The Earth is Expanding

Surely you're familiar with the term "wormhole." This is an internet time-burrow that one enters into when a topic crosses one's mind. If you google a single word like "Chee-tos", the search engine returns a thousand tangential keywords, videos, images, items available for purchase, and soon you've made a bad decision: a) Slouched for 3 hours over a laptop watching war archive films; b) Purchased a box of a thousand discontinued keychains; or c) Applied for a falconry apprenticeship in Brazil.

The one I entered into this afternoon is one that I don't regret. I think I've just been converted to believe that the Earth is expanding, rather than believing what I've been taught all my life: that the seafloor is spreading, and parts of the crust are burying back into the mantle simultaneously.

Here's how I got there.

I recently ordered a book off Amazon for an amazingly low price. (I don't recall what got me on the internet that day, but it wasn't specifically to buy this book!) I first saw it in a bookstore last Christmas and was tempted to pick one up for one of the frequent-flying members of Catey's family. America from the Air, co-authored in 2007 by  Daniel Mathews, a natural history writer, and James S. Jackson, a geology professor at Portland State. It's written for commercial jet passengers (and employees) who share my habit of gazing at landforms and civilization-caused shapes, and guessing what they are as I fly. I have photographed only a few because of the low quality that usually ensues through those plastic double windows. Here's one near Las Vegas showing a solar farm that I've tried unsuccessfully to find on Google Earth. 

Update: see http://americanature.blogspot.com/2014/09/different-views-of-ivanpah-solar-energy.html

Where the Sun is Grown, near Las Vegas, April 21, 2014.

Accompanying the book is a CD-ROM with a nationwide flight map and USGS Map #i2781: The North American Tapestry of Time and Terrain (downloadable PDF file). Zooming in on the Great Lakes, after some study, I thought to myself that it looks like the Great Lakes sort of exploded from the center of Michigan. Can see what I was imagining? Different colors reflect different ages of underground geology -- click on the link above to see the entire map and its legend.

Geologic Bubble Centered in Michigan - Source: USGS i2781

So I googled: "is the earth's volume increasing". The common secod way of digging further into our wormholes is the Wikipedia page. And, I was in.

It turns out there's a comedian and graphic artist Neal Adams who has promoted the concept of the earth expanding. If you want to save yourself from the risk of wormholing, skip Wikipedia and watch this 10-minute video. I think you'll be convinced too. (Forgive the odd soundtrack that spans from 2001: A Space Odyssey to the Nutcracker Suite.)
 

What's up? Dogwood.

Spring is well on its way. I am well overdue in posting due to a month full of travel -- first to Las Vegas and then to Palm Springs: two otherwise uninhabitable desert oases built and thriving on will power and stubbornness, seemingly. I did bring a camera both places, and you can expect to see some content from them soon. 

First, a bit about Cornus, dogwood. Many are familiar with dogwood, or at least aware that there is a shrub called dogwood. My favorite thing about the genus of plants is the "dogwood test" -- when one pulls a leaf apart width-wise, making a horizontal tear, fibrous strands within the leaf hold it together. It's the coolest thing! And a good way to tell whether you're looking at a dogwood. This is illustrated here.

But if you aren't feeling like mutilating an innocent shrub, you can look for strong venation in the leaves -- studying the photo below may help. Also, look for opposite leaves and branches. What do I mean opposite? The leaf stems and branching come off of the larger branches beneath directly across from each other. For an example of this, look at the branch toward lower-right-center below. It is like an inverted "Peace" symbol without the circle around it.  Can you see it?

Most shrubs and trees are branched "alternately", or as one goes up the stem, the smaller branches are arranged one, then another upward and across, then another, etc. -- not paired. 

MADCapHorse is a mnemonic device I just learned from the blog brilliantbotany to help remember the groups of plants that are opposite-branched and opposite-leaved. The first three letters, M, A, and D stand for Maple, Ash, Dogwood; Cap represents the honeysuckles Caprifoliaceae; and Horse chestnuts are not to be forgotten as opposite either. Elderberries are also opposite but no longer in Caprifoliaceae (now Adoxaceae); and buckeyes are too. MADCapBuckingHorseAdox is more like it.

Cornus sericea (red-osier dogwood), Marin County, April 2013.

And, I might as well throw in a stitched triptych (stryptich? trypstitch?) of Bear on the local woodsy dog path. A good place to hear Swainson's thrush sing this time of year. Above him is a large oak, and below that are many wild plums or cherries (both with alternate branches).

Beardog checks out the path to Eastwood Park, Tam Valley, CA, April 2013. 3 separate frames stitched together with Hugin.