And we're off

Just getting started on the first structural geology lab of the semester. It is a bit of a bear, but it is really nice getting back into the stuff I enjoy the most. I measured an awful lots of structures in rocks last spring, but I don't really feel like I have done much structural geology. Hopefully I will learn some things that will change that this fall. :D

Pay homage to the lighter......

I got reacquainted with a thought today. Last winter Jonny and I went to my Uncle's house and spent an afternoon building and using bow and drill fire making kits. It was definitely a cool learning experience. There as also definitely something rather primal about making fire by literally making a fire by rubbing a couple of sticks together. Recently, I have started watching a show on TV (no way!). Dual survival is a reality show on the Discovery Channel that puts two survival experts together in adverse conditions and shows how they cope and eventually survive long enough to reach civilization or get rescued. The two guys on the show have styles that are almost polar opposites. One is ex-military and usually fights nature head on using any modern equipment he can get his hands on. The other fellow is a primitive skills expert and tries to live alongside mother nature. It makes for a pretty interesting show because both of the experts actually compliment each other most of the time. Anyways, I suppose watching the show made me start thinking about some of the very limited primitive survival knowledge I have acquired over the years. The thought that I was recently reacquainted with was that is is almost an insult to our ancestors to not carry a lighter with you. :D

With the right materials and conditions, starting a fire with a bow and drill is tough, but not impossible. Only based on my personal experience, a bic lighter in my pocket at all times seems like a damn fine idea. But I like to take it just a little bit farther... Think about the thousands of generations of modern humans who ran around the planet fighting for survival. If we could take a bic lighter back to some hunter-gatherer types a few thousand years ago I think they would have been extremely appreciative. the power to create fire by flicking your thumb across a tiny striker that is small enough to keep in your pocket and contains enough fuel to light several hundred fires is truly an awesome thing!

The Big Sky and Me.......

"It was strange that a man could go off and leave a part of him living behind him and have no power over it and no say-so but only the knowledge that there was a live piece of him that wasn't with him. It was as if a man couldn't get free from what he had been and done. He couldn't be himself alone; he had to be all the other men he was, in the season before and the season before that and the season before that. He couldn't stand just by what he did now; he had to stand by what he had done in the past, too. Old Dick Summers would understand if he was around to be talked to. Still, it was all right, all right this time. A man knowing he had got himself a young one was alright. It gave him a different feeling from what he had before, a kind of secret fullness in the chest."
- A.B. Guthrie

This almost made me weep.

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Pretty hot stuff

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Virtual piedmont traverse

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Dear god the undergrowth

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Georgia field work in the snow. doesnt get any better

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Wow

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One that didn't quite make it.

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Mylonite.....Kick ass!

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Ahh georgia

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My field partner for about an hour

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I have been on UT's campus all afternoon and it is really just a different world compared to working in the field. The spring semester is in full swing, and all I want to do is walk around in the woods and look at rocks.

I had my 1st committee meeting today. It was really mostly a formailty/get to know you sort of thing. The extents of my field area did change a little bit. Instead of being restricted to the entire High Falls quadrangle the area now includes some of the Indian Springs quad. Hopefully this will allow the mapping done in my area to be connected to much of the other GA piedmont mapping done by fellow Hatcher students. I think this might be a semester of kicking ass and taking names. I am pumped!

So yesterday was my first real day in the field. I looked at a bunch of aerial photos using Google Earth and studied the topographic map of my field area in order to plan a traverse. Matt and I drove down a little dirt road and then just headed off into the woods along a huge lineament that is pretty obvious from the topo map. I ended up collecting about 20 stations and seeing four different rock types. We came across a really odd metasedimentary rock. I called it a metagraywacke in my notes but it was really almost entirely biotite and quartz. I suppose it could have been formed from a really dirty sandstone (which should still classify it as a metagraywacke) but I had never come across a rock quite like it. We also came across a pretty sweet sheath fold and got a bunch of pictures.

The terrain down here is something else. Really thick foliage (especially briars!) and quite a bit more hilly than I would have thought having just looked at the topo. It is hard to imagine doing field work down here in the spring and summer after everything has grown up. Maybe starting out in the winter just sort of eases you into the idea.

We also jumped a bunch of turkey throughout the day. They were all lucky that it isn't turkey season becuase we must have walked past 10 tree stands. Apparently the woods are a happening place on the weekends around here. I think the plan today is to work some pavement outcrops in Matt's area.

Cheers!

First Day in the Field

I spent most of the day riding around in my new field area. There is a really odd mixture of subdivisions with shiny new homes packed together and gravel roads with run down single-wides. Apparently there are quite a few people who work in Atlanta who commute all the way from Mcdonough every day. On the Geology side of things, the day was pretty productive. I stopped in at the state park and got some information about contacting the park manager. I hope to convince him that I have a legitimate reason for walking around on the rocks just below the dam at the state park. I found a few promising exposures that I will be going back to in the coming weeks to document. I am really beginning to see the appeal of this whole field work thing. It sure beats going to class and doing homework all night. :D

1st semester, check......

Well, the semester turned out alright after quite a few long nights. The much needed christmas break has ended. I just finished packing up some books and quite a bit of gear that I think I may need for field work. On Monday I am going to be moving my things down to McDonough Georgia. An apartment there is going to serve as a field camp for my mapping project. Matt is going to be continuing his work in the area around Jackson. I am going to be mapping the High Falls quad which should contain the Brindle Creek and Towaliga faults. More to come on that end of things later.

I am really hoping that I can use some of the "down time" in the evenings to do some good reading. There are a variety of geology related topics that I need to study for classes I will be taking this fall. I really think between the sheer volume of field work and doing some night time studying, I might really start getting a handle on some things this semester. I will still be teaching a 101 lab at UT as well as doing field work. I am also looking forward to going to the joint NE/SE GSA section meeting in Baltimore in March. Aside from getting to hear some interesting talks, I think there should be quite a few of my friends from undergrad there as well.

Well, I need to get things loaded up in the car. I just moved everything into my new office, and now I am moving half of it right back out. :)