“I took a trip with a friend to the middle-of-nowhere desert in California for an event called Gem-O-Rama. All the other people there were Boy Scouts and geologists. It’s a part of the desert that has very mineral-rich soil. They explode the ground, and then people come and pick through it. The people who really know what they’re looking for are looking for specific gems that you can only see in that region. We just showed up with a bucket and picked anything that was sparkly. They now live in a glass cookie jar in my kitchen.”