Accretionary Wedge #53- The end of the world as we don't know it

Lockwood is hosting Its the end of the world as we don't know it as Accretionary Wedge 53.
The call is as follows:
You could make up a tale of geologic and sciency absurdity, describing in the most insanely over-the-top manner how the world/universe will end. Contrarywise, you could report on the world's end as it happens, complete with reporters going out to report "LIVE!" from the apocalypse. Personally, I think the world will go out in sectors, like an orange with 24 sections, as they pass through midnight, but I'm not sure whether it'll be at the beginning or end of the 21st.

Or, you might choose to pick a bit of "respectable" journalism, and pick it to pieces in the most acerbic way you can. (Rick Sanchez, "What's that [10 meters] in English," anyone?) Here are a couple examples of me doing that, the first to point out the myriad mindless errors and misjudgements: Science "Journalism" by Press Release. And the second to show the the original press release totally missed the boat on why this news was important and so very interesting: More On the Gigavolcano.

“Don't wake me for the end of the world unless it has very good special effects.”  ― Roger Zelazny

Or, like I said, you might have another idea. But remember, it's supposed to be a party. No downers allowed- though that might be a topic for another Wedge.



Okay here's my attempt at how I envision the world ending:

A few years ago, around where I lived they used to always say, 'Hell will freeze over before the Saints would win a super bowl championship.'   Well guess what they did win in 2010 and then a few days later we had snow!!  We just knew for sure hell was starting to freeze over.
Here's the pictures to prove it:

2-12-2010 Show on the Bayou

 This was two scenes from my back yard. 

2-12-2010 Snow on the Bayou

In Northwest Louisiana we hardly ever get snow. Every year we have one or two days of freezing but rarely are the conditions right for snow, more often than not if we get anything we get a freezing rain.  About every three years we actually do get some snow but the ground is so warm it never sticks or stays.  Its good for closing schools down and causing havoc with the roads since people don't know how to drive in it but other than that you really don't get to enjoy it.
But once every ten years or so we actually get something that stays and  can be played in. On this day it actually did snow and stayed.



   Now they predict that the world will end on Dec 21, 2012 which is also the first official day of winter.  When I think of winter I think of cold and snow. So that got me thinking about what would happen if hell really did freeze over when winter starts. We would be in a winter state all year long because there wouldn't be any ground heat to melt the snow away. 
    Most people associate heaven with the skies and celestial thing, and the think of hell as the underground.  Hot, fire and brimstone stuff. In other words places within the earth- Hades.  But the key thing here is that its inside the earth-- not some where else.  So now I'm assuming on 12-21-12 the earth is going to have to be cooled down so that hell can freeze over ie it will have to be below 32 degrees Fahrenheit.  That would mean that the upper core of the earth would have to solidify and quit being fluid. We would loose the magnetic field since it was now solid and couldn't move. This would play havoc with our electronic gizmos stuff.
  For the media that still be operating they probably would be report it wrong and blame it on The Penguin, of Batman's fame and enemy. The media will claim The Penquin finally invented a device that absorbs heat and turns it energy, unfortunately everything it touches turns into a frozen solid mass, by compressing the atoms so there is no space in-between the electrons.  Once it starts there is no stopping it, kinda like a chain reaction.  They try to stop it but its gotten totally out of control and just keeps on going, deeper and deeper into the earth.  

   Because the earth would have to get so cold to offset the heat produced by the radioactive decay of materials every thing would freeze.  The media would also be reporting all the fun activities that people would be doing.  The snowbirds would be in bliss they would think they could finally go skiing whenever they wanted too.  They'd just dress warmly.  Not realizing how cold things really would have to be in the end and everything with water in it would be frozen solid - even themselves.
     Since the earth is so cold it would start to shrink forming huge crevasses.  These crevasses would eventually meet up with each other causing huge piece of the earth to break away from itself.  These pieces would go hurtling into space and join the other cosmic debris that is out there. Soon there would be nothing left of the earth. The earth would be no more - fini- gone- kaput.  Thus the end of the world as know it.

    I would really know its the end of the world is as soon as some of this stuff started to happen people would realize whats going on- because the media would be telling me so. People would want to be with their loved ones.  My family & friends would try to contact me and say goodbye.  I would know its really,really, really serious if I ever got a text from a certain friend of mine, thanking me for the help I've given him through the years, and apologizing for being the way he was and realizing what a mistake that was and telling me he was sorry. Without a doubt- I would know its the end because I know the only time that person would every contact me is if he truly thought that -This is it- there is no future to look forward to and this is the the last chance he could make amends.


   Seeing that text would put me is such a state of shock I would have to inhale deeply.  I would inhale so deeply I would cause a barometric drop in pressure.  That and with the global warming that had been occurring plus now the freezing of the earth by The Penguin  would cause all sort of chaos to occur with the weather system.  The result would be one huge gigantic tornado.  This tornado would just keep getting bigger and bigger and wouldn't dissipate like normal tornadoes do.  Finally this system would get out to sea and become a hurricane/cyclone or whatever you would want to call it. Then it will cross the oceans and eventually come back on shore again and will spin off even more tornadoes.  Eventually it would cover the whole world with mass destruction either from the tornado or from the hurricanes. This massive system would help dissipate the heat that's been stored at the surface of the earth and cause it all to be release as one massive destructive force of energy.  .

   But these would be no ordinary weather phenomena since these tornadoes would be the type that come from OZ.  All my loved ones, even my friend that thanked me would be swept up in them and carried to a land of safety in another dimension. Only people with their towels will be saved and since most of my friends and family have read Douglas Adams  -The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (here's the Wikipedia link  ) they will be prepared and have their towels with them.  (Its been so since I read the books, I can't remember the names but I do remember how funny it was and ever since then I've been sure to carry a towel with me all the time in my car.  Most of the time its used for drying off wet kids from practices  and have found it to be some very valuable advice to have.) By having had  my family and friends saved we will all be able to live happily ever after.  - So there isn't a downer.  Plus I'll get to see some people I hadn't seen in a long time since we will all be deposited in the same area of Munchinkinland.
   
So here's how I see the world ending on 12-21-12-  it will simple be frozen solid.



Now I muse:  I wonder if it really will end - am I ready to go?   Should I start to carry my towel with me in my purse along with everything else?

Accretionary Wedge #52- Dream Geology Courses

This month Accrectionary Wedge #52 Call for post is being hosted by  Shawn at Vi-Carius  and is  Dream Geology Courses
The actual call is  here.

And here is the actual call by Shawn
This is the theme of this months Accretionary Wedge. If you are a geology/geophysics student then write about one or a few courses that you wish were offered at your university. They don't have to be traditional lecture type courses, they can be anything that you can imagine (and that are logical). Professors, feel free to do the same, or more specifically, write about courses that you wish you could teach, or that you have taught that were outside of the normal courses (stratigraphy, structure, mineralogy, etc).

For ideas, see my original post here

Now for my stuff:

First off I have not taken a geology course in quite a few years.  More precisely  I got my last degree in geology in 1981 and in 1990 I went into a different field and haven't really had a chance to take any courses in geology since then.  I would have taken some if there were any I could take but unfortunately I had already taken all the courses that were being offered at the local colleges in my area.  

So right now I really am not up to snuff as to whats being offered out there.  I do know my one son elected to take a geology intro course when he went off to college thinking it would be an easy course for him since I had exposed him to so much while he grew up.  He had a rude awaking and only got a B in it and said -dang that was a hard course!! and chose not take any more.   From his intro text book I could tell it was now broken down where more emphasis is place on water and hydrological processes and I was pleasantly pleased to see that.  When I was in school you had to wait until you were in grad school to get that type of exposure.  I always thought there should be more on hydrology since water is so critical to the world and where humans live - its nice to see others feel the same way I do and more emphasis is being place on it. 

    When I first got out into the real world, the one thing I realize I was woefully lacking in was business courses.  My company encouraged all the engineers and geologist to get their MBA's and were willing to pay for it provided you had completed the course with a decent grade ie B or A.  But to be able to get into the MBA program you had to have met their undergraduate requirements which entailed courses like accounting, finance, economics and business law.   I had always wished there was a geology course that could have covered those basics so that when I entered into the work force I felt more prepared for understanding income statements and balance sheets.  Later after I had taken the accounting courses I felt so much more prepare in understanding the way businesses worked and why even though you may have a good  project if it doesn't pay out within a couple of years it just wasn't going to happen until it became economically feasible because it all was based on the price of the commodity you were trying to sell. 
. 
    Now that I'm older and been out in the real world for quite awhile, I think the one course that I would have really like to have had would have been one on how to invest in buying gold, gemstones and other mineral interests. I would have liked to have had more information on this so it could help me with my investing in retirement accounts. I've seen the stock market rise and I've seen it fall drastically and when it crashes like that everyone says 'buy gold'.  Should I buy gold pieces that have numismatic value or is it better to go with companies that mine gold? Should I invest in an oil well - if so what type of interest should I have? What types of gems make good investments and also have nice intrinsic appeal that are affordable for resale if need be?  Should I buy futures and if so what are good future minerals to invest in - salt, sulfur, copper, silver, etc?  

     Also from the practical point of view -  I wished I had a course that taught you how to appraise rocks - gems and minerals.  Something that would help you earn certification through the American Gem Society (here's what Wikipedia has to say  about the  American_Gem_Society ).  When I was working on  my undergraduate degree I thought if nothing else I could work in a jewelry store until I could get a job that I considered more in line with what I wanted to do with my geology training.  I was made aware of how distinctly different jewelers were from geologist when I applied at a local jewelry store and was asked why type of certification I had.  All I could say was I had passed mineralogy and optical mineralogy.  That wasn't good enough for them.  They wanted only trained jewelers and certified gemologist.  That was a whole different line of education than what was being offered at where I was going to school.  I often wondered why the two couldn't be intermingled since we were both using the same type of equipment.
    I do know in later life being a certified gemologist is a good job to have.  My brother-in-law was one for many a year and it made a good second career for him. He always was able to keep busy because it  seemed like there was always a need for an appraisal of  estate jewelry or for insurance reasons by someone. It was good for him because he could work from his home and had flexibility in when he did it so he was freed up to do other things too.  And on the side his wife liked to string beads and make jewelry that he would sometimes sell to stores he was doing business with.

   Finally there is another course I  would have liked to have had too.  Recently I just read a book by David R. Montgomery called 'The Rocks Don't Lie - A Geologist Investigates Noah's Flood'.  I really enjoyed reading it and as I read it I thought this would make a great book to teach from.  I liked the way David Montgomery takes you through the history of the way geology evolved and how the church world and the science world split over some very dumb ideas.  He did a good job explaining how both can coexist together and there really doesn't have to be such a big rift between the two as there now exists.



Now I muse:  I wish colleges weren't so expensive now, because I would have been a professional student if I had enough money to keep on going.  I love learning.  I do know when I was in school it seemed like I couldn't get enough geology courses and there was always something being offered that I wished I could have taken but due to scheduling just was not able to. 

I Muse:  I saw were Glacial Till - Ryan Brown was taking a Scanning Electron Microscope course and I was so envious of him. Oh how I wish I could take that course too and am so glad to see it being offered. For my thesis I did some work on one and wished I could have spent more time on it.  At the time SEM were relatively new and not much work had been done because they were so extremely expensive to operate. The thought of a whole course on just that one instrument alone is so encouraging to see.  The possibilities of  the things that will be discovered just boggles my mind.

I'm not a poet - No Accretionary Wedge #51 Geo Poetry

I just realized, I missed the Accretionary Wedge 51 (   http://blogs.egu.eu/geosphere/2012/10/03/the-accretionary-wedge-51-call-for-posts-geopoetry/    for the month of October over at  Matt Herod @ Geosphere.  I guess the reason I missed it is two fold.

First off I'm not a poet, and have a hard enough time trying to compose lame limericks.
to prove it here's my feeble attempt:

My unPoem:

I'm so not a poet
and I truly know it.
I'm completely fine
instead of wasting my time
writing poems about rocks
to be knitting socks.
So a poem wont' happen
Now I'm putting down my pen.


The other reason is my main computer has been down, and I just have the iPad to work with. It's great for keeping up with email and such but lousy for writing long things on it.



I muse: you can't do them all.

Accretionary Wedge #50- fun moments in field camp

Evelyn is hosting Accretionary Wedge # 50 over at geornerys  . 

Here’s the topic:

Share a fun moment from geology field camp or a geology field trip. You can share a story, a picture, a song, a slogan, a page from your field notebook– anything you like!

It's been quite awhile since I've been on a field trip.
But there is one trip I will never forget - The Geomorphology Field trip of Oct 1979.  It seemed like anything that could go wrong went wrong.  I was suppose to be a simple leave Friday afternoon, camp out at a state park and return the next day and we would eat at restaurants around where we were stop.  Pretty simple and easy.

From the moment we all heard about it  we had a bad feeling about it- none of us wanted to go on this trip since it was right in the middle of midterms.  But it was a mandatory one & if you wanted to stay in the good graces of the department you went - I think having the Department Chairman planning it & leading it  might have been a contributing factor to influencing our decisions to go.
   We all met at the schedule time in the scheduled place - raring to go. Only problem was there was no van. The van was being used by the geography department and they they were no where to be seen. Our departure time came but still no vans to go in.   So we sat and waited, and waited, and waited.  Finally after dark they showed up - (this was before cell phones and no one knew were they were).  They didn't realize the van  was going to be used after they got back and had stopped to get some food and a few brews by the smell of them.They half hardily apologized and took their sweet time unloading.  Then we noticed that the van was on empty so we had to find a gas station that was open- it took a couple of stops before we found one that had the right type of gas we needed.   Needless to say we didn't make it to our first planned stop that night.
   We went to the state park instead and set up our tents.  It was no fun setting up the tents in the dark, especially in a place were you have never been to before.  We finally go them up or thought we did.
    Then we went looking for some food.  By then the restaurant that previous trips had gone to was already closed.  So we had to ask around and realize that we were in the middle of no-where Southern Ohio and there just wasn't any other place to eat.  We finally found a 7/11 open and swarmed in on them like a plague of locus. It was everyone for themselves and you were lucky to get a bag of chips and a drink. Needless to say the owner was very happy with all that we bought and told us to be sure to come back. 
    We went back to our camp site and decided we would be on the road at the crack of dawn so that we could make up some of the lost time due to the missing vans.  Instead of staying up and drinking like some of the guys were my tent mate and I decided to get ready for bed.  We went to the showers and discovered they had no hot water.  I took a sponge bath and called it quits.
    During the night it got very cold and the next thing I knew it started to rain.  It was pouring down when we found out we didn't set the tent up as well as we thought we did.  The one end collapsed.  I shifted over but was now in front of the door.  The door wasn't as water proof as the rest of the tent.  And so all night long I had a steady drip, drip, drip on to my sleeping bag.  I was so glad that I had a polyfilled one verses a down filled because my tent mate had a down  filled one.  The water was rolling off my bag and accumulating in the corner were she was sleeping.  She had down and her bag got soaked and she had the most miserable night of her life - as she so delicately put it.

We were all up well before dawn and couldn't wait to get on the road.  For such a miserable night it was surprising how beautiful the day ended up turning out to be.  It didn't take us too long to find a place were we could eat breakfast, and things were looking better.
    This trip was basically a geomorphology trip.  We saw some interesting erosion features at our first stop.
I even have a picture or two.  (Please note: These images are not the best because they were taken in Oct 1979, and were on slide film.  I just recently have been able to digitize them)

My memory is rusty but if I remember correctly this was an glacial moraine.  And we were looking at features in it and being told how you can tell the difference between a moraine deposit verse a stream deposit. 

 A lot had to do with the grading and seeing cross bedding in it.

 
We didn't stay long at this one spot before we were on the road again.  I didn't mind because I was seeing some lovely fall foliage too.

Then we went to the next stop.  It was a strip mine that was being reclaimed.  We weren't there very long before a pickup truck showed up and two men with rifles got out and asked us what we were doing.  The department chairman, went up to them and told them who we were.  He showed them the letter he had giving us permission to be there at this piece of property on this particular day.  The men said they didn't care who we were - we were to leave and leave promptly.  The department chairman started to argue with them, which wasn't the best thing to do.  They started to get a mean look on their face and it wasn't long before it was decided we best leave.  I did get one photo as we were departing.

 We next went to a golf course that gave us permission to walk along the creek, as long as we kept out of the way of the golfers. We saw some nice erosion features as we walked along the creek bed.

 Here's the group walking along the bed trying to keep dry.  For as much rain as we had the night before I was surprised at how low the water was.

 And this is one of my all time favorites photos of that trip.  The department chairman getting so involved with what he was talking about - he didn't care where he was standing.

 This is what he would have fallen into if he fell.

Finally it was lunch time.  We stopped by a grocery store and got some food.  We all made something to eat and weren't planning on being there long - trying to save time so we could see some of the stuff we had missed the day before.
  Here we are resting and talking about what we will see next.  I'm in this photo - a friend of mind took it without me knowing about it.  It was a pleasant surprise when the slides got developed and has become one of my favorites.

I'm  resting with the rest of the geomorphology class

We were headed back to the car when we noticed we had a flat.

Here's the department chairman fixing the flat.

 So then we had to sit and entertain ourselves.  Some were more creative than others.

There was one more quick stop and then we were done. This was about how careful you must be with clays and weathering. If you look in an area make sure you cover the area back because if you don't over years you'll end up with features like this.  I liked this photo because it was so pretty at the time.

Ohio fall foliage

All I can remember was I was so happy to finally have gotten back to the University.  At least I had Sunday to study for the midterms.

Accretionary Wedge #49- other worldly geology

Dana Over at  En Tequilla es Verdad    has put out the call for post with this:

The time for our next Accretionary Wedge is nigh. I suppose it’s about time for your host to let you know what the topic is, then, innit?
With Curiosity landing at the base of a three mile high mountain on Mars, I think we all know there’s only one sensible choice: we must head for other worlds!

Curiosity’s first photo of Aeolis Mons (Mount Sharp). The 3 mile high mountain in the middle of Gale Crater was named for geologist Robert Sharp, one of the finest field geologists America ever had. He worked with NASA on several Mars missions before his death in 2004. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

Dude. That is us, snapping photos on another planet like typical tourists. Okay, science tourists, but still. And this mission has got a lot of geology in it. I’m loving this mission. But it’s not the only time we’ve done some exogeology. So let’s don our space suits and explore some alien geology! There’s lots to choose from:
Mountains on Mars
Mercury Messenger’s unprecedented look at a hot planet
Io’s volcanoes
Venus’s bizarre surface
Plate tectonics on other worlds*
Hydrogeology on other planets (and if fluvial morphology is caused by liquids other than water, what do we call it?)
And more!

This image is the first high-resolution color mosaic from NASA’s Curiosity rover, showing the geological environment around the rover’s landing site in Gale Crater on Mars. The images show a landscape that closely resembles portions of the southwestern United States in its morphology, adding to the impression gained from the lower-resolution thumbnail mosaic released early in the week. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Can’t get out of the Earth’s gravity well this month? Not a problem! There’s plenty of “other-worldly” geology right here on our home planet, from features so bizarre you’d swear they’re from outer space to places where space agencies have tested equipment like rovers and trained astronauts to walk on other worlds. Places so remote and inaccessible we’ve been to Mars more often than we’ve explored them. Places that are so extreme that we turn to them for ideas of what to look for beyond our pale blue dot.
Since it’s already mid-month, I’ll give you a smidgen of extra time to explore: try to have your posts in to me by September 7th. We’ll publish the 2nd week of September.
Don’t miss the rocket – this edition’s gonna be a blast!


So here's my musings for this call.


When I first thought of what to write the first thing that popped into my mind was Meteor Crater.  (here's what Wikepida has to say about it Meteor_Crater.)  But then I figured lots of other people will probably think of that place too since that is a place that got hit by a meteor and when I think of 'other worldly geology places' I think of worlds covered with meteorite craters.  Yet I kept on thinking about Meteor Crater and decided to look at the pictures I took of it back in 2004 just for old times sake. I was disappointed to realize I didn't get a whole lot of pictures because I had just gotten a new digital camera and was trying to figure out how it worked.
 
   While I was flipping my photo album to those pictures I came across the ones for the petrified forest first.  I remember at that time thinking how alien that place looked and how it felt like I was on some distant planet and not the planet earth.  To me that meets the criteria of 'other worldly geology places.'
    Now I have to just say I'm going with northern Arizona so I can cover those two areas since they both struck me as other worldly geologic places with some really neat geology and they are less than 100 miles apart on I-40, which is really nothing when you consider how big the world is. 

METEOR CRATER
     I first went to Meteor Crater when I was a child of about 10 which was back in 1965.  I remembered being all excited about being able to see a place that had been struck by a meteor and wonder how they could tell that. I wondered was anyone hurt when that happened?  I thought it was a recent event - and wanted to make sure it didn't happen to me.  When we got there the viewing deck was closed to viewing but the museum was still open.  I read everything I could and was very disappointed I wasn't able to see it for my self. At least I found out it would be very unlikely for me to be hit by a meteorite and my curiosity about the place was satiated since the meteor hit 50,000 years ago.   I vowed to myself that some day I would come back to this place and see if for myself again.  And I finally did in 2004 and it was worth coming back to for sure.

And here are the 2 images I got of the place. (the others didn't turn out)
 Looking to the western side of the crater rim.

Meteor Crater, Arizona (April 2004)

And this was to the eastern side. It was morning time when we got there. 

Meteor Crater Arizona (April 2004)

I did find the geology interesting in the area and here's what Wikipedia has to say about it:

Geology

The impact created an inverted stratigraphy, so that the layers immediately exterior to the rim are stacked in the reverse order to which they normally occur; the impact overturned and inverted the layers to a distance of one to two kilometers outward from the crater's edge.^[22] Specifically, climbing the rim of the crater from outside, one finds:

• Coconino Sandstone (sandstone formed 265 million years ago) nearest the top of the rim
• Toroweap Formation (limestone formed 255 million years ago)
• Kaibab Formation (dolomite formed 250 million years ago)
• Moenkopi Formation (mudstone formed 200 million years ago) nearest the outer foot of the rim

 I also couldn't leave the place without getting something from there, so I was glad I could get a piece of meteorite oxide from the museum store.  Here it is

Meteorite oxide from Meteor Crater, Arizona

  THE PETRIFIED FOREST
   When I went out west the first time my family didn't have time for the petrified forest and skipped it in order to go to the four corners.  I wished they did go there because once I heard about it I always wanted to see it and was surprised they didn't once I realize how close the two were to each other. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about  The Petrified Forest National Park  .
  In April of 2004 my husband and I decide to visit Arizona. We decided to fly into Phoenix,  see lake Montezuma, spend a night in Camp Verde, then go to the petrified forest, spend a night in Winslow then meteor crater, spend a night in Flagstaff and check out the San Fransisco mountains and then head up to the Grand Canyon and spend two days  there and then back to Phoenix to catch our plane after he too a course for his continuing ed.. We came to the park from the south- southwest  on  route 180 and were purposely taking the back roads so we could see the area.  My husband had never been in the area before and wanted to see it.  Driving the back roads like we did gave us good feel for the place.  What impressed me more than anything was driving up to it how desolate everything was.  There were very few evidences of man and if it wasn't for the road we were on, I  doubt that I would have ever been able to find the place, even though it covers 146sq miles of Arizona.
(in 2011 we got back to Arizona again because that one trip just wasn't long enough and there was so much more we wanted to see and this time we took a plane trip to the Grand Canyon- Here you can see how desolate things really are - we were flying from Phoenix to the Grand Canyon and this is the area the pilot called the Painted Desert. As you can see there's not much out there.  Very sparse vegetation.

The Painted desert

 This area is famous for its petrified wood.  When you see the logs there is no doubt that at one times these were logs in a forest.  But then when you get up close you see that they are now turned into rocks that are beautiful in there various colors.
 Like the meteorite I just had to buy some samples to take home.
Here you can see the edge looking like tree bark and the growth rings of a tree.

 Here's the other side that is polished.

petrified wood from Arizona

 These rocks have eroded from Triassic rocks (Chinle formation) that formed more than 200 million years ago.  Its kinda amazing that these rocks have eroded out of the formations that they did since the area is so arid (getting less than 10 inches of rain annually) but that they have done.
    It is this dry arid climate that lends itself so much to it being so alien and reminding you of 'other-worldly geology places'.  Because to me that is the one thing that seems to make our planet so unique  - is its abundant water. Every other 'other-worldly geology' place just has the rocks but not the effects of water.  Some do have weathering effects due to their unique systems but again they just don't have the same type of  weathering like we do as seen on our planet due to water.  That's why its was so hard for me to think of a place that reminded me of a distant place - everything I think of has some sort of effect due to water and has lush green vegetation covering it. The petrified forest surprised me at how little vegetation there was and when I did see some I took a picture of it.   Enough of my babbling and now here's the pictures I took.
 Just look at this log and the size of it.  It amazed me that it could still be so well preserved.   

 Because this log didn't have branches, I could just imagine this pine tree tumbling down some huge river and having all its branches being stripped.  Kinda like the logs I see floating in the Red River after a major storm (like right now with hurricane Isaac.)   Then it hits the swamps of the delta and gets plopped down in gooey smelly mud.  Because the deposition is so fast the environment is anoxic and the log doesn't get a chance to decompose before it is covered over with more sediment.  It stays in the ground for awhile in this seal environment.  Then to the west a couple of volcanoes blow their tops, kinda like what Mount St Helen's did in the 1980's.  The fine ash gets transported into the atmosphere and then slowly settles down into this watershed basin.  The ash is high in silica and the conditions are just right for the silicious solution to percolate into the ground and fill in the voids of the tree. Over an extended period of time eventually everything organic gets replace and the tree has now turn into a beautiful stone.  Then the area as a whole got uplifted and eventually it was able to weather out of its encasing  surrounding shales /sandstones. 
   It's hard to keep in mind that this area wasn't always so arid.  That during periods of glaciation there was a lot more moister in this area and that is when these logs were most likely weathered out.    Here's some more images of the arid environment that the Petrified Forest now occupies.

Petrified Forest National Park

The Chinle Formation (Triassic) , Petrified Forest National Park. (Apr 2004)

 

The Petrified Forest National Park

The Petrified  Forest national park

The Petrified Forest National Park

 And finally I had to get this picture of this tree trying to grow against the odds.

Petrified Forest National Park

 That's it for now.  Now you know why I feel Northern Arizona is an 'Other-Worldly  Geology Place'.

 I muse:  I think the reason we probably couldn't go to the viewing area at Meteor Crater was because they were most likely training the astronauts for the moon mission.  When I went again they had a whole display about it at the museum.  I wish we could have seen that - I'm sure I that would have been so neat to tell people when I got back home. 

I muse:  You would not believe the problems I've had trying to get this post done.  Needless to say hurricane Isaac is wrecking havoc on our cable system/ internet system.  It keeps on knocking it out.- I was hoping by Aug 31 it would be working again but it's not.  I've kept this short because of that. 

I muse: At the time I took these photos I was still used to taking film photos and were used to be limited to 24-36 images at a time- I would take images sparingly so I wouldn't run out of film or in this case space. I had no idea I could get so many images on one disc.  Now I take all that I want and just delete the ones I don't - and only print the ones that I really like. Oh how the times have changed in just 8 short years.

Accretionary Wedge #48??? (couldn't find a call)

Is there an Accrectionary Wedge 48? Even if there was one I wouldn't have time to do it but it would be nice to know where to go to see the other entries.

No Can Do Accretionary Wedge #47 - field notes

I saw the call to post for Accretionary Wedge 47 and after reading it I realized this was one I was going to have to pass on because the host was asking for Field notes.  I failed to copy it and make a note of who was hosting since I thought I couldn't do it.  (if I come across it again I will include it here.)

The more I thought about it, the more I could at least write why it can't be done for me.
There are a number of reasons why I can't do it.

1.  When I was taking my field camp course (my junior year) which is where most of that stuff that I had - the professor would collect it and grade it but would not let you keep it.  You could ask to see it and refer back to it but you couldn't keep it.  Since we were camping and such that made sense to me so that he had to keep track of it in his car and it was no longer our responsibility. Then at the very end we had a major project to do that was half of our grade.  That report we were able to finish up later at the University where we were suppose to use the knowledge we had already obtained out in the field. Everything was in that report.   That report I did get back.
      A friend of mine was doing his thesis on that area where I had my field camp.  He asked if he could borrow my report to see what I had come up with.  I let him borrow it.  He did his thesis but had some revisions to make.  Unfortunately he got a job offer 1000 + miles away and moved while putting his finishing touches on his thesis.  My report got moved too.  Years and years later he got part of it back to me - his little girl had found it and thought it was a coloring book because I had colored pictures in pencils in it.  She colored over a lot of it making it hard to see things.  Since by then I was already working and had my masters degree it really didn't matter much to me.
   I read what I could in it and realized it was pretty pitiful anyway.  It was my first attempt at doing that stuff.  The most important thing was all the stuff I learned from doing it - not the report in and of itself. Shoot- when I went to field camp, I had never held a Brunton compass before let alone map with it.  After doing that report & others  I learned so much and things gradually improved.
  I put it away in a box with a bunch of text books that I knew I would never use again.  Then one time when I was moving I didn't have the space to move that box and decided to give it to the library, not realizing that report was in that box - at lease that's what I think happened to it.  To get to gist of the matter - I lost it and have never found it again.

After that  course, so much of what I did in grad school was for my professors and their papers or reports and they would keep all of my material for their stuff since they were the primary author on the articles and I would get a name citation.  I would photo copy what I could but back then it could only be done in black and white and these thing were usually in full color. Again this didn't mater much to me once I started to work.

I do have my thesis stuff but its packed way back in the attic and with being close to a 100 degrees out side, I'm not about to go looking for it.  There's no telling how hot it is up there but I know its got to be 100 degree plus. And there's no telling how long it would take me to find it.  I would probably have to clean out or move the vast majority of the stuff before I could locate it.  I got too many other things I have to do than to start that project now.

Which brings me to the second reason I have no field notes.
2.  When I was working, it was understood that all that I did belonged to the company I was working for at the time and they could do with it as they choose.  When I left, I had to hand over all my notes and drawings and logs books.  The first time they even took my Rolodex so I had to build up a whole new network base.  (After that I learned to buy and keep my own Rolodex at home so that I would never have  to go through all of that again. Nowadays you don't see many Rolodex but I do see people with company phones.  Please keep a separate device for storing that vital information that's not the companies property.  )
    Most of the stuff I worked on was so confidential it was not allowed to leave the room, and was kept under lock and key.   We were not allowed to bring work home and they discouraged us from working too late. The only thing we could take home was the professional journals we were encouraged to read - those could keep you busy most nights anyway.  All of this was done so that copying of the material was next to impossible.
   So of course during my working years as a geologist I have no field notes to share.

3.  The next reason is after being laid off, I had a severance package that covered retraining.  I started to study bookkeeping/ accounting & got a degree in bookkeeping.  By then I had started a family and I wanted something that didn't take me from home a whole lot and was more reliable than being a consulting geologist.  For over 20 years I did bookkeeping, so of course there would be no field notes with that type of work.  I do have a lot of payroll spreadsheets that I used to do manually but again this is confidential material and cannot be shared.

And finally I just want to share this.
  When my youngest started school, I was getting all set to get back into the workforce as a geologist.  Two things happened to me to make me realize I could no longer be a geologist.  I found out I had skin cancer and I needed to stay out of the sun as much as possible.  (Which is great for a bookkeeper but tough luck for a geologist who loves working outdoors as much as possible.)  At first I wasn't discourage from going back into geology convincing myself that if I slathered up a whole lot with sunscreen of 50+ I'd be okay.
   But also at that same time I got bit by a fire ant.  To most people that is no big deal, but to me it was deadly.  I had an anaphylactic reaction to it.  I found out I'm allergic to all ants, especially fire ants.  How could I be a geologist working in the field and avoid all ants?  I just couldn't see myself being able to be avoid them.
  So now I do carry epi pens with me and every once in a while I just have to get out into the field to look at things but most of the time I just stay home.  To me that's why I've enjoyed the geoblogsphere so much because I can still see all these wonderful things others are studying yet view it from the safety of my home.
  Now when I go and look at geologic things I just go for my own pleasure and don't try to map it or figure that stuff out.  I rely more on what others have research and publish to figure out what I'm looking at. I do try to figure things out first and then see if what I come up with agrees with what others have concluded too.  Most of the time we are in general agreement but sometimes some of the stuff really surprises me.  I guess that's why I love studying geology so much there's always so many interesting formations out there to see.

I muse:  I hope all those geologist who are working out in the field are taking proper precautions and are using lots of sun screen, especially now that summer is here and a lot of field work is getting done.  I sure do wish I had, but when I was growing up they really were not that aware of how dangerous the sun could be, and I very rarely put some on.

I muse:  When I lost my Rolodex with all my contacts in it, I lost track of a lot of people I never wanted to.  I was so naive back then and really wished someone would have told me of that possibility. In all fairness the people I was working with had been with the company for many many year (some 30+ years) and had never seen a layoff until the oil bust of the mid 1980's. None of them had ever experience any of this and it was all new to them too.
   For those out there in the working force buy your own device for storing your network contacts, that way the company can't take it from you when you leave.

Accretionary Wedge #46 geology, Life and Civilization

The Accretionary Wedge #46 is  here with this call: accretionary-wedge-46-geology-life-and  .  The host is Cat at Knowledge Flocs.

Here is the actual call:
From these two observations sprang the topic for this month’s Accretionary Wedge; Geology, Life and Civilization. How has life or civilisation been affected by geology or how has geology been affected by life? Do not feel restricted to human-centric themes. This topic can range from global scale events such as the Great Oxidation Event to the fortunes of small mining communities. 

I just got back from a trip to Spain, Gibraltar and Morocco. Needless to say that's what been on my mind.  I've been trying to do a post on Gibraltar.   As I was working on that post I realize that Gibraltar is a perfect place for his call.

The east - northeast view of the Rock of Gibraltar

 The whole community lives there for one reason only and that is because the Rock of Gibraltar controls the entrance into the Mediterranean Sea. By watching the Strait of Gibraltar they know what Mediterranean states are trading with other countries in the world.  If they wanted to they can keep a country from getting supplies by sea.  It is a very stagetistic place to control especially back before airplanes were invented and most places depended on ships to get their goods that they couldn't manufacture themselves.
    The Rock is so important its always been a place were human's have inhabited.  They've even found Neanderthal skulls there.  Which doesn't surprise me since its a very temperate climate.  Being on the sea/ ocean there was always plenty of seafood available for them.

 Caves on the Eastern side of the Rock of Gibraltar

  The natural caves in the area provided good shelter. The caves also had enough water percolating through them to give them a fresh source of water.

Stalactites forming in Saint Michael's cave, Gibraltar

 There was enough vegetation growing on the western side so there was always a source of fuel for cooking things.  

Western side of the Rock of Gibraltar

Since the Rock was connected to Spain they could migrate to other areas to hunt for other food.

View from the Queens road at the bay of Gibraltar

 Yet by its nature it was easy to defend.  In other words you could always see when strangers were approaching and set traps for them if you needed to.
   Although out history its been an important place.  The ancients used to call it the Pillars of Hercules and it was considered the end of the world.  People just didn't go past them and hope to survive.  

  So now I'll just connect you to my posts on Gibraltar so you can see some of the things I'm talking about  Gibraltar, St. Michael's cave, Barbary Macaques (Monkeys)  Gibraltar by Sea .


That's it for this wedge.  Thank you Cat for hosting.

Accretionary Wedge #45- Geological Pilgrimage

Aprils Accrectionary Wedge  45 is here at  Life as a Geologist ( http://lifeasageologist.wordpress.com/ ) or Twitter @denisetang.  The theme is "Geological Pilgrimage – the sacred geological place that you must visit at least once in your lifetime"


 I've always wanted to go see an active large glacier.  So to me the logical place to go was Antarctica.  I don't know why but Antarctica has always fascinated me.  Maybe because its so far away or maybe because its so cold.  But most likely its because its so pristine and there is so much to explore there.  I've always dreamed about going to a remote area that no one has ever been to and to be the first to study the geology there.  But because of its extreme distance and harsh conditions I don't feel like I have "IT" in me anymore to make that trip so now the place I want to make my pilgrimage to is Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park ( Here's Wikipedia's info ) or in the United States Glacier National Park (there's more about it in Wikipedia here ).  It's still remote for me and it will be difficult for me to get there so it should fit the theme.

    When I was in college at Ohio U the department chairman was really, really, really into glaciers.  I mean that is all he seemed to ever talk about.  Every field trip we took seemed to involve some aspect of glaciation that we would look at.  And boy did he know his stuff.  He was always showing us things that I never noticed before and how it could have been related to either glaciation or the run off from glaciation.  Needless to say he was able to hook a couple of other people into loving it as much as he did.  These people would go on to do there masters thesis on glaciation
   One of these guys happened to be a friend I had made in field camp. He was just as fascinating to talk to when he'd started talking about his research on glaciation too.  He was able to go to Antarctica and study the glaciers there.  Ever since then I've been intrigued by glaciers and if I hadn't already had an area of interest that I was already doing my thesis research on I definitely would have considered switching over to that line of study.
    The funny thing was when I did field camp with that guy we did get exposed to some glaciation in the Ruby Mountains of Nevada, but I really didn't appreciate it as much as I did studying the other rocks and structural geology that was present there. The fact was there was just too much to see and learn and too little time to do it all well and glaciation really wasn't our instructors area of interest. Yet they did expose us to some glaciation features because that was in the courses curriculum and they had to teach it. (That's why I feel every geology major should take a summer of field camp study - to get exposed to things you may not be able to in any other place.)  I do remember seeing the U shaped valley and finally understanding how glaciers formed the U verses the V of normal river erosion. I also liked resting by the glacial formed lake.   I know I would have gotten more into the glaciation features if we would have had more time to study things there. Nonetheless,  I truly didn't grow to appreciate glaciation until after I had field camp when I took a geomorphology class where our main text book was called 'Glacial and Quaternary Geology' by Richard Foster Flint (1971).  If I just would have had that class first I'm sure I would have gotten so much more out of that section of my field camp.

   So now I would like to go and see an active glacier again.  The most logical place for me to do so would be Glacial National Park.  About the same time I was taking that geomorphology class my older brother visited Glacial National Park and said I would go crazy over all of the stuff I would see there - he did and he wasn't even a science major - just business. I think the reason I rather go there than say to Alaska to see one is because of its location.  It's on the Continental Divide and that has always interested me.  To think all the water on one side of the Lewis Mountain range goes to the Gulf Coast while the other goes to the Pacific Ocean.  Then there is also the man made divide of two countries Canada and United States peacefully sharing this wilderness area for all to enjoy.
   I would love to see the rocks of the 'Belt Supergroup' that where thrust up with the Lewis thrust. Its hard to imagine this Belt Supergroup could be so old (Precambrian) and yet show so little metamorphism.  There's even igneous sills and lavas there if the other geological features weren't enough.
   But the main thing I would like to see is all the glacial features - the actual glaciers and the sediments they are caring.   The glacial erosion features  such as  cirque lakes,  glacial till, arete, col, horn, U-valleys, hanging valleys and waterfalls, rock basin lakes, ice caves, moraines, glacial outwash planes and glacial scouring & grooves.   I'm sure there are a lot more features but I can't think of them right now but I know I will know them by the time I do get there.
   If all of this geology wasn't enough I think one of the things that has always struck me about this place is this quote by the naturalist John Muir "the best care-killing scenery on the continent".  When I think of all the places that man probably has seen and then for him to say that about this location must make it breathtaking beautiful (and that's according to my brother too). To me this just has to be a sacred place to visit at least once in my lifetime. What also makes this a sacred place verses a glacier in Antarctica or Alaska  is the fact that it was one of  my deceased brothers favorite places that he's ever been. He spent hours and hours talking about it more than once in his life.  I feel like I just can't help but to be close to him when I get there to see it for myself.  I can just imagine me hearing him laughing at me and saying 'I told you so' as I would be staring at everything in wonder.  

I Muse-  I got to get this trip planned soon because the glaciers are retreating so much.  When reading the Wikipedia info - they project  that by the year 2020 the glaciers may be gone due to global warming.  If that isn't a reason for concern I don't know what is.    .


Here's some books I've looked at to help me make this choice:
'Geology of National Parks' 6th ed by Ann G. Harris, Ester Tuttle & Sherwood D. Tuttle (2004) pgs 357-383.

National Geographic 'Guide to the National Parks of the United States 6th ed. pgs 338-345.

'Tenting To-night a Chronicle of Sport & Adventures in Glacier Park & the Cascade Mountains' by Mary Roberts Rinehart (1918).

Wikipedia 'Glacial National Park U S' 

Accretionary Wedge #44 Most important teacher

Metageoloist  has put out the   call-for-posts-accretionary-wedge-44-most-important-teacher/  .   

 I've decided to go with someone that is not a geology teacher.  The reason being I went to universities  that had relatively small geology departments when I was there.  Because you could have a teacher more than once when getting your degree and the all the field trips we went on  together it made us all a tight nit group.  To pick one geology teacher as more important than the others is impossible for me because they all had such a great influence on me.
   I've mused about it a lot.  One minute its So&So and then next it's got to be Dr X but oh no This Guy did this for me and surely that's counts for something too. .  Now I'm to the point I just can't pick one of them and say this person is the most important one.  Lets just say they were all the Most Important Teacher at the time I had them.

  However there is one teacher that does stand out in my mind. She was my sixth grade teacher - Miss Relic (and yes her name really was relic and oh the teasing we did about her being a relic & why she was still a miss.)  Despite her name she truly was a great teacher because she genuinely loved teaching and it came across to us with everything she did.  
   Back when I was in 6th grade I went to a catholic school. The first thing we did every morning was go to the religion class that was taught by a nun or a priest.  Then after that class we would go to our regular classroom.   We had the same teacher for the rest of the day.  There were no rotations and the teachers were expected to teach you everything:  English, Reading, Math, Science, Geography, and History.  Up until the end of 6th grade all my classes had been that way. At the end of sixth grade they started to rotate us so we would be ready for seventh grade where we would have 3 different teachers.  You could usually tell that there were some subjects the teacher liked better than others.  But not so with Miss Relic she seemed to enjoy them all.  I was impressed with the way she could teach them all so well too.  She really knew her material.  When the rotation came I was surprised to see she was to be the English and Reading teacher.  I thought her as being more science and geography oriented.

   The one thing I remembered most about Miss Relic was she was always saying 'there are no dumb questions.' and she encouraged us to question everything.  If we were not asking questions then she'd be throwing questions to us.  It was a lot easier to come up with our own questions than to answer hers. She taught us how to search out the answers using the resources we had available. We quickly figured out the more questions we asked the faster the day went for us.  She really opened my mind to new ideas.

     The other thing she did for me was she got me into my first book club.  It met after school and was called ' The Great Books club'.  They read the classics and discussed a book once a week for about a month. Most of the time you had to buy the book and that kept some people not wanting to be in it.  Also you had to be an 'A' student to be invited into this elite group.  I wasn't an 'A' student but my older brother had been and had been in the club. She knew my brother had been in the club and knew we had the books in our house thus she encouraged me to read them to improve my reading skills.  Up until then I had been a poor reader & student, (and if you can't tell I always struggled with writing and spelling). But once she got me interested in the books, I became an avid reader. I discovered you don't have to be good at English to be able to read and enjoy them.  Because she took such a special interest in me I didn't want to disappoint her, I did as she wanted me too and read and discussed the books with her.  When she realized I was not having any problems with reading them, she broke the rules and pushed to get me into that club.  That book club started my love of reading that has lasted me my whole life time.  It taught me how to truly read a book and get the most out of it.
    It was the first time I felt like I really belonged to a group.  I made friends with all the 'smart kids'.  By hanging out with the smart kids they would help me with my school work whenever I had problems with it.  My grades started to improve.  It was such an ego booster to be known as one of those in that group.  I didn't want to disappoint them and started to learn more and more on my own.  It made me realize I could do this stuff if I just set my mind to learning it. Miss Relic pushed me like no other teacher ever did until I got into college.   She always had faith in me that I could do it and I always tried to give her my best.
   The next year we went into rotations and I really missed her a lot.  I missed the way she pushed me.  The new teachers didn't and I quickly fell back into my old bad habits of just getting by. I liked the just getting by mode because now I was spending all my time with my face in a book.  I loved reading so much and escaping into all those wonderful different worlds. 
   After that every once in a while I would have a teacher for a single subject  that would motivate me but I never had one like I did in her, until I got into college and could finally pick the courses I wanted to take.  Then I finally found teachers that truly motivated me to learn what they had to teach, and that is why I can't pick one geology instructor over another.

Accrectionary Wedge #43 favorite geologic illustrations

Hollis @ 'In the Company of Plants and Rocks' has put out the call-for-posts-accretionary-wedge-43-my.html.  At first  I've thought about it and was going to use one that I've used before but since the call has come out I changed my mind yesterday.
This is the one I want to use instead.

Hammond (1992) World Map

  The reason I've decided to go with this one is because it is the picture that I have hanging over my son's bed.  Every day my son gets to look at this diagram of the world while he lays in his bed.  You wouldn't think doing something like that would make a difference but it does.  He's won his school geography bee and he's pasted the states test and is now going to compete for the states top honor. We got the letter that tells us he's going yesterday.
   I've copied the announcement  that was at the schools web site which is located here @ http://www.middlemagnet.com/  .  

Good Luck Venkat and Matthew!

The Alliance for Education’s Regional Spelling Bee is Saturday, March 3rd at 10 a.m. at LSUS.  Venkat Sivaraman, an eighth grader, will represent CMM.  The competition will broadcast live on CW21 so tune-in to check out all the action!  Good luck Venkat!

Matthew Willis has qualified to represent CMM and participate at the state level of the National Geographic Bee, sponsored by Google and Plum Creek.  The state bee will be held on Friday, March 30th at Bishop Robert E. Tracy Center in Baton Rouge.  Good luck Matthew!

    His brother that is 8 1/2 years older had the same map hanging over his bed when he was younger and made it to the state Geography bee too. Mark lost in the third round of competition at the state.  Ever since Mark won his medal Matt has been determined to get one too.  Now they both have the National Geographic medals hanging proudly in our kitchen along with all the other medals they and their other brother have won over the years.

 You never know what a child will learn or how they will learn but being exposed a variety of different things  does make a difference. That's why I liked having the world map so readily available for my children as they were growing up.  If they had a question about a country they could quickly look and find where it was located in the world and wonder if where it was located helped them with their question.
    Another map that may have done the trick is this map that is in our hallway to their bedrooms.  This map also they got to look at every day.  They used to like to look at this one when we would have a trip planned and see what was a good way to get where we were going to go.

National Geographic Society map of the United States (Sept 1987)

But those two illustrations were not the one I had originally thought of.
The illustration I was going to use was this map of the United States, from 'Field Guide to Landforms in The United States' by John A. Shimer (1972) on the book jacket.

John A Shimer's"'Field Guide to Landforms in the United States"(1972) book cover

   I had used it once before when I hosted  Accretionary Wedge # 29 .  I have always loved maps of the United States. I especially liked this one because it showed the Geologic Provinces.  Whenever I would travel I would like to look at this map and read the accompanying book to get an idea of the geology I would be traveling through.
  The other reason I like this one so much is that through the years I've used it so may time to get the two letter zip codes abbreviation for states I don't write to regularly. I had written them in, because in my geomorph class we were going to have a quiz on it and was threaten with if we didn't get a hundred on this quiz there was no way we would ever be able to pass his class.  I got my hundred but since then I've always had a hard time remembering that Arkansas is AR and not AK which is Alaska and AR is not used for Arizona which is AZ and Alaska is not Al or AA or AS but Alabama is AL and not AB which is what I want to use.  I also would mess up with Virginia - I want to write VI and not VA and why it isn't baffles me since Hawii is HI or why Georgia is GA and not GE or what I used to like to write GEO.
   Needless to say through the years that book has been looked at a lot and is one of my favorites and is a great reference to keep handy.
    So now for Accretionary Wedge 43, I just have to say I just like looking at any map illustration of the United States.