[jdcryans]

I come from one of the towns mentioned in the article, Thetford Mines (they somehow misspelled it), which is about 45 minutes drive from Asbestos. Reading the local newspaper is always entertaining, it seems everyone in town has an opinion about the fibre, and most of the time it's a positive one too. If some MP dares speak against it, everyone gets mad.

Anyways, people live there and as a child it's normal to go play in the dump sites, which have a strange white-greenish color due to the mineral. You pick up a "bearded rock" as we call them, the beard being the asbestos fibre, and stash them in your bedroom or whatever kids do with rocks.

Needless to say, living now in the States and telling people about those stories (which I considered normal, who wouldn't play with an asbestos-laden rocks?) always brings up interesting reactions. I was told (by the local newspaper) that you can't breath the big fibres, that it's once they're processed that they're dangerous, so I do wonder if I still have some it in me...