Ohio: A Great Place to be FROM

As in "not there anymore." H/T @rockbandit.

Guess Who?

From an article at NYT; answer in the comments or click over to the article. Mind=Blown.

Shake, Rattle and Roll

105 years ago today, a great earthquake struck San Francisco and northern California. I wasn't going to mention it, but a couple of related items have come across my screen that have motivated me. First, the above photo from OregonLive shows a rather amusing situation as an auditorium full of civil engineers at an earthquake conference are shaken by, yup, you guessed it.

Steven Kramer, a University of Washington earthquake expert, wasn’t sure what was happening Monday in Tokyo when an alarm interrupted a lengthy briefing by the Japan Society of Civil Engineers. An announcement came on in Japanese, a language he doesn’t know. The large auditorium fell silent.

Harry Yeh, an Oregon State University tsunami expert who speaks Japanese, leaned over from the seat next to Kramer. "There’s been an earthquake," Yeh said, "and it will arrive here in eight seconds."

I find it very cool that the technology exists to warn that seismic waves are on their way and will arrive in eight seconds. Seven. Six...

The second item was that the geotwittersphere was in turmoil a couple of hours ago as a 3.8 (revised) 3.4 "commemorative" quake occurred on the San Andreas Fault. Dave Schumaker just happened to take a photo at Lotta's Fountain a mere three minutes before the quake struck.

For more information on The Great San Francisco Earthquake, see Dave Bressan's post at History of Geology, and Austin Elliot at Trembling Earth has a very interesting chart of estimated shaking intensity during the quake, as well as an update to address today's tremor.

Geo-Mystery

Interzone friend Katie, who will soon be off to Connecticut for her PhD in psychology, sent me an interesting link yesterday to the Wikipedia article on The Devil's Kettle at Judge C. R. Magney State Park, Minnesota. Take a look at the picture and spot the problem:
The Brule River splits in two just above a waterfall and falls in two cascades. That's not all that unusual; in fact it's pretty common. What's odd here is that one of the streams falls into a pothole. But wait! Even though that made me do a double-take, reading the text really blew my socks off. See, no one knows where the water goes, and a number of obvious tests have been done to solve the problem without useful results:

One [theory] is that, after dropping down the pothole, the river runs along a fault underground, or as a variant, that it enters an underground channel and comes out somewhere under Lake Superior. Both of these ideas have one valid aspect in common: they recognize that water must move downhill! But the main problem is creating a channel or conduit large enough to conduct the impressive flow of half the Brule River! Faulting commonly has the effect of crushing and fracturing the rock along the fault plane. This could certainly increase the permeability of the rock - its capacity to transmit water - but the connected open spaces needed to drain half the river would be essentially impossible, especially for such a distance. Furthermore, there is no geologic evidence for such a fault at the Devil's Kettle. Large, continuous openings generally do not occur in rocks, except for caves in limestone terranes. The nearest limestone is probably in southeastern Minnesota, so that doesn't help... Maybe the Devil's Kettle bottoms out fortuitously in a great lava tube that conducts the water to the Lake... Unfortunately for this idea, they are not the right kind of volcanic rocks! Rhyolites, such as the great flow at this locality, never form lava tubes, which only develop in fluid basaltic lava. Even the basalts in this area may not be the "right kind", being flood basalts that spread laterally as a sheet from fissures, not down the slopes of a volcano. No lava tubes have been found in the hundreds of basalt flows exposed along the North Shore. Furthermore, the nearest basalt is so far below the river bed, and even if it did contain an empty lava tube (very unlikely after its long history of deep burial) the tube would have to be both oriented in the right direction (south) and blocked above this site so that it isn't already full of debris. And there are no reports of trees or other floating debris suddenly appearing at one spot offshore in Lake Superior. The mystery persists.

Wow. This is a delightfully puzzling planet.

Big Ol' Bronto-foo-foo...

...scourge of the Cretaceous,
running through the therapods...... and bopping them in the face. (From SVPOW, where you can see this and many other pictures of "Sauropods stomping Therapods.")

And down came a biiiiig comet...

Potholes Most Beautiful and Most Wonderful...

There is a grandeur in this view of road repairs...My inner geo-nerd is in ecstasy. (From Reddit)

It's That Special Day Again

Yes, Great Britain is celebrating National Potato Day. It's also the 152nd anniversary of Oregon's Admission to statehood. So if you can't think of anything special to do, those are two things absolutely worth celebrating. (Image from Wikimedia)

Happy Darwin Day!

The Tree Lobsters contribution to the #chuckdarwin Twitter hashtag; there is also a blank if you're inclined to create your own Chuck Darwin LOL.

Dave Bressan at History of Geology has a dandy post on Darwin the Geologist.

Godless Liberal Homo gives a shout out to The Humanist Society and a video clip with reasons to celebrate Darwin Day.

Wooster Geologist Mark Wilson has also created a Darwin graphic, and elucidated some of his background in geology.

Deep Sea News has a post on the role of how his studies of barnacles helped shape Darwin's formulation of The Origin of Species.

Dr Monkerstein shows a better understanding of evolution than many primates I could name.

And Dana at En Tequila Es Verdad winds it up with a rather glum-looking Darwin "celebrating" his 202nd birthday.

Why, Yes. Yes They Do.

see more Very Demotivational

Stand Back!

Inspired by a post at Geology Rocks; base photo from here. Ah, rocks. How I love pounding on you.

Coffee Kitteh

I'm impressed. As a rule, I drink straight coffee, and only rarely get the fancy drinks, so I don't get the artwork that often accompanies the latter. There are some baristas here who can pull off some some really pretty drinks, but I suspect the kitty above would be more than they'd try for. (EpicPonyz)

Bring the Excitement Home!

Now you too can ignite consciousness! Trigger sentience in a primitive mind! Start a landslide of self-awareness! Fire the starting gun in the long, difficult race from the primordial ooze to intelligence!
I'm sending a dozen to Glenn Beck. Oh, and Bill O'Reilly. Mustn't forget "Where'd that come from" O'Reilly. (picture from Skull Swap)

Can A 'Possum Be Cute and Charming?

Before seeing this one, I almost certainly would have said "no." I have dealt with the critters up close and personal several times. Fascinating, yes. Worthy of respect, absolutely. Even scary in close quarters. Perhaps the issue here is that none of the pictures show Heidi baring her teeth: the armaments found in possums' mouths are fearsome. But I have to say, this one just makes me want to cuddle her. The Germans agree, and the article in Der Spiegel says,

A new addition to the Leipzig Zoo has yet to be seen by the public, but that hasn't stopped her from becoming a star. Heidi, a young cross-eyed opossum, is shaping up to be the most popular furry critter in Germany since Knut the celebrity polar bear.

Awww, what a sweetheart.

Deck Us All With Boston Charlie

Deck us all with Boston Charlie,
Walla Walla, Wash., an' Kalamazoo!
Nora's freezin' on the trolley,
Swaller dollar cauliflower alley-garoo!

Don't we know archaic barrel
Lullaby Lilla Boy, Louisville Lou?
Trolley Molly don't love Harold,
Boola boola Pensacoola hullabaloo!

Bark us all bow-wows of folly,
Polly wolly cracker 'n' too-da-loo!
Donkey Bonny brays a carol,
Antelope Cantaloupe, 'lope with you!

Hunky Dory's pop is lolly gaggin' on the wagon,
Willy, folly go through!
Chollie's collie barks at Barrow,
Harum scarum five alarm bung-a-loo!

Dunk us all in bowls of barley,
Hinky dinky dink an' polly voo!
Chilly Filly's name is Chollie,
Chollie Filly's jolly chilly view halloo!

Bark us all bow-wows of folly,
Double-bubble, toyland trouble! Woof, woof, woof!
Tizzy seas on melon collie!
Dibble-dabble, scribble-scrabble! Goof, goof, goof!

Traffic Hazard: Wildlife

A sea lion decided to take a scenic drive on Route 101 near Yachats yesterday. I had read about this earlier, but I enjoy the photo. Ahh, the stuff we have to endure in this silly state.

Lockwood, Bitches!

My friend Aria was playing with her new i-Touch last night, and took this photo in very poor light; I was surprised it came out as well as it did. Kind of weird how I've somehow turned into a status symbol for the young adults that hang out at my favorite coffee shop.

Rising Empire

According to Sharenator/empires, Outside the Interzone is more powerful populous than Vatican City.This is based on the supposed 5029 visitors the blog gets daily. Color me dubious. On the other hand......the idea of the OTI crowd as 3459 people wearing Groucho Marx glasses seems utterly perfect.

Word Games

In contrast to head games, with which I have no patience, I really enjoy word games. There was a game credited to the Washington Post, which pops onto my radar from time to time that involved adding, dropping, or changing one letter in a preexisting word, then defining your new word. The list, which has been around for at least a few years, can be found here. Some of my favorites:

• Ignoranus: A person who's both stupid and an asshole.
• Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.
• Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.
• Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

Another geo-tweep brought this back to my attention today- always good for a laugh. But this time, I was able to come up with my own: Porkelain: Ceramic ham. Speaking of which, "I am President, and I am holding this ham."

One Look...

...and I'd vote to convict this guy.OregonLive often runs mugshots with crime and arrest reports, and I've occasionally been tempted to post ones that amuse me. I think this is the first one I've actually passed along.

Seriously, dude, if you plan to contest your charges, you might want to reconsider your presentation.

The Onion Sets Its Sights On Oregon

Glad I voted for him. He's our only hope now.

WASHINGTON—In the wake of what is being called the deadliest midterm election in the nation's history, Washington's sole surviving politician, Rep. Peter DeFazio of Oregon's 4th Congressional District, emerged from the rubble of the Capitol building Wednesday to announce his intention to rebuild the fallen U.S. government.