GOLDEN OLDIE 10: The Hunt for Red October

 

 You tend to forget just how good Sean Connery was.  As the first James Bond he set a mark that has never been approached, in my opinion.  He acted in many other movies, some quite popular, and no one, not even our supercilious film critics, ever could detect even a miniscule flaw.  As Harrison Ford’s dad in one of the Indiana Jones movies he all but stole the show.  So, I’m a fan, and I like his role as the defecting Soviet submarine captain in The Hunt for Red October best.  He is simply magnificent.

You know the story, because you saw the film 31 years ago.  I hope you saw it in a theatre with a good sound system, because the Russian men’s chorus providing background music at crucial intervals is wonderful.  There are excellent performances by quite a few well-known actors (Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, James Earl Jones, Sam Neill, and others) but the movie totally belongs to Connery.  See it when you have several hours to kill, and don’t expect to “finish it in the morning”.  It is far too exciting to let you sleep!  A-

 

GO9: Moneyball

Well, so I lied.  I warned you that my next four Golden Oldies would be sport-related, but I also said that three of them would star Kevin Costner.  Well, that part is wrong.  The movie here is Moneyball, and it stars somebody even better looking (and perhaps even richer) than Costner – Brad Pitt.  It was released ten years ago and, wonder of wonders, the critics liked it.  It relates the semi-factual story of Billy Bean, general manager of the Oakland A’s baseball and his inspired efforts to take his chronically impoverished baseball team to the top of the heap.  He did so by adopting a novel approach to assembling players, involving statistics (baseball fans will recognize this as sabermetrics), rather than the hunches of a bunch of good-old-boy scouts.  Billy hasn’t quite succeeded (“in winning the last game of the season”), but he has made progress.  I root for him.

It’s funny how baseball sagas so greatly dominate the category of sporting movies, considering how slow and boring real baseball tends to be.  How many good football movies can you name (The Replacements, for one)?  Golf?  Tennis?  Maybe, because baseball is so slow and tends to be dominated by arcane strategy, it lends itself to human-interest-type drama. But anyway, you might find that Moneyball is a reasonable good, and totally harmless, way to waste a little time.  C+

 

GO8: Chariots of Fire

 

This is my favorite sports movie of all time, by a huge margin.  If you haven’t seen it, you are in for a great treat! 

Chariots of Fire is the almost-factual history of the Brit involvement in the 1924 Olympics.  (With embellishments: The director is quoted  as saying “never let facts get in the way of a good story”).  The principals are two sprinters,  Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell, respectively a viscerally driven Jew and an incredibly pious Christian missionary.  Both guys are legitimate: Liddell won the Olympic 400 and placed third in the 200, and Abrahams won the 100.  Not so authentic is the contribution of _Lord Andrew Lindsay" who, in the movie, is instrumental in getting Liddell a shot at the 400.  Actually, the character of Lindsay is based somewhat loosely on the career of David Cecil, 6^th Marquess of Exeter, who in fact did compete in the 1924 Olympics as a hurdler, but failed to place.   (Happy to relate, in subsequent Olympics Cecil did win several medals.)  Finally, the scene wherein Abrahams successfully challenges for the Caius College run is non-factual; Cecil accomplished it several years later and his run has never since been duplicated!

 The two Americans who appear in bit parts are real:  Charlie Paddock and Jackson Schultz were leading sprinters of the day, with Paddock holding the world record of 10.4 for 100m. 

Finally, even if you aren’t a track and field fanatic, as I tend to be, you will enjoy this movie for the love stuff, the scenery, and the Cambridge ambiance.  Be sure to look it up.  It is free on Amazon Prime for the time being.  A    

MUSINGS ON FLAT SLAB SUBDUCTION

 

More antique musings: 

What is this thing we call subduction?  Well, at its simplest, subduction arises because what we call the lithosphere becomes “negatively buoyant”. That is a fancy way of saying that it becomes more dense than the stuff it has been ‘floating” on, hence sinks under its own weight.  Such action actually will pull a plate along; in other words, it is a positive driving force.  Subduction zones bordering the northern and western Pacific basin are examples of this kind of behavior. 

So, then, why does an oceanic plate become negatively buoyant?  Cooling, that’s why.  When such a plate-edge is created at a spreading center it is thin and hot.  As such its overall density is lower than that of the stuff it over-rides, hence is buoyant – it “floats”.  However, as it ages it cools and becomes negatively buoyant – that is, it wants to sink.  Voila!  Subduction!

So why, then, are there situations in which the subducting slab is essentially plastered along the base of the over-riding plate – known as flat-slab subduction (FSS).  This condition generally arises in circumstances in which the over-riding plate is advancing rapidly toward the spreading center, thus narrowing the subducting oceanic plate and assuring that it will be forced down, regardless of its buoyancy.  In effect the over-riding plate forceably shoves the subducting plate below.  This situation naturally constitutes a negative driving force for both plates involved.  The Nazca plate grinding its way beneath the central Andes often is cited as an example.

Another way that FSS can come into play is the arrival at the trench of a thickened, relatively cool chunk of stuff – what we have come to regard as a terrane.  This can cause at least a temporary reduction in subduction angle – and may result in an “outboard leap” of the subduction zone itself.

So, who cares?  Well, FSS has been proposed by many – especially by Bill Dickinson and acolytes – as the reason we have the Rocky Mountains.  I have always been skeptical of this, mainly because I was puzzled by the reason for the subduction angle to shallow so abruptly at just the right time.  Now, maybe, I can convince myself that the arrival of the Stikinia at the trench was the culprit.  But I am still skeptical.

GOLDEN OLDIES 7: For love of the game.

 

Warning:  For lack of anything useful to do in the geology line, and in view of the fact that it is too gloomy outside to do much of anything there, I plan to while away a few hours doing Golden Oldie reviews – and the next four of them will be sports related and, moreover, all but one star the same guy.  So, if you are bored by sports and/or are put off by Kevin Costner, go read something, play cards, or enjoy a good nap – because, here goes. . .

Of the three Costner baseball movies I think I like For Love of the Game best.  It has a nice love story, some wholesome family stuff – and some seriously captivating baseball.  Moreover, these disparate elements are artfully interwoven (think: flashbacks) to tell a tale that, although totally predictable, sucks you in all the same.  Costner is spot on as an aging ace pitcher, John C. Reilly is excellent as his catcher, and Kelly Preston is appealing as the inevitable love interest.  The movie was directed by Sam Raimi and released in 1999 – to a chorus of boos and rotten eggs from the critics.   However, as I frequently say – what do they know?  Critics go to theaters to see films with vital social content presented as art, whereas I go to the movie to see pictures that are fun to watch.  Big difference, if you think about it.

Also, I don’t get why so many people dislike Costner.  Sure, he’s rich and famous and, as an actor not in the same league as, say, Tom Hanks or Russell Crow, let alone Marlon Brando,  As an actor he is, shall we say, adequate .  But as a presence he has few equals.  If you were bullied in high school (I was not), Costner is the kind of guy you would have wanted as a best friend.

So ignore Roger Ebert and see this movie, again.  B+

 

GOLDEN OLDIE 6: Amadeus

 

Well, my first priceless piece of advice is to view this movie using the best sound system available – because the real star of the show, of course, is the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. 

Amadeus was directed by Milos Forman and released in 1984.  It “stars” Tom Hulce (whom I found quite annoying), F. Murray Abraham (wonderful; got an Oscar} and Elizabeth Berridge (cute, and quite competent) - and some damned fine sets and, of course, music.  As history the film isn’t much; for instance, Saliere (played by Abraham) apparently was no mediocrity but rather a highly respected composer whose operas are sometimes performed even today.  Sure, as a contemporary, Saliere was a rival of Mozart and, unless he was a saint, must have been jealous of him (who wouldn’t have been?), but there seems to be no evidence that he did the great man in.  Nevertheless, the rivalry and associated skullduggery makes for a gripping story line.

So, like I said:  Find a “device” with excellent sound, then enjoy this blast from the past for the magnificent acting of Abraham, the striking scenes of old Vienna – and, of course, the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.  A-

golden oldie 5: A River Runs Through It

 

I announce the grade (A) right up front, and will brook no back talk!  As a movie this may not be so hot, although at the very least it is pretty damned good, but as a story it, as they used to say, takes the cake.  The movie, directed by Robert Redford, is based on a book of the same name, written by Norman Maclean, a University of Chicago literature professor.  Maclean published the book in 1976, when he was 74 years old.  As far as I can ascertain, it was his first book – he published two others subsequently, neither nearly so good but certainly worth reading just the same..

In my admittedly unsophisticated opinion, A River Runs Through it is one of the finest pieces of writing ever to grace the English language.  I must have read it a half-dozen times, and each time as I finish I experience a strong gush of salt water rolling down my cheeks.  At one point I wrote a letter too Maclean, taking him to task for waiting until he was such an old fart before sharing his life and thoughts with the rest of us.  Naturally, I tore it up.

But this is about the movie.  You probably know most of the plot.  It is based rather loosely on Maclean’s real life as a kid and avid fly fisherman in western Montana.  All of the principals are excellent, especially the pair playing Norman’s father and mother.  Brad Pitt does a fine job as Norman’s reckless, doomed younger brother.  The fly-fishing sequences are beautiful; awe-inspiring to a none-to-skillful fly caster like myself.  The film certainly is sad, but ultimately uplifting in a strange, inexplicable sort of way.  If you can watch it and not cry at the end, your heart is indeed constructed of well-compacted quartz-rich terrestrially derived stone!

You’ve probably seen A River Runs Through It at least once already.  See it again.  Have some tissue handy.

MUSINGS ON TECTONIC ROTATIONS

 I wasted an annoyingly large amount of time searching for a suitable diagram illustrating geological block rotations (in the horizontal plane, natch.)  Finally I gave up and resorted to this picture of an honest paleomagician plying his trade - no doubt uncovering more evidence of Cordilleran clockwise rotation.  This almost could be me - except for the color of the notebook and the abundance of hair peeking out from under the cap.

Must I always repeat myself?  These are the musings of a guy who has been out of the game for ~30 years, so if you want to take them seriously, fine.  But be warned.

The topic is tectonic rotations; specifically, rotations with respect to the North American craton.  Having just moved to a nice but smallish retirement apartment, I seem to have lost my access to raw data, so everything I say here will be highly generalized and unsupported by citable fact.  Nevertheless, as one of the people who first attempted to apply paleomagnetism to regional tectonic analysis, I think I am entitled to sound off.  So here goes:

Considering late Cretaceous – early Tertiary rock units currently lodged upon the western margin of North America, rotations (as defined above) are ubiquitous and overwhelmingly clockwise.  Documented rotations range in magnitude from just a few degrees to nearly 90 degrees.  In a vague – very vague – sort of way, rotation magnitudes increase with age and with proximity to the present continental margin.  Some rotated blocks (from paleomagnetic evidence) are associated with large northward displacements, whereas others are not.  So, the question:  How come?

Well, I can think of three - maybe four* – “driving mechanisms”.  The first involves northward displacement (relative to interior, stable, North America, always remember).  As first conceived, the Baja BC story involved northward displacement along the continental margin.  At present that continental margin very roughly approximates a small circle** about the pole of relative rotation between North America and the Pacific plate.  Any crustal block travelling along that path would pick up a small degree of clockwise relative rotation; the further the latitudinal displacement, the greater the rotation.  This mechanism probably is a minor contributing factor. 

A more important element in the rotation story concerns large scale, coherent block rotation.  For instance, many years ago Jim Magill and Allan Cox noted that extension in the Basin and Range province is not consistent throughout but rather increases toward the south.  This would have the effect of imparting a clockwise rotation to the entire terrain located west of the B & R.  Note that the rotation so constructed would be the same everywhere for rocks older than the B & R activity.

Finally, we come to my baby, clockwise rotation of small blocks caught up in a wide dextral shear zone – caused by right-oblique interaction between NA and neighboring oceanic plates to the west.  This has been identified as the “ball bearing” model, made famous (once upon a time) by some clever remarks attributed to Allan Cox.  If this idea is dominant there would be little consistency between neighboring rotation values, although of course there might exist a vague correlation between rotation amounts and either age of the rotated block, its northward displacement, or how close it lies to the continental margin.

In other words, the Beck’s Ball Bearings model predicts near total chaos.  That’s what I seem to remember.  Wish I still had my tables!

So, that probably muddies the waters enough for now.  Thank goodness there are young bucks like Ray Wells to  to sort it all this stuff out!***

* Some rotations may be attributed to the path followed by an exotic terrane before it docked.  Probably older rocks, no prediction possible at present.

** This is your chance to put your Wikipedia skills to use.

***But what’s this I hear?  Ray Wells, retired?  Oh Lord almighty!

 

GOLDEN OLDIE 4: American Graffiti

 

Well, this particular Golden Oldie  turned out to be a bit of a disappointment for me.  It was directed and probably totally hatched by George Lucas, who later attained fame and huge fortune by means of the Star Wars series.  It appears that Lucas grew up Modesto, California in the 60s.  Modesto is a modest sized city in what is known to Californians as the Central Valley.  At the time portrayed in this movie, Modesto must have been fully invested in extreme teen-age car–culture:  Mel’s Drive-in, car hops on roller skates, “dragging the main”, serious and dangerous races between souped-up hot rods, and many other examples of irrational adolescent behavior.  If you like this movie it probably will be for the flashy cars (now they would be worth a fortune!), early classical rock music, references to Wolf Man Jack, and for glimpses of the beginnings of such latter day film stars such as Richard Dreyfuss, Ron Howard, Harrison Ford - and even a tiny sighting of Suzanne Somers.  Several others of the cast went on to have movie careers, whereas other important cast members seem to have flamed out entirely. 

The plot?  Really, there isn’t one as far as I can tell. Just kids having fun, experiencing joy and heartache, and getting into a lot of trouble.

 So, if you like this movie, it probably will be for the cars, the kids, and the music.  It came out in 1973, nearly fifty years ago.  I think I liked it then; maybe in the ensuing 50 years I became an old grouch.  But maybe it’s simple jealousy.  After all, I grew up in Beaumont, California.  We didn’t have a drive-in, there was no “main” to drag, and I drove a battered 1936 Hudson that was zero to sixty in about ten minutes!  C+

 

GOLDEN OLDIE 3: The Big Year

So maybe I just don’t have particularly refined tastes, but it happens that this silly thing is one of my absolutely favorite movies; I’ve seen it at least four times already.  (Others of my favorites include such serious human dramas as Gross Pointe Blank and Major League; this should give you an idea of where I log in on the culture scale.  But then I did like Casablanca.  But then, who didn’t?).

 Okay,  Big Year is a hilarious story based loosely – very loosely - on fact.  It relates the doings of three totally obsessed birders, competing ruthlessly to see which of them can identify (see and/or hear) the most North American bird species in a single calendar year.   (This is a real activity; people do it).  The movie stars three of the funniest guys on the current film scene: Jack Black, Owen Wilson, and Steve Martin, with a couple of great vignettes by Anjelica Huston.  And it has a narrator – John Cleese – whose “explanations” alone make you laugh.  The Big Year came out in 2011; if you missed it then, hunt it down and view it now.  It’s a good antidote to the current news,  A-  

HUMANITY BITES THE DUST

                               Note in particular, pestilence

Pestilence, I believe, is one of the Four Horsemen if the Apocalypse.  Then, again, most religious depictions of the end of the world (actually, the end of we human vermin that inhabit it) invoke fire, sword, brimstone, etc.; combat, in other words.  On the other hand, history and paleontology provide many examples of one species suffering exterminated by another.  For instance, we Homo sapiens exterminated the passenger pigeon and nearly did in the buffalo in just a couple of centuries.  There are hundrads of similar examples, if you care to look for them.

So, with tongue only partly in cheek, I sometimes wonder:  did Providence send the corona virus to erase humanity and allow some other species – crows, for instance – to inherit the earth?  Due in large part to stupidity and endemic human cussedness, at this point in time we are barely holding our own against the corona virus, our enemy of the moment.  Covid seems to toss up mutations with dreadful abandon; what if it tosses up a variant that spreads easily, is deadly, and is proof against our vaccines.  Is this impossible?  I don’t think so.

Maybe, then, we ought to get our collective asses in gear and exterminate this bugger, before it does the same to us.  We know how to do it, but will we?  I’m honestly skeptical.

GOLDEN OLDIE2: Cinderella Man

                                     Not for the faint of heart

Okay, so maybe the reason I’m doing this “Golden Oldie” thing is that it takes far less energy to view a movie than to blunder through the seemingly endless biography of FDR that I have been contending with for at least month.  I admire any writer who has the self-control and persistence needed to produce a book running to tens of thousands (hell, maybe millions) of words.  About all I can manage are blog bits consisting of a few short paragraphs, and thus I find myself turning to my computer for respite  and relaxation.  But, anyway. . . .

Last night I watched the 2005 boxing movie Cinderella Man, starring Russell Crowe and Renee Zellwegger, with an award-winning performance by Paul Giamatti* in support.  The director was Ron Howard, of whom many good things are said.  I liked it a lot.  B+. 

However, if you are faint of heart or tender of sensibility you may this a hard flick to watch.  The first half takes place in a Jersey tenement during the worst of the Great Depression.  It truly it is hard to watch.  This half of the picture really belongs to Zellweger*; you can hardly avoid sharing her desperation and helplessness as her life dissolves around her.  As far as I can see she didn’t receive any awards or nominations for her efforts, which is a shame. Crowe is great here, too.  You share the humiliation of this proud man who, through no fault of his own finds himself unable to provide for his family.  It almost hurts to watch.

However, the second half of the movie is all boxing, with Crowe and Giamatti, lots of violence, and plenty of blood. It tells the (true) story of how light-heavyweight James J. Braddock fought his way up the ladder to take the title away from a truly nasty specimen, Max Baer.  (At least Baer is portrayed in the movie as nasty bastard; I didn’t know him personally.)

So, bottom line:  Most of you will enjoy this movie, and those of you who quit when the blood begins to flow will at least have learned a few things about the age your grandparents lived through.  Or great grandparents.

*Giamatti deserves his award; Zellweger deserves one.  And, by the way, Giamatti appears as co-star of a disgusting flick called Sideways, which I despise.  Don’t see it.  Ever

MY FIRST GOLDEN OLDIE

                                                 American Gangster

Well, what’s a codger to do?  I am pushing 90, hard, it is wet outside, my balance is shot to hell, I have given away my car – and, except for football – I hate daytime TV (yes, even the news).  Thus it seems that I must reconcile myself to lots of happy hours with my computer.  The problem then arises that often I have nothing in mind to write about, at least nothing most of the world would want to read.  Moreover, if I don’t watch out I may run out of pictures of Linda.  All that being the case I have decided to launch a new series, patterned on my “Taped Treasures from my Basement” offerings of a half-dozen  years ago.  Having no basement in my new dwelling place (The Willows), nor tapes or anything to play them on, I’m going to call this series something else, although I haven’t decided what.  (Maybe Pictures you Saw a Long Time Ago, but might enjoy Again.  Nah, too long and too clunky).  So, whatever, it will work like this:  If I feel inspired and have a splash of energy still in the tank, after dinner I will pour myself a shot of Bellewood Farm’s pumpkin liqueur and sip it while viewing an old movie on my iPad.  I will chose movies that I liked and that are old enough so that, even if you’ve seen them already, you might enjoy watching again.  And if you don’t get into them, what the hell -  there’s always Wheel of Fortune.

So anyway, my first offering is American Gangster, co-starring two of the best male movie actors of the last several decades – Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington.  (Did I spell those names correctly?  No matter, you know who I mean.)  Released in 2007, it made me grateful that I have been able to spend nearly all my life in places like Beaumont and Borrego Springs (and yes, Bellingham).  Supposedly based on a true story, but clearly Hollywood-ized to woo the Oscar voters, American Gangster was nominated for several Oscars and collected a few.  The director was the ever-reliable Ridley Scott.

I rate it a solid B+.

OVCA FIGHTS DIRTY!

                                                 LINDA AS A BAG LADY

                                                            Halloween

OVCA doesn’t fight fair!  This interesting little article details how ovarian cancer cells evade the immune system by pretending to be babies!  Fetuses, actually.

I guess I have never thought about the interaction of childbirth and the immune system.  Killer immune cells are vigilant, at all times waiting to destroy stuff that it regards as “non-self”.  When you think about it, a fetus growing inside a woman is non-self in spades!  Yet babies are born.  Clearly the body has evolved a mechanism that somehow tells the immune system “Hey, I’m non-self but harmless, so leave me be.”  Well. It seems that (somehow – way above my pay grade) OVCA cells have hijacked that trick.  Stanford researchers are hot on the trail of a way to counter this.  More power to ‘em!

Read this article; it’s good.  Actually, you can listen to it, too.

https://www.stanforddaily.com/2021/10/31/stanford-study-discovers-how-ovarian-tumors-avoid-detection-by-the-immune-system/  

 

ON THE SHAPE OF AN OCEANIC PLATEAU

 Well, drat!  I just spent an hour drafting a little essay on the expectable shape of oceanic plateaus/large igneous provinces.  Then I went to see how the Seahawks were doing (not so hot) and when I came back I somehow screwed up and lost the whole blinking thing!  I have a sister-in-law who is a computer whiz; she might have pulled my bacon out of the fire, but apparently she is out somewhere, enjoying life – so I will just summarize my thoughts and spit them out without any attempt at literary embellishment.  Here goes.

But first: remember that I have been out of the tectonics game for nearly twenty years, during which time great strides have been made (and many new conundrums discovered).  Anyway, don’t take my speculations to the bank

The question is: what is the shape of the typical oceanic plateau at the moment it docks?  Is it more or less circular (equi-dimensional, in the horizontal plane. equant)?  Or is it an elongate “gummy bear”, to use Nick Zentner’s flavorful terminology?  Well, here goes:

Large igneous provinces erupted on land seem to be roughly equant; think CPB, Deccan traps and others.  If LIP are the tops of pipe-like mantle plumes one would expect them to be roughly circular, everything else equal.  But if the plume, assumed to be stationary or nearly so, lies beneath a moving tectonic plate then the expectation is that they would be elongate in the direction of plate motion.  How much?  Well, that of course depends on both plate velocity and how long it took for the oceanic plateau to accumulate.  Assuming reasonable numbers – a velocity of five cm/Ma and an accumulation time of five Ma – an undistorted circle of 1000 km. diameter  would be transformed into a 5X4 ellipse; still substantially equi-dimensional.  To derive a worm-like shape would require an improbably rapid rate of plate motion, a very long eruption interval, and/or a very small LIP accumulation, and probably some (unlikely) combination of all three.  Voila:  our LIP probably arrived as roughly equi-dimensional cow pies, not as string beans

Hence, I continue to suspect that our Cordilleran terranes arrived as  blobs, and then then were sliced and diced to their present elongate appearance by action of a persistent dextral shear zone.

Pretty simplistic, yeah.  What have I overlooked?

 

HOW HAVE THE MIGHTY FALLEN!

 

Back a couple decades ago three other guys and I used to work out regularly in the WWU gym.  Although we were in our 60s we regularly benched 230, pressed 90, curled 75, and tossed 25 lb. dumbbells around like so many bags of feathers!   Although we never said so, we felt pretty darned buff; between workouts we jogged on the track for all the world to admire.

Well, times they have a way of changing.  Currently I am living in a retirement community, The Willows, which offers all sorts of classes and other amenities.  I enrolled in an upper-body strength class, which met earlier this week.  We work with dumbbells, the heaviest of which was 5 lb.  Naturally that’s what I grabbed.  Half way through her routine the instructor stopped, came over to me, took away my 5 lb set – and handed me 3s!  (Several of the women in the class still were using 5s!).

But I will persevere.

 

A WALKER JAM

                            THE VEHICLE OF CHOICE

Can you imagine a monumental traffic jam – consisting of four-wheeled walkers?  Well, neither could I until today – when they administered the Moderna booster shot to everyone at The Willows:  residents, staff and, for all I know, casual visitors and a few delivery boys!  Kind of reminded me of central Cairo on a Friday night.  (I’m kidding of course; it was crowded but orderly; hardly even frustrating.)  Anyway:  there are a heck of a lot of nimble old folks here, almost all of whom can easily out run me with their vehicles of choice even though I seem to be a relative youngster.  Clean living, I suppose.

So, anyway, now I am good to go.  Bring on that damned virus!

A BOOK REPORT

                                      Battle for Okinawa

I wish I were young again and had a lifetime of reading ahead of me.  Then I could enjoy a pristine encounter with William Manchester, who is far and away my favorite writer of what might be called popular (i.e., fun to read) history.  Manchester’s biography of Winston Churchill, three volumes (although the third co-written) are simply marvelous.  Although Manchester calls himself a “knee-jerk FDR liberal”, and I regard myself as a (flexible) small-government conservative. I find nothing in WM’s writings to dislike.  If you haven’t discovered him yet – lucky you!

And, moreover, my sister-in-law was once his baby-sitter!

Anyway: a book tip.  Manchester was a Marine sergeant in the Pacific theater during WWII.  If you want to attempt to understand just  how horrible that war, in that theater was, read Goodbye, darkness.  In it Manchester revisits many of the places he fought in and for.  Powerful writing, if sometimes hard on the sensitivities.  Available from Abebooks for as little as $3.79. Go for it!

 

SOUR GRAPES?

                   OLD MAIN.  PARTOF THE PROBLEM

Feel free to regard what follows as the ill-tempered mutterings of an obsolete academic whose attitudes were inherited from the 19^th century, if it pleases you.  Hell, I am so far from being “woke” that I had to ask Google what that word meant.  I guess I am, not actually woke, but rather more like drowsy.   I agree with most of the goals of you thoroughly woke people.  Not all, but most.  It’s about how to go about things that we tend to part company.

Take WWU, for instance.  I am not up to the minute on the details of current WWU policy, but what I do hear causes me to feel that my university has jumped the tracks.  Maybe I’m wrong, but I get the strong impression that our current administration regards combating social injustice as its primary goal.  I am all for fighting that sort of thing, but I think that a university is far from the best weapon for the purpose.  Social injustice, insofar as it results from inadequate education, should be confronted at the family and pre K through 12 levels, not at the university.  Universities have always been, and should continue to be regarded primarily as centers of scholarship, and their ruling ethos should be to strive to become ever more so.  They should be centers where knowledge is accumulated, debated, and disseminated.  Anything other activities have a tendency to get in the way.

 Here is an example.  In the 1970s and 1980s I think it would be fair to say that we (WWU) had the best geology department in the state.  We turned out well prepared B.S. and M.S. students who contributed mightily to society.  Many became college professors in their own right, and many more became engineers and other important cogs in the economy.  That’s because we took on our scholarly activities with dead seriousness.  (Our psychology department was similarly highly regarded.)  Now, I suspect, no WWU department stands nearly that high – at least partly because faculty tend to feel the need to continually glance over their shoulders at the cadre of social warriors recent administrations have deployed. Hiring the best, for instance, now (I surmise) will only work if that person also is somehow socially disadvantaged.  Don’t get me wrong; hire the disadvantaged candidate every time, all else being equal.  But be sure they are really equal

So, what I’m saying is something like this:  Let’s buy expensive lab stuff when needed, and maybe do without the long house on Sehome Hill.  Hire fewer vice provost/deans for diversity and such matters, and use the money to acquire the best young academics that come on the market.  Be the best damned university, in the traditional sense, that we can be.  Sure, always keep an eye out for top-notch scholars that happen to be under represented in academia, but don’t make that the preponderate deciding criterion.  Get the best, reward them, and turn them loose.  The future will thank us for it.

Anyway, that’s what I think.  Yeah, I know – I’m a crusty old crank.  So what:  I’ve earned it.

A BOOK REVIEW

                               Certainly you know who

Book tip:  I just finished reading William Manchester’s American Caesar, a biography of Douglas MacArthur. If you have several thousand hours to kill, I enthusiastically recommend that you tackle this book.  Apparently Manchester served under MacArthur (WAY under; he was a grunt).  This book confirms me in my view that MacArthur was our greatest general- perhaps the GOAT – but not a very good politician.  Also: a very peculiar person.  Revered in Japan and the Philippines, his reputation can only be described as iffy here in his home country, which is too bad.  Read this book and learn why.

DO NOT GET BROKEN!

 

I don’t want this to sound too churlish/whiny here; I am fully aware that taking care of sick and/or broken people is a difficult, thankless job, often poorly remunerated.  I have been told that they do it better in other “advanced” countries/  I can’t comment:  I have been in plenty such places, but was never sick or broken at the time.  I suspect we would be better off with a single-payer health system but, Lord knows, I am no authority.  The only advice I can dispense with confidence is:  DO NOT EVER, EVER NEED REHAB!

I just spent about two weeks in a local rehab center, one reputed to be one of only two such in town which rates 5 stars.  There are a half-dozen or so locally that rate two stars. Judging from my experiences I can’t imagine conditions in a two-star rehab center: is it that Medicare pays Uber to drop you off at the nearest homeless encampment under a convenient bridge?  I shudder to think.

So, my place had excellent PT and OT, ample meals that ranged in quality from mediocre to inedible, complicated adjustable beds guaranteed to shape you into a human pretzel by midnight, and night time attendants that spoke little or no English,  (Sure: they do unpleasant to disgusting work for, I’ll bet, next to nothing – but, still), call buttons that sometimes worked, and so forth, on and on.  Days were tolerable because you could sit in a chair and exercise your mind; nights were hideous, with nothing to think about but aches, pains, and how to get your adjustable bed to allow you to breath!

But, enough: I am beginning to sound like a querulous octogenarian, which I suppose I am.  So again: WHATEVER YOU DO, DO IT SO AS NEVER TO REQUIRE MEDICAL REPAIR!

TOO MUCH OF A GOOD TIME

 

How much does an alcoholic drink actually cost?

Well, you might reply, anywhere from $2.00 to $2000 depending on what it is and, more importantly, where you buy it.

But that[s just cost to YOU.  How about cost to society as a whole?  Well, I’m not about to get into a discussion of whether or not we would all be better if the stuff never had been invented.  We’d probably be healthier than we are right now, but perhaps a bit less content.  What I WILL do is illustrate the problem using a personal example:  two gin and tonics at a fancy local dive.

First drink:  Me. $8.50 (plus tip); Cost to Society, next to nothing.

Second drink:  Immediate cost to me $8.50; Cost to Society, maybe around $25,000!

You see – that second drink was probably enough to slightly perturb my already shaky sense of balance, causing me to fall –  right into some poor bloke’s nice dinner!  The eventual upshot was a slight concussion, a cracked femur – and five fun-filled weeks in the clutches of the US medical system (about which I will comment soon).  All paid for by Medicare, of  course

So, what did I learn?  Primarily that one is enough.  Also, that I’m not a kid anymore!

AN HYPOTHETICAL NIGHTMARE

 

I probably shouldn’t post this because it may lose me a lot of friends but, what the heck….

If Donald Trump is elected President in 2024, what country do you plan to move to?  Give me your first three:.  For instance here are mine:

1, Chile

2, New Zealand

3, Canada

Remember, you don’t have to sign your comments.  Or do you?

SMEARED OUT TERRANES

 

I have been taking advantage of our sunny weather by half dozing on my back deck while listening to various of Nick Zentner’s geology podcasts.  Much of the material is new to me: either ideas that have originated since I stopped working in the Cordillera, or – sadly – stuff I may have known a long time ago but have thoroughly forgotten!  Either way, it has been useful, restful, and fun.

But I have a suggestion or maybe it should be called a question.  I notice that terrane maps for the most part depict a series of extremely elongate map units.  Most, if not all, are very much longer (NW/SE) than they are wide.  Obviously, some exotic material is highly attenuated at origin: hotspot tracks for instance.  However, some definitely are not; for example many oceanic plateaus as well as various chunks of detached continental crust such as are found between Australia and southern Asia.  And how about Madagascar? 

So, my question or perhaps more accurately speculation: are we paying too little attention to what I will call “post-docking attenuation”?  After all, interaction of various oceanic plates with western North America has had a northward element since way back in the Mesozoic.  I can visualize roughly equant exotic terranes getting “all smeared out” by dextral faulting after they are added to North America.  Seems likely to me.  What do you think?

 

A REQUEST FOR HELP

About 45 years ago, together with several students and colleagues, I undertook a delightful study of what we referred to as the Central Montana Igneous Province.  The result was published in 1980 in two “letters” to the journal Geophysical Research Letters.  There is no reason for anyone to dig up these articles (Diehl et al, 1980; Jacobson et al, 1980); they together are the brightest star on the NA  APW path (I will brook no disagreement on this issue!), but they have no significance to the present subject.

The present subject is: why are they there?  Over beer on many a balmy summer evening we pondered that question.  They were roughly 1000 km east of the nearest active plate margin, and moreover 100 km or so east of the Rocky Mountain Front.  They seemed to have derived from volcanic plug-like intrusions into much older, flat-lying cratonic sediments.  Moreover they were lithologically peculiar, consisting of highly alkaline rock types, the names of which I have long since forgotten.  Well, as some of you know, recently I made an Amtrak journey to Wisconsin and back.  The route (the Empire Builder)  passes directly through the Central Montana Igneous Province and so, for the first time in 45 years, I was reminded of those enigmatic little buggers and the question once again arose:  why are the there?

Some of my Facebook friends are geologists and all younger and  vastly more au currant than me.  Please:  Somebody fill me in on the latest hypothesis for the origin of my old igneous friends.

  

AN OPEN LETTER TO AMTRACK

                                An open letter to Amtrak

First, note that I am writing from the standpoint of friend and enthusiast.   I recently took three long-distance, overnight journeys by rail, in each instance utilizing a private room.  While it is true that these experiences were far from perfect – see below – they thoroughly beat the torture chambers into which our airports have evolved.  But of course, improvement always is possible, so here goes:

1)    11  WASH YOUR DAMNED WINDOWS!  Even the best scenery is degraded if viewed through a filter of brown dust and streaks of old rain water.

2)     Turn some real human geeks loose on your web site.  I am not exactly dumb, but it took me hours finally to realize – too late – that what I really wanted was called a “bedroom”, not a “room” or a “roomette”.

3)     Or, if you don’t like #2, above, hire a few dozen more real people to give answers over the telephone.  Try to avoid people who speak with a strong Bangladeshi accent.

4)     Put grab bars everywhere, and especially near stairwells.  In case you have forgotten, trains tend to jerk a lot, especially at high speeds.

5)      Fix your intercom system so that it actually can relay messages, especially to “rooms”.  It is no fun sitting there wondering if the last announcement was either “the lounge is now open for cocktails”, or “Dreadfully sorry:, the train is about to plunge into the Mississippi River”.

6)      Finally, do not try to make up your budget deficit by charging so much for booze.

So, yeah, I much appreciate your service, but inevitably  it could be better.  All of these suggestions come at some cost, but so what?  You are a governmental agency, after all.  You are supposed to lose money. 

 

Araucaria araucara

                                              Dawn redwood

I want to complete my backyard collection of peculiar trees.  Who (experienced gardeners only) can find me an Araucaria araucana , about 3 ft tall, and plant it for me?  Local (Bellingham) preferred.  Please "apply" by commenting on this blog.  Thanks.

A BOOK REVIEW

 

I rarely if ever blog about fictional books I read for pleasure, but here is an exception.

You might really enjoy Gray Mountain, by John Grisham.  It certainly commanded my attention; I devoured it in two days – and I’m a slow reader.  All the while I read, I often wondered if I had made a mistake in not going to Stanford Law all those years ago.  If I had, I might have had a glorious and praise-worthy career as a militant environmental lawyer – and maybe even moonlighted as an eco-terrorist on the side.  And this from a geologist, one who always has had a soft spot for useful mining and its hard-working practitioners.

Apparently this book didn’t get very good reviews from real critics.  The wrap on Grisham is that he doesn’t do females we..  The chief protagonist in the book is female, and she seemed fine to me – but then I’m no literature, and male besides.

 

a quiz for you gearheads

 Never mind the 50s era stud with turned-up jeans and blue suede shoes.

What is this car?  Make, model, year?

No prize; just bragging rights.  Answer will be posted on my birthday.

MY SISTER, SUSANNAH

 One of the more disheartening aspects of aging is the inevitable necessity of watching your contemporaries perish.  My sister, Susannah, has just died, and of course I feel rotten about it.  Of course, now that it is too late, I strongly regret how little attention I paid to her during her 83 years of life.  As a child she was a bundle of joy to my parents but, I regret to say, an annoyance to me.  I was four years her senior and teased her mercilessly - she once threw a hammer at me, certainly for good reason.  She was not an excellent student, but by dint of hard work and dedication she mastered a difficult program at U. Arizona and then functioned successfully asa health care professional.  She was married twice – her first husband Harry, a prince of a guy, died tragically at an early age. With Harry, Susannah had two children, subsequently two grandchildren and, just before her death, a great grandchild.

Susannah was not a particularly gregarious person, but she always seemed to be involved in things.  She was a birder on and off, delighted in taking her little dog to visit nursing homes, at various times taught a fitness class, went on group hikes, and so forth.  I had the impression that she needed little “down time”.  I envy her that.

Well, Hell!  Susannah, what can I say?  I will always regret not making more of an effort to keep our lives entwined.  Now all I can say, after the Navajo – Go in peace, dear sister.  We always will love you.

·        * * * * * * * * ! ! !

Okay, I give up!

Another of the more annoying aspects of advancing age is the increasing inability to organize/store/retrieve things, ranging from favorite coffee cups to invaluable computer files.  I have spent many fruitless and frustrating hours searching for pictures of, and writings by, my sister.  That is why this blog has no introductory picture – and also lacks a wonderful attachment.  Family members should have a CD with remembrances of our days at the Lake City cabin (late 40s and most of the 50s).  True to form, I have hopelessly misplaced my copy.  If any of you can find it, please share it, along with any pictures you might retain.  Susannah’s contribution is absolutely priceless.

ANOTHER COMPLICATION

             NOTE THE ANGLE OF SUBDUCTION

Nick has amply demonstrated the fascinatingly complicated nature of tectonic activity along the western margin of North America during late Mesozoic and Tertiary time. Zentnerds will of course know exactly what I am talking about; all others Google “Nick Zentner geology lectures” and go from there.  This little blog is meant to add a bit more complication, as if any more were needed.

If western North American tectonic history were as simple as the original Dickinsonian model a lot of present-day academic geologists (including, probably, me) would have spent their lives earning an honest living as bricklayers, plumbers, and other useful people.  Fortunately, it wasn't..  

To slightly oversimplify, the early model called for monotonic eastward subduction of the Farallon plate beneath North America, resulting in formation of the “California triad”; from east to west: magmatic arc, forearc basin, sedimentary subduction complex.  The earlier model also called for creation of the San Andreas Fault a few tens of million years ago, as the Pacific plate impinged on North America.  Zentnerds will know this stuff backwards and forwards; the rest of you should study up.  Anyway, this model – which works well for California proper -  is owing to vital early geophysical work by Tanya Atwater and others, and rendered into geological dogma by Bill Dickinson and his followers.  As I said earlier, it works pretty well for the southern portion of the Cordilleran tectonic belt – if, of course, you ignore Baja B.C.

However, north of Cape Mendocino things get very  much  more complicated.  Nick has done a masterful job of describing what might be termed “accretionary tectonics”; that is, growth of the continental margin by adding large scraps of foreign lithosphere to the craton.  Again,  Zentnerds will know exactly what I mean; anyone else still with me will have even more to study.

So, did you follow up on the bit I wrote about triple junctions?  If you did, you will know that some of them are mobile, and can go sliding along the continental margin.  That introduces some secondary complications, particularly with timing.  For instance, as the Mendocino TJ tracked northward from southern California it should have altered the margin tectonic setting systematically, from subduction to transform.   This ought to show up ,in the geologic record.  Does it?  Damned if I know.

Well, finally, my additional complication.  Magmatic arcs appear above the point at which certain pressure-temperature conditions are encountered.  This, obviously, depends mainly on the angle of subduction.  Most models depict that angle as about 45 degrees, but in the real world it can range from nearly vertical to nearly horizontal.  For the most part the actual subduction angle seems to be determined by the age of the subducting lithosphere.  Old, cold lithosphere is “negatively buoyant”, hence tends to sink at a steep angle, pulling its trailing plate along with it.  This kind of subduction is a positive plate-driving force.  Conversely, young lithosphere is hot, positively buoyant, and has to be forcibly shoved under to be subducted.  Such subduction zones retard plate motion, and can produce super-large earthquakes, like those found in Chile – and, unfortunately, our own Cascade forearc!

Finally, what determines the sink/not sink properties of a slice of oceanic lithosphere?  Well, pretty obviously: how far it is from the ridge that gave it birth, and how fast spreading at that ridge is taking place.  (Cooling rates seem to be fairly constant).   So, the additional complication I threatened earlier is this; potentially, the location of subduction-related magmatism depends largely on the location and activity of an offshore ridge – and these  can, and do, change.  So, poentially, the location of the magmatic arc likewise can skip around.  Hasit?  Again, damned if I know.