Friday, February 14, 2020

EXTRA hard wood, petrified!



Autos of beauty

                  Cars of the desert

For today:
When we lived aboard GITMO BAY I was introduced to a ‘type’ of wood called Iron wood. In all my days I figured Oak was the hardest wood growing. I knew Walnut was also hard. I had never heard of Iron wood. Granadillo is a wood native to Cuba. It is probably ten times harder than oak.

 There was a Granadillo pole in our back yard and it was a past time when some of my shipmates came out for dinner, to see who could drive a nail into the pole. No one was ever successful for more than a ¼” penetration before the nail bent. 

Once, with a crowd there and after several guys had tried it, our son Mark said, “Dad, I can do it. We all watched as he sank a #16 penny nail with about 4 hits.” IMPOSSIBLE.  He refused to do it again, once was enough? The little dude had planned this and had used my drill to pre=drill a ¼” hole into the pole in an inconspicuous place. LOL







Well on one of our trips out west I found even harder wood in the Petrified Forest. Trees and wood have always interested me. So on one of our swings around the USA we took time to visit the Petrified Forest. I was amazed at LOGS up to 2 ft. in diameter turned to solid stone.




WE even stayed at an RV park with several complete logs in the campground. It appears when this one fell it broke into 1-3' lengths
 
Nite Shipslog  

PS:  I searched for standing petrified trees on the net, we never saw one. But I found this, in NY state even:
There is a Devonian formation in New York State that contains standing trees. ... The swamp slowly filled in leaving the trees surrounded and buried in mud that turned into rock.
There are many other standing, I just never saw them in person. ;-)      

PS2: My healthy up date. We went to the VA walk in. The Dr. referred me to some guy called GI.  He will call in a couple days to set up what ever them GI's do. BUT on the bright side. I spent today without a pain. Felt as good as new with no pain pills of any kind..  Valentine's day just might be magical!                

6 comments:

I'm mostly known as 'MA' said...

GI will be sure to find a problem if there is one. The thoughts of him, may have scored the pain away.So gled you had a painfree day whatever it took. Here's wishing you many more

Woody said...

Wishing you Good Luck and Prayers for seeing the GI ! Had a few meetings myself with the Upper and Lower GI ! Sick Bay is not always a bad place to be when ya need it ! You and the Mrs. stay warm and behave yourselves !!
It has warmed up to - 4 below Zero ! sending down Blessings : Gary an Anna Mae !

Mevely317 said...

Isn't nature amazing?! That's pretty funny about Mark driving the nail.
Thanks for the health update! Ya, I know several folks who've spent time with a GI (Tom included). And every durn one of them were better for it. Keep looking on the bright side!

Lisa said...

I have never heard of that kind of wood. I love hearing about your adventures. I have learned so much here on the Shipslog.
Wouldn’t it be funny if GI was named Joe?
I’m glad to hear you are pain free. Let’s hope it stays that way.
I’m not sure of the pain your experiencing but have they ruled out Diverticulitis? It can be very painful after you eat foods like nuts or seeds.

Happy Saturday
Lisa

betty said...

Glad you are getting referred to a specialist and glad you didn't have any pain yesterday, Jack. How cute with Mark's thinking to drill that little hole! I bet everyone's mouth dropped open when they saw what he had done with the nails :)

betty

TARYTERRE said...

i collected petrified wood when i was a kid. my grandpa from california used to supply it to me. hope everything worked out at the doctor.