Column Chronicles: Riff Shattersmith and the long-lost jewel adventure

Riff Shattersmith and the long-lost jewel adventure

Frank Cotolo
June 1, 2023

Anywhere I go on Earth, I, Riff Shattersmith, have become part of unexpected adventures. These are testimonies to such events.

How was I to know the diamond I found lodged in a fast food burger was The Hopeless Diamond, the world's most expensive jewel ever found? After all, one does not expect to find a precious stone in a fast-food burger, especially one that isn't the burger being advertised.

At first I thought it was a prize, like the crap in a Cracker Jacks box but then I noticed it gleamed and glittered even when covered with special sauce. I put it in my pocket and finished my burger, wondering if it tasted better because the jewel was an ingredient.

I found out that the Hopeless Diamond was stolen decades ago and the fellows thought to have stolen it died in a hot air balloon accident. I thought it best to get in touch with a hoodlem I knew, a guy names Crooked Nose Nutley Barton Singleton. He was in hiding, as usual, but somehow still recieved mail.

"This is not the Hopeless Diamond," said Crooked Nose Nutley Barton Singleton. "I'll take it off your hands for sixteen dollars."

That's when I knew it was worth more than sixteen dollars so I kicked Crooked Nose Nutley Barton Singleton in the gut and ran to a jewelry store. There I showed the jewel to a jeweller.

"Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm," the jeweller said. "This looks like The Hopeless Diamond, stolen decades ago by fellows thought to have died in a hot air balloon accident."

I left the jeweller and ran as fast as I could run, crossing the border of one state to another and all the time wondering what I could do with a gem so precious, a gem stolen decades ago by fellows thought to have died in a hotair balloon accident. I am left in a peculiar position. For the first time I have no ending to my adventure. I have the most expensive jewel ever found in my pocket and that makes me the richest man in the world. Sort of. You see I can't cash it in but owning it means nothing. I can't even get a free fast food burger because I own it.

Now I know what it is called The Hopeless Diamond.

Frank Cotolo can be found hosting the talk and interview programme Cotolo Chronicles. You can send him an e-mail at this address: frank@148.ca.