love is fleeting, stone tools are forever (or what I learned during reading break)

1. I have a new found respect for cobble choppers. A stone tool which looks totally unimpressive but is, in fact, much more difficult to manufacture. It requires you hold two large rocks in your hand and smash one into the end of the other with great force, while avoiding totally crushing your fingers between the two. Needless to say I was too hesitant to give enough of a blow, and my toolkit is therefore without a cobble chopper.















2. Obsidian is amazing, and ridiculously sharp. Well, I knew that already, but I thought I'd emphasize it again. The leather gloves that I got for my course are covered in cuts (but at least that wasn't my hand). Surgeons can use obsidian blades in surgery, if the patient supplies their own scalpels, because the edge of an obsidian blade is 10 to 20 times sharper than surgical steel, and cuts at the molecular leve;. Wow.









3. Making stone tools is very very fun, and now I want more raw materials to play with. Which is why Harmony and Kristy and I are going to Oregon in April. Yay - obsidian sourcing!