Diorite blocks

[Norman Watts <Norman_Watts@zzzzzzz>]

I've been trying literally for months to arrange to have some stone
delivered from a quarry near Culpeper in Virginia to my place in
Maryland, a distance of about 100 miles. Well, yesterday it finally
worked out. I took a trip to the quarry, my second, and watched them
load my two small diorite blocks, 7 and 8 tons, onto a flat bed
truck. Like a kid with eyes bigger than his belly I kept looking at
the real blocks lying around. These things go all over the world,
recently to a museum being built in Dakar. I was told someone
recently was looking for a 10x10x10 ft block. I also got to see the
blocks being trimmed. They just run primer cord down the drill holes,
pour in water to spread the shock, tamp out any bubbles with a hose,
and then they blow the sides off, in this case three blocks at the
same time -probably because it makes a bigger bang.

A local crane company called Digging & Rigging did the off-loading.
It was impressive to see these guys at work, they really can handle
their machinery. They got an 18-wheel flat bed and a 50-ton crane
onto my lot without messing up the lawn or having to do three point
turns in the wildflower meadow. They even laid a swamp pad to roll
over so they wouldn't break some underground pipes. Off-loading the
two stones was easy but righting them so as to stand tall was a
challenge and provided a moment of excitement. When one of the slings
snapped the shock wave knocked off the computer cable that runs up
the boom. Still, both blocks were eventually placed and oriented just
right. Then they backed all the machinery back out the curving drive,
picking the mat up after them selves. No ruts in the lawn, no mess in
the meadow. If it rains today the grass will stand up with barely a
sign that anything happened.

I washed some mud of the blocks last night, all sides have the drill
lines except one which is flat and shows marks from the diamond wire
when wet. It looks vaguely like part of clock face or gear, reminding
me of time. The blocks continue to change in size. Sometimes they are
only a little taller than I am, other times they seem to grow and
crowd out the view from the house. As I was leaving for work in the
dark this morning I kept my eyes averted so I don't know what size
they were then.

n