Heavy Metal

Damon and I went for a walk on the beach during lunch the other day and came across these two enormous pieces of iron in the sand.  We were about a half-mile away, but could not resist the urge to carry them back to the truck.  This was an agonizing endeavor and probably hilarious to witness from the window of one of the many beachside homes, as the collective weight of the two objects was over 300 lbs. 

  Both pieces were really interesting and I almost took them home to put in the yard, but figured I probably had enough giant iron rusting in my yard as it is.  Besides, these things were heavy, and at the scrap yard, heavy means money.  12 cents a pound for number one iron, to be precise, which at over 300 lbs., is pushing 40 dollars.  It's a beggar's ransom, for sure, but money is money and we already had a load of metal anyway.  Honestly, I just need excuses to go to the scrap yard.

  I love that place.  It seems to be one of the last vestiges of lawlessness and chaos left around here. The other day, one of the workers was telling me how the excavator operator dug into an RV with his bucket and hit a full sewage tank, which exploded from the pressure of methane gas inside and spewed stinking human waste hundreds of feet in every direction.  "You should have seen it," he said, laughing and taking long drags off his cigarette. "This place smelled just like somebody's rotten a##hole all day long."  And he was right.  I should have seen it.  And I'm really sorry I didn't.