From: none@none.com99   
      
   On 1/19/2026 3:10 AM, Richard Smith wrote:   
   > Bob La Londe  writes:   
   >   
   >> Yeah I'm talking to me too.   
   >>   
   >> I took almost two weeks off from customer jobs around the holidays.   
   >> At first because I wasn't feeling tip top, and then I decided I was   
   >> ...   
   >> on most of them, and accomplished none of them.  There kept being some   
   >> little thing I needed.  At one point I was just going to throw the   
   >> front seat pedestal in my bass boat and go fishing, but the bolts I   
   >> ordered were to short.  Sigh!.  Pretty sad when I can't even   
   >> accomplish going fishing.   
   >>   
   >> Show me how productive you have been for the last few weeks.  Make me   
   >> feel bad.  LOL.   
   >> ...   
   >   
   > Comment 2   
   >   
   > Your government, "the beltway", "the Versailles on the Potomac", is good   
   > at   
   > making a mess   
   > the size of a Shakesperian tragedy, of everything it touches at the   
   > moment - does that count?!  :-)   
   >   
   > Look - I do see that the one president is inheriting a vast "kicking the   
   > can down the road" mess.  I won't decree absolution ;-) - but I do see   
   > an impossible situation to resolve.   
   >   
   > I have this winter watched videos of American mining enthusiasts going   
   > out into the wilderness finding gold and other resources.  Bright,   
   > experienced and practically skilled.  Only enough findings to hopefully   
   > cover costs and maybe make a few bucks on-top, but my goodness they are   
   > alive and that is where hope for America resides - that spirit.   
   >   
   > Best wishes   
      
   At the current price of gold even a small amount can be profitable.  Its   
   tempting to pack up all of my dad's old hobby prospecting gear and head   
   out into the desert.   
      
   I know a hard dry clay (caliche) bank on bedrock above a wash that did   
   not get worked out by the Chinese gold crews that worked the wash   
   bottoms down to the bedrock in that area.  We found where a lens had   
   been worked out just above that clay bank, and a friend of my dad's knew   
   the guy who sunk a tunnel into that clay bank along the bed rock in the   
   1950s taking out over $80,000 USD.  (Gold ran 35-45 usd in the 50s) He   
   supposedly retired to Mexico after that.  We explored it back in the   
   late 70s.  Its not a big tunnel.   Its a huge clay bank , and he only   
   knocked off a tiny portion of it.  We dry panned some of his tailings   
   (the rockier stuff that came right off the bedrock), and he missed a lot   
   of gold.  I could probably take enough gold if I was younger and   
   stronger just using hand tools to make it pay.  With just a little   
   equipment.  I could probably make some real money.  Unfortunately its on   
   a wild life refuge now.  Even dry panning his tailings might not have   
   been legal.   
      
   There is a lot of gold in the USA that will never be worked due to   
   various restrictions.  One section of creek up near Prescott is   
   designated a recreational prospecting area.  Nearly everybody who gives   
   it a go finds a little flower gold in the sand.  Imagine what you could   
   find just dredging the creek for a mile or two.  Not legal.  Shovel and   
   pan only.  Maybe a small sluice, but I don't think so.  There was some   
   land up stream that had proven for lode claims, but they are all patent,   
   legitimately private, or no prospecting national forest.  One claim   
   belonged to a friend of my dad's (Virgil Corly sp), and we had   
   permission to placer the creek there, but we mostly just went camping in   
   the woods.  Mr Corly and my dad have both passed away, and I am sure his   
   permission doesn't extend to me with Mr Corly's Heirs.  Mr Corly retired   
   fairly wealthy, but he did it by parleying his gold findings in the   
   stock market and hitting a vein of good luck in wise stock choices.   
      
   I never really got the gold bug, but I do have a little gear.  Haven't   
   picked up a pan except to move it to a different shelf in 40 years.  I   
   have wielded a shovel a bit... for digging ditches and repairing   
   plumbing.  There are still plenty of opportunities in the US for gold.   
   Particularly for "recreational" prospectors, but those gold shows don't   
   show you the legal mine field that can be sown in your path if you get   
   serious.  One fellow I knew played the game hard.  He didn't even really   
   prospect.  He just filed lode claims over top of other people's placer   
   claims.  I didn't really study the law to know how that worked, but one   
   semi serious recreational prospector I knew was pretty sore about it.   
   Made a point of telling me how he despised the guy for it.   
      
      
      
      
      
   --   
   Bob La Londe   
   CNC Molds N Stuff   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)