Unententional match making at a gem show.

[Slave to the Phone]

There is a small gem and mineral show here every year. It starts on Friday afternoon and shuts down Sunday afternoon. I love wasting money on pretty rocks, so went after work on Friday so I could get the best stuff.

I found one of these https://www.fossilera.com/minerals/7...ck-crystals--8 for a very good price and bought it without haggling. I asked the vendor if she would hold it for me until I was done spending the *mortgage money and she agreed.

A while later, I found a colored glass dragon baby who would fit in the open space, so took it to the vendor and asked if she could put it in the dragon egg without damaging it as much as I would have done. She thought it was a wonderful idea and agreed to file off some crystals and epoxy the baby inside.

An hour later, I went back in time to witness 2 security guards dragging a handcuffed woman away from the vendor's booth.

Apparently, my vendor thought my hatching dragon egg was such a good idea that she was in the process of making another one to sell and the woman came up and snatched mine, tossed 20 on the table (not even close to what the geode cost and took off. The vendor ran after the woman to tell her to give it back, and the woman screamed that she had paid for it, it was for her granddaughter and to f*** off.

Vendor yelled for the already arriving security guards and one of them got hit with my pretty rock. Woman got handcuffs and my geode was returned with a broken baby dragon.

Poor vendor was mortified about my pretty rock and offered to replace the dragon for free but said it would take a day or so because of the epoxy she had put in there. I refused her offer of a free dragon and went to the glass maker and told him what had happened and asked him to make another one with silver flecks on black and where to deliver it. He agreed, I paid and left.

I went back today to get my repaired pretty thing and saw 5 beautiful hatching dragon eggs and the glass maker and gem cutter looking very friendly. Gem cutter said the hatching dragon eggs were all reserved, but waiting for the epoxy to dry before pick up. Glass maker said it was easier to make dragon babies to fit in the geode than to cut room for them so they were working together.

You could almost smell the romance in the air.


*not really, i walk into gem shows with a certain amount of money to spend, when its all gone, that's it.

[RealUnimportant]

What a fantastic story. And what an awful woman! But that’s brilliant about the vendors, ad i really love the sound of those eggs.

[Seanette]

I think we need pictures of the pretties.

[Slave to the Phone]

I totally agree that this story is worthless without pics, and I have been trying to get some good ones.

I am learning that trying to take a good pic of a black geode with a black glass dragon is like trying to get a good pic of a sleeping black cat. They are stunning irl, but become black blobs when photographed.

I have a friend with a real camera who has promised to come over and take pics this week, I will post them once I have them.

I have to have pics, as soon as my sweetie saw my pretty rock, he asked if it was for our 15 year old granddaughter. While I hadn't planned to give it away, Summer would be thrilled with it and is mature enough to be trusted with a rock filled with sharp crystals and fragile blown glass.

Even if I do lose my pretty to an adorable beggar, I will always have the memory of watching those young craftspeople and thinking that I managed to spark a little more love in the world.

[TheSHAD0W]

I am learning that trying to take a good pic of a black geode with a black glass dragon is like trying to get a good pic of a sleeping black cat. They are stunning irl, but become black blobs when photographed.

Assuming you're using a phone camera: (1) Turn off the phone flash. (2) You want a single bright light in the room aiming at it from above and at an angle. Multiple bright lights might be better but might be complicated to set up. Also try shooting in sunlight. (3) See if the phone app has a "macro" mode. (4) Hold the phone very, very still when you shoot the photo.

[Dreamstalker]

I use an app called Open Camera (Android) that seems to work much better--way more settings/options--than the installed one.

[Nunavut Pants]

I have also had some luck with basic color manipulations in a free-to-download editor, or in the simple editors you can download for your computer. (Less so in the GIMP; there are so many options that I get lost trying to select what will work on a given image!)