Well, I've assembled the following:

....a "dead stick" sort-of caber. It's a 14 foot 6 x 6 that I've somewhat rounded off the ends, to (very) vaguely circular. Bill tells us that picking it is about like picking the real thing, and if you can pick, you can at least attempt a toss. It's about 80 pounds.

A 16 pound hammer. It's three five pound weights and a 1.25 pounder on the end of a 4 foot piece of abs pipe, held there by the threaded pipe cap and and a LOT of duct tape.

A 16 pound river stone, care of the local garden supply

A 28 pound weight for distance/height. This is two 10 lb weights, a 2.5 pound and three 1.25 weights all set on some threaded plumbing fittings. It's much like the various pictures on the 'net about how to make this stuff. I couldn't find a handle, so I finally bought a big galvanized ring (that weighs 1.5 pounds) and used a 3/8ths inch anchor shackle to attach it to the eye bolt at the top of the weights. All up, it's proabaly just a shade over 28 pounds.

So today I went to the park and threw stuff around. I left the "caber" at home and just took the other weights. It took a tape measure and used my towel for a trig.

Seems like I'm pretty good at hammer. It seems to come naturally and I'm tossing them out there around 60-65 feet, and this is my second time at it.

the 16 pound stone...I'm doing "form throws" to get the feel for it back again at 25-27 feet, and when I go for it and do 'em mostly right they're out there around 31-33 feet.

Weight for height also comes fairly naturally and I'm guessing I toss the 28 pounder about 14 feet??? If I'd drive up with my hips better and work my back less I bet I'd get another foot to a foot and a half out of it.

Weight for distance is hard for me. It's really hard to keep centered with all that weight flinging you around. My best throw today was about 37-38 feet and most were in the low 30's. I was all over the freaking trig.

None of these will win me anything around here, but I won't go out and look the fool either, from what I'm reading on the Scottish Heavies web site.

If anyone has any hints about how to improve on the weight for distance, I'd love to hear 'em!

Bay Area X-Markers, let's get togethr for another throwing session with Bill in early February!