistical of this plan.
You examine the diffraction pattern closely, reeling back in shock realizing at 9.5nm this is the longest crystallographic axis of any known mineral.
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> Time travel
By a narrow margin, you select time travel over gardening.
It’s 1865.
You lurk, awestruck to realize James Hector, kickee of Canada’s Kicking Horse Pass, and William Skey, renowned for deliciously awful Shakespeare parodies, first formally described Taranakite.
By a narrow margin, you select time travel over gardening.
It’s 1865.
You lurk, awestruck to realize James Hector, kickee of Canada’s Kicking Horse Pass, and William Skey, renowned for deliciously awful Shakespeare parodies, first formally described Taranakite.
Satisfied you now understand how this mineral discovery was so poorly documented archives hold no clue which cave holds the official type specimen, you return to the present era.
> Garden
You sprinkle the hydrated phosphate on your garden. Your flowers are exceedingly happy.
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> Garden
You sprinkle the hydrated phosphate on your garden. Your flowers are exceedingly happy.
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> Pet
You gently stroke the creamy mineral. It feels soapy, almost oily under your fingertips, grains finer than flour.
The mineral is extremely soft at Mohs hardness 1, and highly malleable.
It’s a soapy, sour, guano-tinged clay.
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You gently stroke the creamy mineral. It feels soapy, almost oily under your fingertips, grains finer than flour.
The mineral is extremely soft at Mohs hardness 1, and highly malleable.
It’s a soapy, sour, guano-tinged clay.
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> Burn
You hold a small sliver of taranakite in a match flame.
It heats quickly, melting into a gobule. You yelp, dropping the mineral and shaking your singed fingers. You didn’t expect such rapid fusibility!
You poke at the cooled powdery glob, noticing it dehydrated.
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You hold a small sliver of taranakite in a match flame.
It heats quickly, melting into a gobule. You yelp, dropping the mineral and shaking your singed fingers. You didn’t expect such rapid fusibility!
You poke at the cooled powdery glob, noticing it dehydrated.
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> Lick
The flavour has not changed at all since you first licked it, once again filling your tastebuds with sour clay and a hint of penguin poo.
This cannot be healthy.
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The flavour has not changed at all since you first licked it, once again filling your tastebuds with sour clay and a hint of penguin poo.
This cannot be healthy.
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