tsa-la-tsi-s-gi gv-do-di ka-ne
dance
- with - snake
DANCES
WITH SNAKES
"CONSUMER ACQUISITION SITE"
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tsa-la-tsi-s-gi gv-do-di ka-ne dance
- with - snake
DANCES
WITH SNAKES "CONSUMER ACQUISITION SITE"
|
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Field Trip Report April 21st-22nd-23rd, 2006 Jasper, Texas
When the alarm went off at 5:30 it wasn't that much different than any other Friday morning... Wait a minute, of course it was! This morning I was headed for Jasper, Texas to visit an old friend. Namely a 1000# piece of petrified wood that has been calling to me for more than a year now to come visiting. Brandon was itching to go nearly as bad as I was. The ATVs were loaded, the gear was in the truck, we had come-a-longs, cables, chains, and a 1-ton hoist just in case. Plenty of room on the trailer for the large pieces of petrified wood we were hunting and fully expected to find where we were going to. For the past month I had been planning this trip with David Dobson from Dallas. David had gotten in touch with Ron Ducote in Jasper and made arrangements for access to a new locality on private land that promised to be very productive. Our plan was to spend about half a day collecting a creek that has a virtual log-jam of pet wood in it. Ron warned that even the ATVs might not be helpful here due to steep terrain. Brandon and I headed out by a little after 6:00 am to go and pick up a friend and fellow rock-hound, Floyd Speck in Tulsa. After collecting Floyd and his gear, we hit the road for Jasper and a pet wood rendezvous that was long overdue. The drive to Jasper was uneventful and we arrived in good time around 4:00 pm. After checking in to our motel, we dropped the trailer and headed out get an early dinner at a nearby Golden Corral. After filling our tanks we decided to go and explore a couple of other areas for potential collecting on the north side of Sam Rayburn Reservoir. David called and he was doing the same on the east side of Jasper, checking out a couple of promising locations. We made our way to an area that looked promising and began searching for signs of pet wood along the logging roads. We found several pounds of small pieces of varying quality, and one nice piece of brown palm wood, but all in all determined there wasn't much potential in the area for the larger pieces we were looking for. We drove around a while checking for other accessible areas but didn't find much. David had about the same luck in the areas he was checking. On the way back to Jasper, we checked the access road to the area we planned to hunt the following afternoon. Even though there had been two inches of rain earlier in the day, the road was in good shape and we didn't have any problem driving into the area. We managed to locate a couple of pieces to dig out the next day and marked their location and waypoints. We determined that we could get the trailer into the area and headed back out to the motel to get some sleep in preparation for the next day. The next morning we were up at 6:30 and ready to go. We headed just down the road to the McDonalds to meet Ron around 8:00 am. When Ron arrived with his wife Donna, we made introductions and after a few minutes visiting we headed north for our first stop. The area we were going to is a hunting club lease, and we would be collecting in a steep sided creek. Ron led us back into the property nearly a mile on a two-track to a clear-cut. We unloaded the ATVs while Ron and David drove another 1/8th of a mile to a fire-break where we would be accessing the creek. Ron pointed us in the right direction and explained where the bulk of the wood was located from their experience. He wasn't wrong! As soon as we got to the creek bottom, there was petrified wood laying everywhere! Within just a couple of hundred yards of creek, there must be 20,000# of pet wood from tumbling size to 1000# or more, and just what can be seen exposed. The creek banks are full of it if you want to dig for it. This is a massive zone of silicified wood, mostly oak, that is somewhere around 55 MYO. Burls, knots, and curly features are common in this wood. Here you see David Dobson already stacking cord-wood on the bank.
Brandon went for the larger log that was immediately to David's right.
While Floyd went work inspecting smaller specimens that would fit in a backpack on down the creek.
Here you can see some of the pieces that David hauled up from the creek. Note in the one picture the three foot long palm log that David tried to make me believe he had found the previous afternoon. (He bought it from a buddy in Dallas. Looks to be a piece of Louisiana palm.)
A while later after hauling a few hundred pounds of pet wood up from the creek I decided to explore a bit. Heading down the ridge in a clear-cut behind David's vehicle, I discovered this nice one just sitting on top of the ground waiting for me. Hook 'er up!
David got all he could manage and left just before I found that one, so he missed seeing it in the wild. Around noon we loaded up so Ron and Donna could get going. We owe them a hearty thanks for helping us out and taking us to this great spot.
As you can see we had a few larger pieces on the trailer by then. But wait! We didn't even make it to the gate before we discovered a 500# log in the road that was in two segments. We dug them out and rolled them up the ramp onto the trailer, eventually rearranging them along the side next to the ATV to balance out some weight.
We decided to go to town and get lunch before going to our usual hunting ground. Back in Jasper we found a Texas stop sign and got burgers. After relaxing for an hour we stopped by the motel to freshen up, change shirts, and take a short break. We were soon headed back out for the old stomping' grounds. We didn't waste any time unloading the ATVs and heading for the woods to find some bigger prey. Our first stop was the log Floyd had spotted the evening before and we had marked for removal.
This didn't take too long as it wasn't as big as we had hoped, only around 50#. We explored a few other spots after that and picked up some smaller stuff. After getting something of a load on the ATV, we went to find Brandon and unload back at the truck. Brandon had located a few larger pieces and we found him racing up and down the roads like a speed demon, just having some fun on the ATV. Brandon wanted to go explore on the pipeline clear-cut so we doubled-up and followed him about a mile from the truck to the clear-cut. I had looked here last year but not found anything promising at that time. This time was no exception. Brandon barreled off down through a small wet ravine and once on the other side decided to take a new track through the grass instead of the relatively dry, well used track. Guess what? Yea, you guessed it. 4-wheel drive ATV does not mean invincible... he buried it some nasty black mud where a spring is relatively always wet. The funny part was when he looked back at me sitting on the other side of the ravine and hung his head, just knowing he was in for some criticism for that one... I wasn't too hard on him... I eased my ATV across the ravine and got in front of him on the dry track. For some reason the winch on the ATV wouldn't work so I went to check it out and discover that I had left the ground cable off of the battery when I replaced it last week. After getting the tool kit and correcting this, we winched the ATV out of the mud and headed back the way we came. While we were winching out, Floyd was looking around and found a wallet lying on the ground. What's a guy to do? He handed it to me thinking it might be mine or Brandon's, I looked in it and there was no ID, but there was $33 cash... I handed it back to Floyd and told him it appeared to me he was $33 richer as it didn't belong to me or Brandon. Most likely some kid riding his ATV lost it who knows when. Brandon headed back toward the truck and Floyd and I decided to explore a likely looking area off one of the logging roads where there was a new wash after the hurricane and heavy rains. Here we hit the jackpot. The rains had exposed a number of larger pieces in the wash, and better yet, we could drive right up to them with the ATV.
Just up the hill in the road we spotted some more exposed logs. These turned out to be much larger pieces, the largest one is still there, we decided it would best wait for the next trip. We covered it back up and noted the location. One of the pieces seen on the back of the ATV behind Brandon is around 300#. This was the second trip to transport the pieces back to the trailer. It took all three of us to load that one on the ATV!
On the way back we decided to visit our old friend. While Floyd was standing on it, he spied another piece buried in the brush nearby. It turned out to be a beautiful round full of druze and agate, one of the prettiest pieces of the trip after it's cleaned up I'm betting!
We stopped at Tiger Creek on the way out to wash off in the clean, cold water near the low water crossing on the forest road. Quite refreshing I must say.
All in all we had a great trip this time. Lots of pet wood for the yard, some for the saw, and plenty of good fun to remember. We only had one spot of trouble on the way home. After leaving Jasper on Sunday morning, we got perhaps thirty miles north to Pineland and I was hearing some noise from the trailer. I pulled over and discovered that somehow, all of the lug nuts on one wheel had mysteriously loosened during the night, and the wheel was destroyed. Another mile and it would have worked it's way off of the hub entirely. We have our suspicions how this happened, but it's speculation at best based on certain incidents. I thought Texas fishermen had a better sense of humor... I pulled the ruined wheel off and chained the axle up. We transferred as much weight as possible to ease the strain on the remaining tire on that side and then took the next twelve hours to make the eight hour drive home. Hey, all in a day's work, right? I was just in too good a mood to let a little thing like a ruined trailer wheel and hub get me down. I loved every minute of the trip. We took all of the back roads going home and enjoyed the Americana along the way! ©2006 Virgil G. Richards http:\\www.dances-with-snakes.com
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HAVE YOU BEEN THE TARGET OF A SCAM LATELY? DON'T LET YOUR GUARD DOWN! AUGUST 20TH, 2008 - BROKEN ARROW, OKLAHOMA
If you are not on your toes all of time, you could be the target of a scam or con. Last evening while filling up with gas at QT in Broken Arrow a blue PT Cruiser pulled across in front of my truck. A casually dressed black man stepped out and in a hushed voice asked if I was interested in buying a laptop computer. He proceeded to tell me he had three or four of these for sale for $250 each. Claiming they were brand new Sony Vaio laptops. My first question was "Are they hot?" and I informed him I wasn't interested. He pressed on asking if I would pay $200, then $150. "I don't buy merchandise from the trunk of a car" I informed him. He then asked how much I would be willing to pay, and went back to his car, retrieving a package from the back seat that appeared to be a box about the size of a laptop, wrapped in brown paper, taped up excessively with packaging tape, and a photocopied ad from Office Depot advertising a Sony Vaio for $2099. In the process of getting the package from his car, he covered it with a sheet before bringing it to show me.... A lot suspicious... He handed me the package and returned to his car to retrieve a laptop from the back seat, again covering it with the sheet so no one else could see what he was doing. The laptop was an older Compaq, that he claimed a lady had dropped, but the ones in the packages were Sony. He very quickly returned it to his car, not letting me see more than a glimpse of it under the sheet. Meanwhile, I was hefting the supposed "new" packaged laptop, the entire time suspecting a scam more so than stolen merchandise. I strung him along a little while, squeezing the package (it was too lightweight, and compressed easily) Now knowing I was actually holding a package with nothing substantial inside, I told him I might be interested if he showed me what was in the box. He very quickly retrieved it from me, still trying to get me to pay $150 for it, as he gradually put distance between us getting back to his car. That pretty much ended the conversation. I told him again, "show me what's in the box, I might be interested." No go, he got back in his car and quickly went looking for another mark.
I had meanwhile finished filling my tank, and drove to a strategic location in the parking lot to watch him and his accomplice as they drove about the lot, approaching literally everyone coming and going, I quickly dialed 911 and reported their activity, gave a description of the vehicle and what they were doing, stressing that I firmly believed they were scamming people with empty boxes. I waited for police to arrive, but before they did, the vehicle exited the QT, and drove down the street. I followed at a distance, again calling 911 dispatch to report they had moved to another location, near Chili's and Buffalo Wild Wings. Actually, they had gone to the Lowe's parking lot and by the time officers arrived, had already approached several patrons in the lot. As an unmarked Dodge Charger pulled into the BWW lot, I pointed them to the Lowes. Two other marked units quickly converged on the lot, and as the PT Cruiser approached another mark in front of the store, they hit the lights and surrounded the vehicle! Too cool! I watched from the lobby of Lowes as they talked to the "suspects", and got the passenger out to open the back of the vehicle. After some minutes, a couple came out of the store and saw that the police were questioning the pair, and hollered at them "What are they doin'? Tryin' to sell ya a laptop?" One officer motioned them over and asked if they had been approached, to which they answered yes. The officer asked if they would be willing to make a statement, and a citizens arrest on suspicion of fraud. When they said they would, one of the suspects started cursing at them, this just added resolve to the couple, and they immediately made the citizens arrest. (This was necessary because the officers had no evidence of a crime otherwise.) At this point the two were arrested on fraud charges.
As it turns out, the packages were Fed-X boxes filled with newspaper... They had empty boxes, brown paper bags, tape, scissors, and flyers in the back to make more fake packages. Officers also found bolt cutters and a few personal items in the vehicle, along with three or four bogus packages, and the old, useless Compaq laptop they were using as a prop for their con. They did not find any weapons or drugs fortunately, but the passenger had a felony warrant for his arrest in Florida (the officer said that unfortunately, Florida would not extradite). Officers said they also had a fair amount of cash on them, leading officers to believe they were semi-successful with their con game. Both suspects were from Alabama, and the PT Cruiser had Alabama plates. Both are now sitting in the Broken Arrow jail, the PT Cruiser is impounded, and at least for now, they are off of the street.
Do you think those who paid $150-$250 for a box of newspaper will report it to authorities? Probably not.... Wouldn't you feel a bit foolish for falling for the scam? How about the fact that anyone with common sense would know they were about to purchase stolen merchandise, had the package actually contained a new $2000 laptop...
If you buy merchandise, especially new or near new expensive merchandise off the street, or from the trunk of someone's car, for pennies on the dollar, you should know you are about to buy stolen merchandise, and will be supporting crime. So don't do it! Don't be a victim! Report this kind of activity and save some other fool from making a mistake. These are tough times and if we don't stand up as citizens and do our part, then we are part of the problem!
In all honesty, it felt good to help get these two apprehended! And yes, I gave a written statement, and if asked, would gladly testify against them in court!
Virgil
© 2006 - DANCES-WITH-SNAKES.COM VIRGIL G. RICHARDS
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