Elton John

I am not muchon making comments about others, well only if they warrant it.
Certainly, Elton John has got some comments due him, but he plays nothing in my life at this time.
This was not always so .......

Now, there was a time when I was living in Colorado, outside of Colorado Springs.
I worked on a new type of computer development with IBM.
Well, that was six days a week.
That left me one day for my passion, as well as weeknights, rock collecting.
And Colorado does have rocks!

I was reading a piece on the scarcity of tungsten, and its worldwide demand.
Prior to the 1920's, Colorado had the the top producer of tungsten.
So, what happened?

South Africa was opened up for mineral development.
Well, if the price of tungsten was going to go up,
Why not see about getting a few of those Colorado mines working again?

Oh, I located a good property, plenty of potential.
But, it seems I kept crossing paths with this Elton John dude!
No he was not looking  for minerals, but a Colorado retreat.
In fact, a working mine was the last thing he wanted to see happen.
Interestingly, the county had zero interest in that either!

So, Elton locked up the entire Caribou area.
Dozed anything to do with the mines on that property,
Dozed the mine dumps,
Flattened the townsite,
and then posted the property!
Problem was, he bought it on a silver claim.
Mining properties are supposed to remain just that.
You can't lock down a mining claim and convert it to vacation playlland!

Unless you are rich, world famous and officials are corrupt enough!

So I was a pain in his backside and visa-versa.

To me he was just another famous cocaine addict.
Wasn't going to live long.
In the meantime, I would get my tungsten rights secured.

Four decades later,
I am looking for something to watch and there is this movie about his life.
Now, no one under 21 needs to see this movie,
Probably those over 21 do not need to either.
But it is interesting to see if you knew him or had to deal with him!

It does lay out his problems, bad homelife and drugs.
It does define why he became the way he was.
Sad part was that God was allowed no place to play a role in his life.

And Caribou did not even exist in this movie!
Of course a lot of other things in Elton's life where either brushed over or ignored as well.

As for me,
I found my father's "dead" family in Switzerland,
And thus began the very quiet and fragile work at seeking them out.
Family is far more important to me than rocks .....