Today was the very best, most overwhelming day of our entire trip.
Derek and I left at 7:15am to head off to Cedarburg, a town right outside of Milwaukee proper, to go to The Gem Shop's Box and Bucket sale. It's their yearly blowout sale where they clear out inventory for practically a song. Everybody wins. They have less stuff, and people throng from miles around to get buckets. And boxes! Buckets and boxes full of mystery rocks and trinkets and treasures. Since they're moving to a new warehouse location, this year's was promised to be bigger than ever before. With fossils! Cabochons! And many other things, as well!
This is going to be the most photo heavy blog for the trip, because...well. We're a little nuts about rocks.
We get to the parking lot about 20 minutes before opening, though this was MY fault this morning and not Derek's. I said I thought we'd be fine to leave as late as 7:15, because surely the wait would not be ridiculous by 8:45 with a 9am opening. And like...we got there RIGHT as everybody else started to pile in. The line did get VERY long.
Derek was already waiting in line, I dawdled in the car for a few minutes. We listened to everyone chattering excitedly about what they do, what rocks they love, how many of these they've been to. I heard one guy tell his friends, "I just got an email from guns.com....pretty sure they emailed the wrong guy!" So he's either a convicted felon or anti-gun. Hard to say, in Wisconsin.
The Gem Shop workers gave a little speech, opened up the floodgates, and everyone piled in to a fucking buffet of boxes and buckets.
The buckets!!
The...boxes?
People were buzzing around like crazy, and honestly, the boxes were ripped through in a fucking INSTANT. I got two amazing boxes, and I was shocked that I got them at all. I got an amazing box of fossil plates, and a box of dryhead agates. But we were in a pit of fiending...um...fiends. And everyone was in it for themselves.
I grabbed one bucket because two of the rocks on top looked promising. Derek grabbed three buckets. And then I grabbed two more. We ended up with six buckets.
And then I grabbed two boxes. The dryhead agates, and the fossils. Derek grabbed two huge chunks of rock being sold at $1 per pound: a 30 pound hunk of what he thinks is copper and host, and then he found me a 20 pound block of some kind of moss agate from Mexico (moss is my favorite). And we were then, begrudgingly, done. I do want to say upfront that we saved and saved and saved for this trip knowing we were going to blow an irresponsible amount of money on rough. So when I say begrudgingly done, it was less about MONEY and more about WEIGHT. We had a seven hour drive home, and too much drag was really going to kill our fuel economy. We were also considering a third thing: space. Derek snagged us the most ridiculously stupid good deal on a 14 inch slab saw that we picked up in Rockford, and it is a fucking hefty piece of machinery. So we had a few factors to consider, and all of them converged on the idea that we needed to quit while we were ahead. A Gem Shop employee came over and added up our totals, and I went to go stand in line to check out while Derek loaded the car with our spoils.
I am going to tell a story now that is going to sound like I'm trying to big myself up as an amazingly considerate person, and that I am judging everyone outside of the story I'm going to tell. Neither thing is the case (well, I am KIND of judging the other people...you'll see). I'm not telling this story to make myself look great, but to demonstrate how very fucking silly the sentiment I'm about to describe was.
I was standing in line, and the line was VERY long. I was fifth in line, and there were at least twenty people behind me. There was a crowd of people still milling around the box tables, which were right next to the checkout table. Lots and lots of people around in very close proximity. Close enough to hear and see things going on around them. A much older gentleman cuts through the line with a dolly and a bucket, trying to get past all of us to something by the warehouse. He gets a few feet away from the line and hits a crack, which knocks his dolly a bit, and his bucket falls over, and then breaks when it makes contact with the pavement, spilling his five gallon bucket of rocks EVERYWHERE. Myself, another woman (older than me), and a gentleman (also older than me) rush over to assess and help. The lady and I start picking up the rocks and putting them in what's left of the bucket while the gentleman said he was going to see if an employee would give the man another bucket to replace his broken one with. The man who had been carrying the dolly with the bucket is professing his gratitude, thanking us a whole lot and saying, "only in the rock community are people so compassionate!"
Sir.
Sir, I would like a word.
I looked around, fairly gasted by the flabbers, because...people were watching us. Watching myself and this other woman helping this man pick up his rocks...and not helping. Three people rushed in to help, while at least thirty more looked on and did nothing. And this was compassion. A community being compassionate, far more compassionate than other hobbies.
Again. Sir. Let's reassess together.
He tells me and the lady how grateful he is, he just had back surgery and both of us cluck at him, "oh stop helping us, we've got this, don't bend!" and then the gentleman comes back with a new bucket and a Gem Shop employee. I ask the man who was carting the bucket if I can help him anymore, he says no, and bless me (barf), so I go back to the line.
I did not expect my original place in line, as I left to help and that was a choice. I gave up my space. And everyone in line seemed to agree, as nobody offered me to cut ahead of them and they clearly expected me to go back to the very end of the line. I did, but then the family behind me sent their daughter to come get me and tell me to come back to my space in line, which was very nice of them.
Only in the rock community, I guess.
I will not divulge how much money Derek and I spent at the Box and Bucket sale, but it was more than enough. We had initially planned on heading over to The Gem Shop proper to look at rough, but I expressed a minor misgiving, as we had more than enough rough to last a lifetime.
Guess where we went! And guess what we did there!
The Gem Shop is so much fucking bigger than you can ever even imagine in your wildest of fever dreams. My body was not ready. The top floor is where they ring you up, and where they sell the bulk of their trinkety wares. There was actually quite a lot to love on the first floor. I found myself exclaiming over several items and sending pictures to my oldest of all the delights I saw.
It's bigger than I expected!
Turtle shell fossils!!! Good and cheap, I'm sure.
Some cabs. I love the picture jasper.
Each time we go to the Great Lakes, I am ALWAYS hunting for Septarian Nodules. Does saying that make me sound like L. Ron Hubbard?
Is this what going to Mecca feels like?
The way I fucking groaned at how white women will fucking buy ANYTHING.
I just love cabachons!
Well this display looks WAY neater than my altar. Which just has dead bugs floating fast and loose on any ol' surface.
I had been so locked in at the ox and bucket sale that I didn't really notice how badly I had to fucking pee. Derek and I were heading toward the outside bins, I stopped to ask to use a restroom, and we were ushered downstairs to...fanfare music, please...The Basement.
Listen.
If you have any kind of hobby, just imagine being at the fucking BIGGEST supplier of whatever thing your hooby requires, where you can handpick all of your materials yourself, in whatever sizes you'd like, in whatever quantity. This is the dopamine high of being in the basement of The Gem Shop. The unfettered glee of being an adult with adult money and the unapologetic lack of restraint from unmedicated ADD is an absolutely LETHAL combination in the most wonderful way.
I went pee, came back out to Derek looking at laguna agate nodules. I was giddy. We saw that there were instructions at the weigh station.
Rules? What I'm doing, we don't need rules.
Frankly, I did not take enough photos of the basement to reall do its scope any kind of honest representation. It. Is. MASSIVE. It is stuffed to the brim with rocks. And it is unfortunately musty, hot, and still. I did not spend nearly as long down there as I would like, because I am very sensitive to heat since my heat stroke hospitalization, and I almost fainted. I do believe I spent about an hour down there, though. We looked through bin after bin after bin. I only busied myself with rock that I know I love, so I mostly stuck with agates and picture jaspers. I DID find a really stunning piece of ruby in fuschite, which was interesting to me, I mostly think that is a pretty dull rock. But this piece I really and truly was struck by, so I grabbed it. Derek, on the other hand, was being his dependably methodic self, looking through all of the bins thoroughly, while I gremlin'ed my way through everything like a truffle pig. I think my biggest find was a stunning, and I mean STUNNNNNING, piece of malachite. The Gem Shop's website has said they've been sold out of malachite for quite some time, but I found a hunk and I squealed, and I grabbed it, and then I had to go outside because I was damn near fainting. I had been fanning myself with a few of the paper bags to try and cool down, and an older gentleman caught a little bit of air and remarked on how nice it felt. So I fanned him for a few minutes and he said, "this is just a hint of what it'll feel like for him in a few years" and he looked toward Derek. I laughed really hard and said, "Nice try, but I'm perimenopausal, this is what it feels like for me ALWAYS". The fucking pluck. See if I ever fan you again, sir.
I left Derek downstairs to continue his quest for the rocks HE wanted, and I went to the outside bin portion of The Gem Shop.
Which was, objectively, a mistake.
Yes, that's Derek, who by story telling timeline, is still downstairs. I do not put these photos up in linear time. Get in, loser, time is a flat circle. Or a rubber band.
Hot damn.
All of my favorites were in the outside bins. In hunks the size of rubanesque toddlers. When we knew we'd be going out to The Gem Shop, Derek and I had an entire plan of attack: we would create a wishlist for the rocks we wanted, and then stick to JUST THOSE ROCKS. Hey everyone, guess what I did not do? Any of that.
After cooling down and collecting myself a bit, I started looking through bins. I really wanted some sarape jasper, some mookite, and some picture jasper from various regions. I couldn't QUITE dig through the bins because seriously, these chunks were massive.
Since I wasn't forward thinking enough to bring a banana for scale, I'm just going to have to describe how this wad of sarape jasper is bigger than my fucking head. And I have a big head. I hope that clears it up so you can contextualize the size. I grabbed a modest little hunk or two, but I didn't open up all of the bins to peek at what was inside. I really did do that onpurpose, it wasn't that I was bored or incurious. What I was trying to do was be calculating. Surely Derek and I were about to drain the remainder of our trip fund at The Gem Shop, and we still had three days left of our trip (including the day we were leaving). Not only did I have to think about my allowance, as it were, but weight and space in the car. I drive a Subaru Ascent, and she is built for hauling heft, but I was still trying to be good about exactly how MUCH heft I forced her to endure.
And then Derek found me and he took his turn outside.
Again, if we're listing our mistakes and missteps, this was another big one. I had traded in my comically large armful of rock bags for a five gallon bucket that I was barely able to lift when Derek called me over to look inside of a bin I hadn't looked at.
It was full of moss agate. Full. Of. MOSS. AGATE. My favorite moss, and my favorite agate. I was fucking elated. I start looking through the bin and I tell Derek, "Oh honey I'm so happy, I knew I married you for a reason!" and as Derek was saying, "this among many other reasons", the lady next to him said, "That's so nice, my husband won't even LOOK at my rocks." And I stopped what I was doing and said, "Oh my god, that's so sad, I'm so sorry to hear that!" and she didn't even hesitate to say, "well it doesn't matter, he's on his way out, and then I'm going to find a man who WILL look at my rocks." I said, yes, absolutely, and Derek responded pretty well the same. But that really kind of dragged me down. Derek and I talked about this in the car for quite some time, and I think my biggest question is....did she mean he was dying, or are they getting divorced? Derek thinks divorced. I think dying. Either way, good for her, but we both remarked how thrilled we are that we're best friends and we can share our interests and geek out with each other EVEN WHEN the other person is not interested in the thing. Of course there is less enthusiasm, but we'll still listen and look.
Derek spent about 45 minutes looking at all of the bins and the free floating pieces of rough rock, and I found some pre-cut slabs of really wonderful picture jasper. And then he came in and we agreed it was time to tally up our horrible, amazing rock damage. It took about an hour for them to have our stuff ready, not because we bought so much, just because everybody had come over from the box and bucket sale and the line was intense.
Does how much we spent matter? No. We spent less than we allotted for, but more than we should have. Can't stress enough that we saved and saved for this, we knew we were going to do some financial damage to ourselves because we wanted to, but it was well worth it. And we DIDN'T deplete the trip fund. We still had money left over. What a win for unintentional responsibility, my favorite kind!
We got back into the car, cooled down for a solid fifteen minutes...in the excitement of the morning, neither of us realized exactly how hot we truly were. We opted to head back to Doctor's Park to hunt for even MORE rocks on Lake Michigan. This was going to be the last excursion on our three pronged rock trip. What did our trunk look like at this point of our journey? Oh I'm so glad you didn't ask!
Embarrassing? Amazing? A secret third thing?
We had a little in-car picnic for lunch at the park, slathered on the sunscreen, grabbed our rock scoops, and headed down to the beach. Derek and I couldn't find out rock bags, so one of us had to improvise. And that someone was me. I grabbed a reusable bag from Sunflower Market. Stay tuned for how that turned out!
The hike down to the beach is really pretty in summer. The last time we were here, it was a very dreary winter day, and while it was still quite pretty, the verdant lushness is preferable.
As it was last time, the rock spoils were direclty in the shoreline. This is much more closely aligned with a sandy beach, at least at the immediate access point of the beach from the trail. It does get rockier as you go further down the beach, but in this section, there were people just out sunning and swimming. I skipped quite a few pictures that had people in them.
Except this guy, who is contractually obligated to let me photograph him while he doesn't get to photograph me. Being married is great!
Hey, look at that, it's Milwaukee! Which, as well know, is Algonquin for "the good land".
The water did get...um...sludgier as we traveled further than the beach access point, and I stopped walking in the water and stayed on the rocks. Derek, as you may notice if you squint, was not as widgy about the state of the water. Must be nice.
I had initially only wanted to find some chain coral, and Derek only wanted to find a petosky stone. I found mine, he did not find his. But I also found a ton of other rocks. My bag was burdened, and I found that the term "reusable" has parameters. I guess I won't reuse anything for rocks. My bag definitely broke on the way back to the car.
I hung out on this jetty while Derek searched...in vain, as we now know...for a petosky stone. I started digging around for him, too, I just wanted him to have the rock he wanted, since I found several of the ones I wanted. I didn't find any, either.
It was a lovely day on the lake. We had such a great time looking for rocks, and I think I found some really and truly great ones. Derek did, too, but I wouldn't know that until later. We saved up all of our rock finds to view at the hotel. Overall, we combed the beach for two and a half hours. The trek back up to the car was deeply unfun as we were both pack muling tens of pounds of rocks, but we made it back up, packed all of our rocks into more reliable bags, and headed to the hotel.
We stayed at a nice little Candlewood, and I apologize for what we did to one of their towels. You'll see. I wish it was sex stuff, but it's nerdy rock stuff and that is not better. It took a LOT to get all of our buckets and boxes into the hotel room so we could properly investigate our spoils. I don't think we were necessarily UNallowed to look at the rocks in the buckets, but I know I grabbed my three buckets based on the sight available rocks that looked nice. So we really had no idea what we had gotten ourselves into.
Now, this may come as a surprise to most of you reading this who aren't into rocks for cabbing and slabbing, but hotel lighting isn't really condusive to seeing all of the goodies rocks have inside. Look at that lighting. Perfect for having a night of dismal sleep on a bed that is both too hard and too soft at the same time, but not perfect for properly assessing the spoils of the day. Derek and I hopped over to Walmart to fix the problem for ourselves, came back, and set up our makeshift jeweler operation.
Professional scientists.
And then we spent the next several hours looking through our bags, buckets, and boxes. I did not take nearly as many photos of the best things as I meant to, but I did grab a few when I wasn't so wrapped up in exclaiming and oooohing and ahhhing.
My malachite. My most prized find. I think I need to stabilize it, but I'm so excited to work with it.
A dryhead agate that has all of the hallmark colorings of a laguna, and I couldn't be more pleased.
Picture jasper. I'm not sure from where, this was in a bucket, but it is immaculate.
Hours. For real hours. I think we likely spent about six hours, maybe seven, looking through everything. We didn't go to sleep until 1am, and I crashed out fairly immediately, completely exhausted by blissed to the max over what an amazing and overwhelming day we had.
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