I thought it was going to be a simple matter of visiting the creek near my house, but being new to the area, I hadn't yet been there and didn't know that it was really more like a swamp. Walking along an asphalt path through the most "rockless" terrain I have ever seen, I saw no easy way to get to the water itself. If there were any rocks in there I wasn't about to trudge through the grassy muck to find them.
After about a mile, just as I was starting to feel like turning back, I found an out of place swatch of small river rocks hiding in the grass under some bushes. So I got out my newly purchased bright orange handled, telescoping, "mechanic's magnet" and started poking around. I tried to behave as best I could like what I was doing was normal so that passers-by would hopefully overlook me. It didn't work. One girl came right out and asked, "Whats that?" Not being much of a conversationalist, I answered, "it's a magnet". Looking at the rocks she then asked "and what are you doing with it?" This was just the kind of surreal exchange I was hoping to avoid. "Finding rocks that are ...magnetic..." I said sounding uncertain. Much to my relief she didn't come back with "why" and instead continued on her walk.
I managed to come away with about twenty rocks that I thought might do the job. As it turned out only three of them would do the turning thing and only one of them (on the left) would do it well.
(Continued with 3. The way it works)
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