Posted on 06/11/2021 11:51:04 AM PDT by Red Badger
At 563 carats, the Star of India is the world’s largest gem-quality blue star sapphire, and is approximately 2 billion years old. (Image credit: D. Finnin/Copyright AMNH)
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What does the legendary Star of India — a 563-carat star sapphire the size of a golf ball — have in common with a 35-million-year-old petrified redwood slab; a massive cluster of sword-like crystals that looks like it came from "Game of Thrones;" and a 5-ton (4.5-metric ton) stone pillar that can "sing?"
You can see all of them, along with 5,000 other amazing stones, in the newly renovated Mignone Hall of Gems and Minerals at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City, which is reopening after a four-year closure on Saturday (June 12). There, one-of-a-kind precious gems appear alongside odd-looking rocks — some of which date to billions of years ago — that have been uniquely warped and twisted by extreme temperatures and pressures.
Individually and together, these objects tell a story of the diverse geologic processes that shape minerals on Earth's surface and deep inside our planet, beginning when the world was young and continuing to this day, museum representatives told Live Science.
Related: 13 mysterious and cursed gemstones
The Star of India, which formed about a billion years ago, was discovered in Sri Lanka in the 18th century. It is one of the best-known gems in the world, in part because it was famously and brazenly stolen from AMNH in 1964, along with several more of the museum's prized stones, by a pair of thieves named Jack "Murf the Surf" Murphy and Allan Kuhn, Smithsonian reported in 2014, on the heist's 50th anniversary. (The one-of-a-kind sapphire was recovered and went back on display in 1965).
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Happy Monday!
Monday iz lizurd killz day.
We got the puppy a puzzle toy. It’s a log with 3 openings in it and 3 little squirrels. That entertained her for an hour.
Her right front leg is bothering her, but we can’t find any source of pain. We’re hoping she pulled a muscle or something. And, of course, this happens the week I am in NYC.
I realize the U.S. is no longer covered by the rule of law, but my wife watched a videon on Rumble this weekend where the host said the law forbids coercion of anyone to take a vaccine approved for emergency use. The Liberty Council (lc.org) is helping people who want to fight coercion.
This may have already been all over FR, but I don’t go to any other threads unless pinged there from here.
Happy Monday!
LOL about the puppy toy! Boredom comes easily when one is intelligent!
I hope puppy’s leg problem goes away without getting worse. Hopefully it is just a pulled muscle. Murphey’s Law says problems with puppy will happen the weeks you’re in NYC.
That’s interesting to know bout the the vax information, because with my immune system, I’ve been staying away from anything that even looks like coercion. That vaccine could kill me. I’m not ready for that quite yet!
I check the news here, in the sidebar, but this thread is where I hang out. However, I haven’t checked today’s but will do so in a minute and let you know if there is anything of note.
I don’t see it in the News columns at all; mostly just stuff about Afghanistan. That’s so sad. Hostile countries are walking all over us now, since we have a dementia-ill POTUS who’s strings are being pulled by idiots.
Happy Monday to you, ArGee. Sorry about the puppy’s leg!
Kathleen is shrieking in the shower. Maybe she’ll be loud enough to annoy Pat.
Why on earth is Kathleen shrieking in the shower? Or should I ask?
I would say children. The original plan for this Republic was to have the adults able to harness the best of the energy of the young without giving way to their lack of experience.
But, that's gone. The kids are in charge. And I still remember "The Lord of the Flies."
I surmised that in Kathleen’s ears it’s singing.
I read “Lord of the Flies” a long time ago, but it made no sense to me, and promptly forgot about it and what it was supposed to be telling us. I’m still wondering why I read it and whether I should read it again.
It might have been some sort of animal conversation.
Ah. Who knows what goes on in the minds of small girl children?
I’m inclined to agree with ArGee. But it could also have been to hear see if there is an echo.
All the youth have been told not to play, sing, dance, etc., in the bathroom. Maybe someday she can live in a cave ...
Sigh.
No camp letter yet.
I’m listening to the Lawn Guy do his thing. He was here on Thursday last week and on Monday the week before. Because he has no helpers, he doesn’t have time to blow the debris off the vehicles, so I have to run out and put the windshield cover on to minimize the amount that gets put on the windshield. I hate driving to Walmart in the dark, only to find, when I pull into a parking spot under one of the big lights, that my windshield is covered in a fine layer of dust.
He seems to have no set day to come, and he doesn’t even pretend to come and repair the sprinklers he decapitates. The word is that he has delegated the job to the Sprinkler Guy, but I’ve never seen him, and the little patch of lawn that was freshly sodded last year is dying and ugly.
Sigh.
Epic Fail all over the place, eh.
Yes, but if the moving gods and goddesses smile on me soon, I may be able to get my skinny ol’ self out of here and find shelter in Dogpatch.
It would be nice to be somewhere I’m somewhat familiar with, around people who kinda like me. On good days.
I just saw the Lawn Guy leave so I stepped out to put the door mat down that Charlie made and saw the sprinklers running on all four corners of this little patch! Whoa! Be still my heart!
Sigh.
We’re having another storm. James brought Shannon in, and now she’s mad.
We had sprinklers in one yard. Maybe it was Chula Vista, in the 70s.
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