I finally worked at the station that I haven't posted much about yet: the sorting station for the microfossils. When the Rhino Barn was built, a good architect felt the need to make some sort of foundation for the building. This meant digging into part of the sand layer below the ash bed where the ash bed is thinner. However, a good paleontologist didn't like that, and before the building was built and the foundation laid, the site was excavated in the areas that needed to be dug up. This area, a lot more fragmentary than the ash layer, gives us a picture of what life was like around the watering hole before the ash fell. Like any good ecosystem, most of the animals weren't actually that big, and so at the sorting station we sift through dirt from those foundations and find tiny remains of snakes, turtles, salamanders, rodents, birds, and other creatures who tend to have small bones or whose bones tend to fall into a million tiny pieces (thank you, turtles...).
And here I sat yesterday, listening to thunder rolling in... apparently though Ashfall sits on a hill in such a place that it just doesn't seem to get weather. It rolled in, and...rolled out. No threat.
However, while the parents may be very interested in what you are working on, and the occasional child, most kids lose interest in about the first oh, five minutes. That's about how long it takes to explain what you're doing here, at most. So as the station is officially called the "discovery station," there are some other things around. First of all, not by man's doing, there is a birds nest in the rafters. The pair tends to hang around, and doesn't mind a single intern sorting through dirt. That said, they didn't seem particularly thrilled whenever crowds of people came through: their happy song would quickly change to panicked squacks. But they returned, and there are no eggs yet to be concerned about them leaving, and frankly this station is sort of isolated and unlikely to get traffic anyway. Besides, what the kids always notice is the big cart of bones sitting in the corner. These have been found around the park. All are modern, and some of them are pretty cool, like the woodchuck with the over grown front tooth. However, you have to keep an eye on kids with that thing, because they like to pick it up before you can stop them, turn away from the cart, drop it, and give you one more job to do in the lab the next time you have a shift in there.
Did that happen? yes. To me? yes. Was I mad? no. Was my boss? no. Ok then, it's all good.
Thankfully, when rodent teeth break, they just sort of snap cleanly in such a way that its nothing a little dissolved plastic and an hour in the sand box can't fix. It's just like fixing a fossil, and it breaking actually gave me a good chance to explain to them about how rodent teeth are designed to wear down to a sharp point, in just the way this one broke. Rick actually said he was surprised that the bones out there (and other things at the museum) don't see more wear and tear from the abuse that anything within a child's reach is going to sustain. He got a good laugh when I told him about the same girl putting the teeth back into the correct jaws where they had fallen out (she also got a kick out of some of them being loose and about to fall out, and I was quick to tell her that the animals they belonged to probably weren't going to have much use for the tooth fairy, so to please leave those teeth in place...). I was very proud of myself for staying calm and continuing to tell them about mammal teeth (the station also has a horse, bison, and deer jaw). No one got mad, no one got in trouble, no small child is going to associate Ashfall with being grounded, life is good.
When we got back to the visitors shelter for the day, we found this little fellow, banging his head against the glass door. He had found his way inside while fighting his own reflection, and was continuing to fight. After a few minutes of watching poor Ellen trying to coax him out by standing between him and the door, Rick stepped in and caught him, and, as she was walking that day, he handed the little guy to her and she carried him to the cabins to release. I wish I could have photographed this, but I had to drive my car back down (because no one wants to carry garbage half a mile to the dumpster in the morning).The sad part of the story is that he came back to the museum and continued to fight his reflection. Hopefully we can find a better solution to the problem here, although blue birds do have nests, so personally I'm a little nervous about moving him.
And today, being my first day off, I drove a full hour to the Walmart (which despite technically being the city still smells like cows. Thankfully Ashfall doesn't...) and back and made dinner out of something that wasn't canned food. I learned a little cooking last summer in Utah, but never by myself, so I was still very proud of myself when it turned out okay (aside from the fact that my potato was a little green and so once in a while you get a really bitter bite.) Yeah, I know, those people who take pictures of their food can be annoying, but I'm just going to sit here and be proud of myself for a minute. The town, Norfolk, also has a small local history museum apparently. If it doesn't charge admission, that may be worth exploring next time I go into town just to say I did. As fun as the park can be to explore, it may be interesting to see.We had our first perfectly clear night tonight, and the stars are gorgeous. There are advantages to having to drive an hour to the nearest Walmart.
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