rooks and minerals

wutheringhype:

sexism is over

(Source: keybladeofsteel, via roxievizcarra)

Occasionally I get into discussions with folks on the internet that go something like this: “You’re in geology? I bet you’re going into mining. I bet you don’t even believe in global warming! You’re KILLING THE PLANET. GOD. 

Sent from my iPhone”

These people also tend to say something along the lines of “I’m studying liberal arts because the pursuit of knowledge doesn’t HURT THE PLANET IN THE WAY SCIENCE HAS.”

The reality of the situation is this: mining isn’t all tar sands and tailings pits, it’s the process of getting you shit you and the rest of the world need (and let’s also talk about the rising standard of living and the increased pressure from a greater population. People who are anti-development tend to actually want to shoulder the greater burden of poverty and going-without of resources on the developing world while not giving any of their shit up. Fact is, the only way it’s possible to live the way you do right now is because there is massive poverty elsewhere in the world. You want to change poverty, don’t blog about it on your iPhone; figure out how to change these things by helping communities sustain themselves and then go and actually do it). 

This .pdf is pretty great. Mining REEs is pretty damn difficult and, in many places, an ecological disaster. It’s not as simple as just going without, either; you need them for many electronics that you probably don’t even realize you’re using or were necessary. It’s the same with petroleum products — are you really going to tell me you’re going to give up all plastics, ever? Oh… okay, enjoy wearing only 100% cotton and wool and linen, then. What about coal? Gold? Silver? Heavy trace elements? etc, etc, etc

Ignorance about these things doesn’t actually help anyone or change anything. Your lifestyle, whether you throw out grandma’s jewelry and only buy vegan sustainably-farmed Nokias or whatever or not still requires resources. The whole point of studying many earth sciences and mining-related disciplines is to understand the impact of human presence on the environment and to figure out a balance between human interest, the environment, and cost and efficiency. 

You want to change something? First understand the problem. Then work to change it. Sticking your head in the sand is useless, and your vegan Birkenstocks, in the grand scheme of things, ain’t doing shit. 

(also, for the record, any geology or earth sciences degree generally features significant amounts of ecology, climatology and meteorology classes. ‘Oh you’re a geology major? I bet you don’t believe in global warming’ is just about the stupidest statement I’ve heard in the past few weeks.)

Tunes, etc. 

Lab until 8pm tonight! Although this one’s supposed to be a little less labour-intensive than the last one, so maybe I’ll actually go home at a reasonable hour.

Snatching for the first time in two weeks is something I’m not sure if I’m looking forward to. 

Where the hell did I go?

In the past weeks I have had:

• no phone
• no internet connection
• garden-variety frosh flu
• a student job
• a surplus of assignments
• a sizable amount of fuckery regarding the scheduling of the previous two items

At least the first three have been resolved. The other three, well, I’m still holding out on. I really have no business having a blog, if I’m being perfectly honest; life is entirely too busy and exhausting to write about on a consistent basis. 

THAT’S OKAY BECAUSE NOBODY READS THIS BECAUSE I’M NOT THAT INTERESTING

WOO

Anyway.

LIFTING 

went really well for a few weeks and then I pulled my shoulder in a funky way doing some drop snatches about a week and a half ago. Been doing mostly squats now, along with some jerks (which feel great and are probably the only thing that do) over the past few sessions. It’s better now, but I feel like I’ve been losing strength instead of gaining it, and thanks to the frosh flu, being poor, and a visit from the brofriend, my nutrition has been terrible. Two scoops of strawberry flavoured protein powder do not an acceptable meal make. 

I’m trying not to get too frustrated with it, but it’s hard. 

LIFE 

is something I don’t have right now. I eat, I go to the gym, I drink coffee by the liter, then I plop down in front of a microscope or a computer for hours on end. Then I go to school and/or work. I haven’t seen my family in weeks and most of my friends have dropped off the map altogether. My roommates are hermits who I never see, and so my only socialization lately is coming from a) the internet b) the gym and c) school. I can’t remember how to make small talk that isn’t a meme, about lifting, or about an assignment or something geology-related any more.

Just kidding, I didn’t know how to do that before either.

SCHOOL

is about as close as I’ve gotten to actual science (so far) within the course of my undergraduate degree. I genuinely like all my professors, I’m keeping up with the material, and I’m actually learning things instead of hashing over old concepts or slogging through endless prerequisites. Also, we have a Department Dog. His name is Puffi.

He’s been helping me with my geophysics night classes.

oldmanyellsatcloud:

jtotheizzoe:

PLANETCOPIA - Earth and Other Planets Re-imagined

This home we call Earth? Well, it’s the only home we know. But who among us, I ask, has not wondered what this planet would look like, say, if Antarctica was not an actual landmass, or if all the continents were upside-down? Even XKCD has wondered such things, when Randall showed us what an Earth with 90˚-rotated continents would look like.

Chris Wayan is someone who, until 2010 at least, actually made such worlds. He would envision a different scenario for Earth or another planet, find a globe, sand it flat and then (re-)build the new planet from scratch. This is no haphazard guessing-game, though. It’s not pin-the-continent-on-the-planet. Detailed predictions and calculations are made, involving orbit, atmosphere, reflection, currents, total water, modified tectonics … even biology. Here’s more about his process.

Then the new planet is sketched, sculpted, and the tour commences! I can barely fathom the planning, research and creativity that goes into these. Some that I have included above (clockwise from top left):

• Dubia - A future Earth, showing the effects of twice the atmospheric carbon dioxide that we have today. The name is a not-so-subtle poke to a certain climate-denying former president. Note the 110-meter rise in sea levels.
• Siphonia - An Earth where 90% of the water has been sucked up by thirsty alien invaders. The highlands are even higher and colder.
• Mars terraformed - Picture Mars a thousand years in the future, after colonization and terraforming. Massive oceans and huge, ice-tipped volcanoes abound.
• Turnovia - It’s Earth, flipped on its head. Easy one, right? Not so fast. Our rotation still continues in the direction we are used to now, which changes everything in terms of weather.

There’s more Earths, an uncovered Venus, and even a Europa or two. Awesomely cool stuff. Go check it out.

Wow, I missed this update. All of these are all VERY detailed under the links, with examinations into their structure. Science-driven sculpting, really.

This is probably one of the coolest interactions of science and art I’ve seen in a really long time.

(via nekoama)

First day of class today! Goodbye, slacking; hello, cold labs and long, sexy sessions with the microscope. 

My body is ready. 

Kira Neris continues to make some lovely jazzy downtempo.

erhmagerd

gee erh oh gee

Quiet med student who is clean, organized, and almost even lifts (curlbro, but wants to change). We’ll see how things go, but he definitely seems alright. Especially now that we have a sweet chicken breast wholesale buying scheme in the works.

Some photos of me taken by someone else at a thing I went to, doing some paused front squats. 170lbs on the bar.

Some photo I took. I’d love to actually start taking pictures again, but I only have a long lens and so I can only take cheesy macro shots, or pictures of very far away things.

I’ve been clearing out the memory card on my camera (which hasn’t seen much use in a long time) and it’s slow going. Back in high school when I first bought it, I wanted to be a snooty artiste about the whole thing and only shot in RAW; now, I still shoot in RAW because it really is better, but processing in Ubuntu takes absurd amounts of time and I’m usually too lazy to do it.

Anyway! I turn 21 on the 11th, one day after school starts. I’m looking forward to it, although it’s shaping up to be a busy year. I have a job now (not especially noteworthy) along with an offer for a seasonal position at a place I’d much rather work at (we’ll see if it pans out) and potentially some tutoring gigs during the school year. I’m also helping out with a friend’s powerlifting club along with my department’s student union, and I’m hoping to compete in an Oly meet taking place in November. 

Lifting’s going okay. Gains have stalled out because I’ve been really tired these past few weeks. Cutting and severe fuckarounditis haven’t helped, either, and I have 8 weeks to cut weight for the meet and hopefully make some progress on my lifts. Snatches are as finicky as always, but my jerks are slowly getting better. I’m horribly inconsistent, though — I’m as likely to miss a 58kg jerk as a 63kg+ one, and my snatches start failing around 43kg even though I’ve snatched 48. I guess this can only mean one of three things: practice, practice, practice. Hopefully I can get some videos in the following few weeks.

Other than that, not many noteworthy things have happened in the past few weeks. School can’t start soon enough. 

More migmatite, just outside Bancroft, ON.

Migmatite showing some sweet boudinage from a trip last year.

Actual blog content forthcoming, I promise. 

JOP210H1    Holography for 3D Visualization[24L/54P]

An introduction to the theory and practice of holography. Human perception & 3D visualization; fundamentals of 3D modeling; ray and wave optics; interference, diffraction, coherence; transmission and reflection holograms; color perception; stereograms. Applications of holography in art, medicine, and technology. Computer simulation, design, and construction of holograms.

The university screwed over third and fourth years in my department by cancelling half the courses we need, but at least I can take a course on HOLOGRAMS as an elective. Because… it’s more important to fund, or something.

Summer school is finally over, and I can move on with my life and breathe easy. Even if yesterday’s exam didn’t go well, it’s too late to bite my nails over it now. 

L’s still living with me for another week, which means a bit more time going incommunicado and a lot more eating than I usually do. I think I’ve eaten more bacon over the past two weeks than I’ve ever eaten in my life. I haven’t been able to get as much gym time in, either, but the lifting I’ve been able to do over the past while has been pretty good. Snatches feel considerably better now that I’m actually snatching and not doing wide grip reverse row curls, thanks to some awesome lifters I’ve had the pleasure of meeting at the new gym. Unfortunately, the new gym is also the Land of a Million Bros.

School-wise, things are getting interesting. I’ve enrolled in my third year of my program, but one of the courses I need isn’t offered this year (metamorphic processes), with the stipulation that “there may be a course offered for third year students in the spring semester”. I can’t take more 200-level courses because I’ve transferred to a new campus and don’t have priority, and I can’t take the 400-level courses I’m eligible for because they conflict with the courses I’m taking, and, since geology is such a small department, all of the courses that I want to take offer only one section. Academically speaking, this is starting to look pretty bad for my graduation date unless I manage to get myself an ROP position next year. It also jeopardizes a lot of things, like student aid and my standing as a full-time student in the spring semester.  

Practically speaking, however, with no electives left to take and only four courses in the fall semester (and potentially only two in the spring), I have a lot more time to work, volunteer, and get involved with the geology club and lifting club a friend of mine is starting in the fall. Basically: I have a better chance of not starving this year, but worse prospects at actually doing the things I’m supposed to be doing. It’s upsetting, but I’ve already resigned myself to the fact that I’m going to graduate late anyways, and there’s not a whole lot I can do besides begging the mineral engineering department to let me take some courses on how to blow things up.*

I’m pretty excited for the courses I did manage to get into: environmental analysis (apparently you get to play with plasma and electrocute things, which is always a bonus), igneous petrology, sedimentary geology (eh), and geophysics in the fall. Spring, on the other hand, is not so good. With metamorphic processes cancelled in the spring (a course I was genuinely excited for), I’ve only got applied hydrogeology (ugh no why) and structural geology to do unless the geology department here works some magic by January, but I’ll be able to work so much that paying for field school shouldn’t be a hassle at all. 

In any case, school starts on the 10th, so here’s to three weeks of lifting, relaxing, drinking, and trying to get employed. 

* Having never taken a mineral or geotechnical engineering course, I am of the impression that this is literally the only thing the mineral engineering department does.