Not just any rock, a REALLY COOL rock! In my own back yard!!! It is somewhere in the cryptocrystalline spectrum, maybe agate? Or maybe jasper? I am leaning toward common opal? Maybe even a bit of fire opal? I am not sure, but I honestly think the creamy half is common opal and the top half is fire opal... Low quality and no play of color. Until I Moh's test it I just can't be sure, but it is chalcedony or opal, Either way, I love my rock! It is smooth and shiny and half ORANGE!

All photos taken with my Samsung LunaPro cell phone

Conchoidal fracture on the orange and creamy parts!

Enlarge this pic to see all the layers, especially near the bottom.

I am a lifelong rockhound, child of rockhounds, grandchild of rockhounds. If there is a gene for it, I have it. The first non-leaverite rock I found on our property was super awesome too. (For non-rockhounds, "leaverite" is all that rock you find and "leaver her right where it is." ) It is also cryptocrystalline, although my unofficial diagnosis is "agate" on this one. I am not an expert, I am a hobbyist. If anyone would like to correct me, please do! Both of these could possibly be obsidian but they are certainly not like most of the obsidian I have seen.

This beauty turned up when we had the moat dug!

There was a rock shop we had been passing for years when we came to play in the mountains up this way. It was now the closest rock shop to us, so we took our awesome rock to have it cut in half. The tiger stripes were on both sides and it looked like they went all the way through, I LOVED my rock! We got to the shop and were greeted by the son of the old rockhound. We just missed him. I mean REALLY missed him, he had passed away very recently, the son was there trying to help his mother liquidate the shop. The son said he could cut it for me. He also said "You know those stripes are not going to go all the way through. This is just a sex rock. You know what a sex rock is?"

I said "Yes, I know."

That did not satisfy, he just had to say it. "It's just another f*ckin' rock."

I smiled, and said "But you will cut it for me?" He grouched himself off to the back room and returned shortly with my AWESOME rock now in two pieces and with tiger stripes ALL THE WAY THROUGH!!! The outside is pretty well polished jsut by natural forces. I have not polished the cut surfaces, you may have to enlarge it to see the stripes.

I LOVE my rocks! Strictly platonic, though. "Sex rock" indeed! PFFT!

OK, I honestly was not offended by the "sex rock" comment, I was heartbroken by it. Not for me, for his mother. While he cut the rock and after he was done, we chatted with the mother. She was also a rockhound, but she was very old and feeble and not able to run the shop alone. To be able to play "show and tell" with us was clearly easing her grief. It made me very sad that her son could not see how much it was hurting her to let go off all of it, how much it hurt HER that he had a "sex rock" attitude. I do not mean to be too harsh. He had clearly just put his own life on hold to come help his mother, so he gets some brownie points too. Still, it was sad.

We live on a large, volcanic basalt flow and at the terminus of a glacier, so there could be almost anything out here. Mostly what I find are small chips of jasper. We hope to get the rock polishing room set up this summer so we can start making some fun stuff out of our AWESOME rocks. (Sex rock! Psshht!) We have driven all over the country and paid good money to go look for pretty rocks. In fact, our vacation this year is to a mine... watch for that slide show next month! But these are some of the jasper chips from our own property. You have to know it is incredibly satisfying to be able to rockhound without driving anywhere or paying a dime!

I LOVE my rocks! And I feel sorry for anyone who doesn't love rocks!

NAMASTE