Glenn Speaking...

Hey, all. It's me! Surprised? Well, this is my blog too! Kim is really excited to return and report on this last week's events with the "Clan Makechnie", so I will refrain from divulging any of the goodies on the Big Event, but I have some fun (not nerdy) 

stuff to share with you! That's right, folks... GEOLOGY!!! Woooohoooo!

For all those of you who just shut off your brains, there will be pictures! Everybody loves pictures. And there will not be a quiz at the end. (I know you were scarred for life in your last geology class, so we will keep it simple and fun)

I know I have been having a lot of fun at football games and recruiting dinners, but I have also done a lot of geology in the last few months. I didn't want you to think I was slacking off, so.... here goes!

My "Dynamics of Sedimentary Systems" class spent a few days on the Gulf Coast looking at washover deposits from Hurricane Ike. We went out on Matagorda Peninsula south of Houston. There, the storm surge toped the barrier island system, spilling sand from the beach and dune system on the island into the lagoon. The deposits left behind after the hurricane storm surge subsided look a little like lobes of a delta like the Mississippi. They are attached to the barrier island, and build outward into the lagoon. We went and trenched one of these deposits to study the sedimentary structures. The crux: using sedimentary structures (three dimensional patterns made by the moving sand), grain size, and other such geology type things we can say something about the flow conditions of the water spilling over the barrier island during the storm. This information is useful for identifying other such deposits in the sedimentary (rock) record (old rocks) and to understand paleoclimate (old weather) conditions. Here I am trenching.

I spent the week after the Matagorda trip in the Guadalupe Mountains of New Mexico and Texas.  Those mountains are a large reef system.  You can go into the desert and stand on an ancient carbonate reef.  It's pretty cool.  Since I don't have any spectacular (to you) photos, I'll spare you the details.

As we were flying from Houston to Boston, I looked out the window and saw a pattern in the clouds that reminded me a lot of the types of sedimentary patterns I study in many of my classes.  Take a look.  The first two are my pictures, the third is a picture of sand ripples.  My professor says the cloud pattern occurs due to wind shear.  The pattern in sediment occurs due to sediment transport conditions and grain size.

In Boston, I got to meet up briefly with Dan, Loren and Emily.  It was great to see them, and to see that they are doing so well for themselves.  It is amazing to me that I can be away from my friends for so long, but we can see each other again and it's like we've never left.  I am so glad to have friends like them. (those are Ginger Beers)

On the way home, we flew over a classic example of an eroded mountain system... the Appalachians.  I have never flown this rout, and have never been above this area when I could see the ground.  It was great to see the textbook example of eroded anticlines and synclines this area of the world is so famous for.  (and you thought it was famous for the Amish and soft pretzels...)  Basically, the rock layers in the eastern United States experienced severe folding and faulting during the Taconic Orogeny (the creation of the Appalachian Mountians).  These mountains used to be as tall if not taller than the Rocky Mountains of the western United States.  Water erosion and time have taken their toll, and all you see now is the roots of the ancient mountain belt. Well, the patterns you see from the air show the ancient folding.... with the tops of the folds cut off by erosion. (excuse the fuzzyness... it was hazy and the window also had a really pretty fracture pattern that made it hard to get good pictures)  The first image is a "block diagram" showing what is happening in three dimensions.  Sorry the subtitles are not in English, but I think you can get the idea.

That's today's lesson in Geology!  We had a great time in New England.  Hope it happens again before next Thanksgiving!