The Tree of Life

So I came across this site, evogeneao.com, back at GSA in Portland and had no time to mention it before but here it is now. The guy who runs the site makes T-Shirts and posters with the tree of life image to the left as well as how closely related animals are to humans.

Like the brochure I have in my hand shows a tree frog and says "My 174, 613, 349th cousin 81,442,957 times removed". It's a very cool concept and I recommend anyone to stop by and pick up something cool. I would have gotten a shirt at GSA but I'm a grad student and I have no money.

Not sure how valid these numbers are though if new species turn up in the future, but things should change that much, I think.

In honor of my Soon in coming Gummy Bear

Dino Pic of the Week - Walking Under Dinosaurs

When presented with the opportunity, who could pass doing something like this up?

This is basically my office mate Jared taking my inflatable dinosaurs, which I had nothing to do with, and deciding they needed to be walking along the ceiling. It actually looks rather cool, until they fall down.

You can check out the rest of the DinoPics of the Week here.

Darwin Awards - Geology Strikes Back 2

The next geological Darwin awards winner is:

Man injured by tsunami, sort of

The geologically relevant thing here is that it is based on the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. A man jumped out of a window trying to evacuate from it and broke several bones. Unfortunately, he was in Serbia at the time.

Article courtesy of Nicole Reid

You can check out the complete collection of Darwin Awards: Geology Strikes Back at my website.

Healthy = (not) Salt Lake City (in January)

And that's not fog folks, that's pollution, or "inversion" as they like to call it. Yesterday we had the worst air in the nation. Today?

That's right worst again, by far. It's ungodly unhealthy out there. --> http://www.airnow.gov/
I am sooo happy I had to run to the bus stop this morning. Probably took 20 years off of my life.

Teaching Geology - Intro Lab

So I decided to take a page from a friend of mine and try something different for the intro Geology lab this semester. He had people come in and organize their shoes in whatever way they liked then describe their organization. This was to show people that science is about organizing information in a way that makes sense and people can understand.

Since I can't stand people taking off their shoes near me I went a different route. I have a whole bunch of random stuff that is all very similar that I could use for this assignment. And I will have the students organize this in whatever means they see fit as a class, then describe their organization.

The items:
Football thingy
Aerobie
Wobble thingy (the yellow and green thing) that is 2 ovals attached to each other
Boomerang
Roomerang (a boomerang made of foam so it can be thrown indoors)
Circle thowing thingy (I wish I knew the name of some of this stuff)
Racquetball
Squash Ball
Tennis Ball
Ping Pong Ball
Golf Ball
My dog's ball
Foam globe
Giant Foam Die
Regular die
20 sided die

So any comments or suggestions?

The Darwin Awards: Geology Strikes Back

As mentioned before here is the first of a series of posts based on the Darwin Awards.

Gypsum Kills Potential Thief

This is a story of the Earth taking revenge on the immoral. This guy was killed slowly and painfully by a giant selenite crystal in Chihuahua, Mexico when he tried to steal it.

Article courtesy of Rob Armstrong

You can check out the complete collection of Darwin Awards: Geology Strikes Back at my website.