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‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all thro’ the claim,
Nothing was stirring, not even a flame;
The Dredges were docked by the river with care,
In hopes that the Pirate soon would be there;

The cronies were resting after eating their supper,
From campfire tales and stories of summer;
And Tim in his ‘hot rod, and we in our campers,
Settled down for the night amidst all the clamor,

When out on the creek there arose such a scare,
We woke from our sleep to see who was there,
Away to the bank we ran in a daze,
To see the commotion that caused such a craze,

The moon on the water reflected a vision,
Could it be our wish, had come to fruition?
With wondrous amazement our interest was peaked,
Appeared Sherpa Shad towing a dredge down the creek.
With a rider, so jolly and causing a riot,
I knew in an instant, it must be the Pirate!

Quick as a whip the dredge sputtered and flamed,
And he whistled, and shouted, and call’d us by name:
“Hey! Timmy, Kathleen, and Swiftwater Toney!
“Hey Cooley and Shad and all of the cronies!
“To the bottom of bedrock, to the layer of clay,
“Now dredge away all, dredge away, dredge away!”
So on down the creek the Pirate withdrew,
With a sluice full of cons and gold pickers too,
And then in a twinkling, I spied in my sluice
The glistening of gold as big as a moose?

As I did my gold dance, and was spinning around,
The Pirate let out a magnificent sound,
dress’d in his wetsuit, from his head to his toe,
He laughed and he bellowed, now I must go!

Buckets of cons were tossed in the air,
And he danced on his dredge with a Pirate’s flare;
His eyes - how they twinkled! his movements quite merry,
His cheeks were like roses, and his beard was all hairy;
The dredge hose was coiled up like a bow,
As he leapt on the dredge and told Shad to go
The current picked up and swept them away,
Gotta get back to Indy before Christmas Day!

The magic took over with a mystical flame,
As a blanket of snow fell over the claim
A voice was all booming as they drove out of sight,
Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

by Kathleen Biffle

The "Americans with No Abilities Act" (ANAA)

The Senate is considering a sweeping legislative Bill sponsored by the Democrat Party, that will provide new benefits for many more Americans. The "Americans With No Abilities Act," is being hailed as a major legislative goal by advocates of the millions of Americans who lack any real skills and ambition.

"Roughly 50 percent of Americans do not possess the competence and drive necessary to carve out a meaningful role for themselves in society," said California Sen. Barbara Boxer. "We can no longer stand by and allow People of Inability (POI) to be ridiculed and passed over. With this legislation, employers will no longer be able to grant special favors to a small group of workers, simply because they have some idea of what they are doing."

In a Capitol Hill press conference, Nancy Pelosi pointed to the success of the U.S. Postal Service, which has a long-standing policy of providing opportunity without regard to performance. At the state government level, the Department of Motor Vehicles also has an excellent record of hiring Persons with No Ability (63%).

Under the Americans With No Abilities Act, more than 25 million mid-level positions will be created, with important-sounding titles, but little real responsibility, thus providing an illusory sense of purpose and performance.

Mandatory non-performance-based raises and promotions will be given to guarantee upward mobility for even the most unremarkable employees. The legislation provides substantial tax breaks to corporations that promote a significant number of Persons of Inability (POI) into middle-management positions, and give a tax credit to small and medium-sized businesses that agree to hire one clueless worker for every two talented hires.

Finally, the Americans With No Abilities Act contains tough new measures to make it more difficult to discriminate against the non-abled, banning, for example, discriminatory hiring interview questions such as, "Do you have any skills or experience that relate to this job?"

"As a non-abled person, I can't be expected to keep up with people who have something going for them," said Mary Lou Gertz, who lost her position as a lug-nut twister at the GM plant in Flint, Mich., due to her inability to remember “righty tighty, lefty loosey”. "This new law should be real good for people like me. I'll finally have job security." With the passage of this bill, Gertz and millions of other untalented citizens will finally see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Said Sen. Dick Durbin, "As a Senator with no abilities, I believe the same privileges that elected officials enjoy, ought to be extended to every American with no abilities. It is our duty as lawmakers to provide each and every American citizen, regardless of his or her inadequacy, with some sort of space to take up in this great nation, and a good salary for doing so."

This ANAA, is backed by Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Diane Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi, Fredrika Wilson, and Maxine Waters. 

Was a fun weekend and great to finally meet you all in person. Will do it again... a special thank you to Lee for sponsoring it all and for all the goodies GPS gave me/won. (CC hat & mug and some crevicing tools). Another special thank you to all those who cooked... had some really good meals.

My gold dredged at the CC outing.....not bad for a spot with the easiest access and hit before...

Rich Cooley and David Bogan.....

Lee Hershberger and Shad Biffle...

As some of you might remember my brother had a heart pump put in to save his life, well he has developed an infection and has gotten really bad. They turned his pacemaker and his defibrillator off this morning and they are planning on turning his pump off Friday morning, it has been a long and sometimes tough fight for him but hopefully he will have peace tomorrow. I know how his wife and kids feel knowing they are going to lose him but we just want him to have some peace. I ask for your prayers for his family and ours for this loss.

Thank you All,
The Franklin family

 A great man, friend and lifelong miner recently passed and left the mining part of his estate to amra for selling off to raise money. This is over 3 truckloads of mining gear. Metal detectors, drywashers, dredges, highbankers, concentrators, etc. This outing will be the first time this stuff has ever been for sale to the public. 100% of the money you spend on this equipment goes directly to continuing to fight for your right to mine.
Come on out, setup camp, do some prospecting, browse the broadest selection of mining gear i’ve ever seen in one place, and just like all AMRA outings, there is NO CHARGE for any of this and it is open to the public. No membership to any club/group/association is required.
This is being held on the large, private Slash X Ranch Cafe property outside of Barstow, CA, with access to nearby claims being provided by Route 66 Gold Miners and Temecula Valley Prospectors Clubs.
Here is the nitty gritty on the event and a pic of a few of the items that will be available (ya, thats a Minicab GP Extreme on the left side of the pic)

I don't have a smart phone, not smart enough to use one. I'm thinking of buying a GPS system for my truck, any suggestions on what to get?

I bought the 1 pound GPS special from Ipan4gold.  I finally got around to panning it a teaspoon or so at a time.  There was gold in every pan, chunky gold. 

I setup in the laundry room in the basement

A lot of backwash and tap

I got about 1.2g or about $48 in gold.  Not bad for a $55 purchase.  I had way more than $7 of fun.  And a picker

Looks like a good site. Hoping to learn a lot.

Do you love to shoot photos? I do. Check some of mine out on "Guru Shots".  https://gurushots.com/terrysoloman/photos

A few days age interesting thought came into my mind: "Waht precious metals people can find at Everglades?" But, as usually, at first i decided to learn history of this place and share it with YOU. This great article I found at essaywriter.org.

Everglades is the largest tropical eco-region in the United States, one fifth of the territory, which is under the protection of the Everglades National Park in Florida.

Everglades includes nine ecosystems, including grass-covered sword steppe, mangrove forests, cypress swamps and rocky ridges dotted with pine trees. The region abounds with a variety of flora and fauna, many of which are unique. Everglades - the area of ​​rare natural beauty, directly related to the environmental health of Florida. In the past century, the region suffered because of result of human activities and are now making great efforts to restore the damage.

Everglades system begins in the north of the State of Florida with the Kissimmee River, which extends to the south and empties into Lake Okeechobee - second-largest freshwater lake in the United States. During the rainy season, the lake follows Neboli Scheu stream, forming a huge pool, which floods the region, and in a drought dries up and can even lead to the brightening of Rania. All ecosystems are interconnected Everglades - swamp covered with a sword-grass, interspersed with deep ponds, canals and dense thickets, and in the place where the ocean meets the swamp, Everglades turns into a shallow system of mangrove forests and islands.

These different ecosystems are home to 260 species of birds and different species of animals - from alligators, crocodiles, snakes and other reptiles to bobcat and deer. In the wild, inhabited by 15 species, endangered species, among them - the sea turtle, and West Indian manatee. Thousands of years in the Everglades callus Indians lived, who travel long distances in the region by canoe. However, unfortunately, after the relocation of the Spaniards in 1513 this nation was completely destroyed by European diseases.

European settlers destroyed the fragile ecosystem of the Everglades, draining large and, in their opinion, useless swamps and clearing the territory for agriculture and urban sprawl. Also, the wild damage caused uncontrolled hunting, handling fertilizers marshy land in the 20-ies of XX century the impact on the flora of the region, and the construction of the Hoover Dam on Lake Okeechobee in the 30s led to the disruption of the seasonal rhythms of the region.

Fortunately, the United States government realized that the Everglades is on the verge of extinction, and in 1947 to protect the region from further destruction Everglades National Park was established, which later became a UNESCO World Heritage Site. December 11, 2000, President Bill Clinton signed a comprehensive plan for the Everglades restoration, ushering in the world's largest recovery program environment.

Nowadays, Everglades National Park is visited by over a million tourists a year. Florida State Government is spending millions of dollars on the protection and restoration of wilderness areas, and now his future looks much more favorable than in previous years.

About the Author: Hanna Maepog is a blogger. She is from Hawaii.

Had a great time this weekend at Cottonwood! Saw Orrin again, met Randy Hunt and a bunch of other great prospectors this weekend.  Plus Mac the manager made the best corn on the cob to go with dinner Saturday nite.  

And then to top the weekend off Thomas Pennyweight put my son on his 4 in dredge.  Both of us stood by and watched him have fun.  To top it off Thomas insisted that my son keep the cons from what he dredged.  Thank You Thomas!  you made my sons whole weekend.

Had a great time.  Had great people around...

http://darylburkhard.com/tommyknockers.html

Robert had a check up today and our Doctor knows we dredge and asked if we had been in the water.  After telling him about the situation with our River he said....I have 80 acres with a creek and its never been checked, you can go out there and dredge. This is where it gets funny.....

He wrote permission to dredge on his land on a PRESCIPTION Pad slip.....We have a prescription from our Doctor to dredge and dig. Wonder if BCBS will pay the gas...lol

In the interest of a happy wife makes a happy life ( And since i am bribing her for a bigger better toy.)  I broke down and sold my flake gold today from this years prospecting to date. Sold 16 grams of flake and pickers.  Sad that they had to leave me.  Happy bout the money in the pocket.