FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[Brooks]

Well, Jim, if you insist. I have to say that my best Montana agate is still my favorite as it is one of the best specimens of this material that I have seen and has great size and color. I loved the Editorial in the month's Min Rec on polished specimens and the fact that some species in the mineral kingdom need to be cut and polished to reveal their inner beauty such as this one.

[Jordi Fabre]

Jim,

I'm afraid that I can't say which is my favorite specimens, because, believe it or not, I love all of them (and in fact I love many others that I don't already have), so, as one mom I can't say "who is my favorite" because all of them, for one reason or other, are loved for me. ;-)

Anyway, as in the future a column about my collection will be published in the Rock & Minerals magazine, and some photos will appear there, I take the compromise to explain here the reasons why I love those photographed specimens and if I like specially some of them.

Jordi

[Jim]

Hi Gail,

Yes, anyone who comes to the DFW area is welcome to see my collection!

Hi Brooks,

I LOVE quartz and at one time had a large collection of fine quartz gems (now placed at the Houston Museum). Your Montana agate is super primo! I love it.

Hi Jordi,

I understand that you love all of your "babies," but there must be a couple that stand out for one reason or another. I look forward to the article.

Cheers everyone!

[MineralParagon]

Hello

My favorite is cumengeite

Then are coming :
- boleite cube of about 9,5 mm
- twins of cerusite on anglesite crystal from Morocco
- pink fluorite from Alps
- twin quartz from La Gardette
- kammererite for the colour
- some twin fluorites from Cumbria

I love minerals from few provenance in the world, and the mix of twin and scepter.

[Tracy]

I don't have a permanent favorite, it varies depending on what I am most fascinated with and what new things I've acquired. Currently am enjoying my quartz specimens though, some of which are posted on my personal thread.

- Tracy

[Matt_Zukowski]

I have to say that it too hard for me to pick a favorite. I am drastically winnowing my collection right now and it is terribly hard to decide what to sell and what to keep.

[Gail]

This ranks highly on my favourites list.

[Gail]

Before Carles corrects me....I went to our catalog and pulled this info.

The Boleite
Amelia Mine. Santa Rosalía, Boleó District, Mun. de Mulegé, Baja California Sur
Boleite (twinned) on Anglesite (white, formerly var. "bouglisite") coated with Gypsum var. Selenite TN

A perfect matched pair of butterfly-twinned cubic indigo-blue boleite xls 5mm on edge (with octahedral corner modifications) is speared by the pinnacle of a doubly terminated white floater anglesite xl coated with selenite gypsum (23x17x10mm) included by and sprinkled by tiny indigo-blue boleite xls, with another cubic indigo-blue boleite xl 5mm on edge (with octahedral corner modifications) mounted at the very heart of the anglesite xl

[Carles Millan]

Gail Spann wrote

>Before Carles corrects me....I went to our catalog and pulled this info.

Hi Gail,

Fortunately for you I was sleeping when you posted your message. This is not Texas, it is here seven hours later (CET, Central European Time), so there was no chance for me to correct you this time. But I've just added the new info to your photo, as you will see. Thank you for providing it.

Very nice boleite!

[Carles Millan]

MineralParagon wrote:

>My favorite is cumengeite

Hello!

Why don't you post here a photo of your cumengeite for everybody to see? Come on!

[Tobi]

According to Jordi, Tracy and Matt there isn't one special favourite specimen to me. Of course, there are always some which you like more than others, but it's hard to pick one or two. But in general my most appreciated specimens are always among my favourite mineral species: Garnet, Fluorite, Calcite, Tourmaline and Quartz. But as i said I can't define the "most favourite" because they are too much.

[John S. White]

Gail:

That appears to be a truly unique boleite and a great candidate for favoritism. As far as I know there is no twin law reported for boleite so you may have the only example. It certainly appears to be an interpenetration twin, but in general twin laws are not conceded based upon a single example. All that aside this is probably the most aesthetic boleite that I have ever seen.

I would also argue that "most favorite" is redundant and I cringe whenever it pops up.

[Carles Millan]

John S. White wrote:

>I would also argue that "most favorite" is redundant and I cringe whenever it pops up.

Hi John,

I agree with you. I also hate that kind of expressions. Especially the usual "most exhaustive" that nowadays can too often be read in many newspapers and heard on radio and TV (over 700,000 finds at Google if you enter it with quotes).

Right. But I've just looked up 'favorite' in the Wiktionary and found as an example "To add to one's list of favorites...", and at WordNet (Princeton) you can read "that book is one of my favorites". So I think now this topic's title might not be redundant at all because it is not wrong to have more than one favorite. If you can have several, then you are allowed to talk about the most favorite of all. Just google "most favorite" (with quotes) and you'll find 1,700,000 items.

Since I'm not a specialist in linguistics this is just my humble opinion.

[John S. White]

Gee, I thought I had an ally at first in Carles, but then he did the reasonable thing and went to the dictionary. In spite of what he found there I still claim that most favorite is incorrect. You can have "favorites" (many) and you can have "a favorite" (only one), so a "most favorite" would indeed be redundant.

I also still cringe when I see selenite, but I realize that this is a personal problem not shared by many mineral people. There are hundreds of minerals whose crystals may occur in transparent forms, but they do not have aliases (varietal names) and it is not considered necessary to draw attention to the fact that they are perfectly transparent every time you illustrate them. How often, for example, are captions for photos of clear quartz referred to as "variety rock crystal"? Not often, fortunately. Selenite is so abused that very often it is used for any gypsum crystal, transparent or not.

[Peter]

Lovely Boleite Gail!!!
John I agree: favourite means just that.

" most favourite", "most best" is not in my vocabulary, but I did not want to be nit picky when I first saw it.,

Just seeing such expressions makes me feel uncomfortable : )
( I guess the expression cringe is the proper one, or in Swedish we say:
it makes my back shiver)
We have so many languages on earth that we have to have some patience for translation problems.