Didn't do a whole lot today; contradicted what I said yesterday about not buying anymore moroccan fossils. I just couldn't resist. I bought one jaw segment that looked like it might be from Globidens (it wasn't) and two small blocks that I realized fit together, giving me two nearly complete dentaries; $10 per block, so $30 total. Yesterday I saw two cleaned dentaries of about the same size for sale for $175 and $225 each. It's definately worth my time to prep out the specimens myself. I'm still trying to figure out if the bone fragment associated witht the pterygoid that I cleaned up the other day is an epipterygoid or something else.
Other purchases: 1 dried Draco (the kind that glides using an expanded rib cage) lizard $40, 1 skink skeleton $25, 1 book on the ammonites and other cephalopods of the Pierre Shale formation $20. The guy who was selling the modern lizard material said that he could also hook me up with indonesian monitor lizard skulls, possibly a whole skeleton, and various snake skeletons on the cheap.
In other news, I dropped by the various gem expos around town. I was like one of pavlov's puppies hearing the bell. I saw gems so gorgeous that I wouldn't dare desbribe some of them, lest I do them injustice. One that I will describe though is an emerald that measured roughly an inch and half by 3/4 of an inch. It was a brilliant stone, moderately clear, but of a pale green. It had to be over 150 carats. It almost makes me want to take a semester of gemology to become a master appraiser.
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
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I don't want to disappoint you but it takes a LOT more than one semester of gemology to become a competent gemologist and years of experience to become an appraiser who stays current with the latest trends in valuation science.
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