RETIREMENT_AVOCATION/JOB/WHATEVER

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Ive decided to retire, Its gonna be an interesting financial stretch , what with all the capital depreciation and all. Still, Im gonna do it. I can sell my company interests and live on that for a while till I can start hitting my IRS's and my company retirement.
NOW, whatm I gonna do?
I figgered it out
Im gonna travel about. AM I gonna travel to see stuff? sorta. I want to take pictures of all the major geological boundaries on earth.

Starting with the "CAMBRIAN ESPLOSION" I want to photograph several locations on the planet where this unconformity can be seen on the hoof. Im gonna start with the Grenville /Potsdam unconformity of the Appalachians and The major unconformity at St Johns NB.
Then Im gonna start photoing all the other geologic boundaries where some major **** happened. The reason? I still am a teacher at heart and Ive found that my stories and lesson plans always sink in with examples . As the man said,"The best horse doctor is the one whos seen the most horses" Text books of special subjects like what I contemplate, are few and far between. However, when they show up, they are used extensively.
Anybody have any sites that they recall from school or from trips that would serve as a significant time gap in the rocks?

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I don't have anything to offer, but this sounds very interesting.

Congrats on your retirement.

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@farmerman,

New Mexico has plenty of them, including the Dys.

BBB

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@BumbleBeeBoogie,

Ill be looking for time gaps that are significant in earths history

The HAdean base
The top of the Grenville or Canadian SHield
CAMBRIAN EXPLOSION

The base of the CArboniferous

The Permian/ Triassic boundary

K/T boundary

Pleiocene/Pleistocen

Pleistocene/Holocene

Any significant uncomformable features like a metero strike or a tsunami track, flood deposits, dune deposits, loess hills with cross sections

This is gonna be a text with lots of pix. The organization is whats gonna make it a usable work.

All these unconformities will, of course, have to be located within 50 miles of a really great restaurant.

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That sounds so interesting, farmerman. You should apply for a grant to
finance your book that (no doubt) will be used later on by many geological
engineering majors. Why spend your own money?

1 Reply

@farmerman,

Congratulations, farmerman.

I'm no expert in geology/geography (as will become apparent...) but are you talking sites like Sudbury (meteor strike, I think)? If you come this far north you should see the Cup and Saucer trail on Manitoulin Island (northern end of the Niagara Escarpment) -- view from the top:

http://www.risingedgegallery.com/image_1/View%20from%20Cup%20and%20Saucer%20Trail.jpg

If you do, let me know and we'll air out the "guest Boler" Very Happy

(Your wife might enjoy Woolly Harvest -- a local yarn producer.)

1 Reply

@CalamityJane,

Im not going to seek grants or advances until I have more than just an idea. Ive always been good at grants when I have been into the project for a time and have some results already. The U always liked that because they would get their money back almost as an upfront .When I finance me, its no different than any other author. You are correct, this isnt really a "vacation" there will be product being generated at each stop. I may be into this for several years.

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@Tai Chi,

Thanks, Immaking a note of the Sudbury area. Ive been there on several projects but never at the "crater' area. THere is a significant ex[posure of the Shield overlain by younger sediments and of this I will have to do some more research.
I just got an idea. SInce this will be a field guide as well as a text, I can plan our several trips and combine several sites.

I got the idea dfrom a book about "The Ghost Towns Of Pennsylvania" Its a good idea but that book is totally lacking in good pictures and its all a word descripyion of a series of sites that dont exist anymore.
When We went to visit one such town in Central PA, we found the site to have good clues that a town was once there. Why didnt the author use more photography.

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@farmerman,

While you're in Sudbury, ask passersby for a nickel.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

I can go strait to the mines and hand out niccolite and polydymite nodules to the passersby. I have skills.

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@farmerman,

Sounds fantastic FM! Smile

I'm envious. If I was retired I would love to travel with you and see all these geologic area. Unfortunately I still have to work my ass off.

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FM I would probably join you for dinner iffin you were in my hood.

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Farmerman - how I envy you! Are you staying on the North American continent? I'm not sure it fits, but I was just reading about the sea bed floor and mantle thrust up in Oman (ophiolite) (SciAm).

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@farmerman,

farmerman,
There is a glacial deposit in Kane County, Illinois (near Chicago) called "Johnson Mound".

Quote:

Johnson Mound is a heavily wooded classic example of a stratified gravel hill known as a "kame", which was deposited by glacial ice and water some 10,000 years ago. This kame is a prominent feature on our mid-county landscape, rising 50 feet above the surrounding tributaries of Blackberry Creek and the glacial outwash plain.

http://www.esri.com/news/arcuser/0408/graphics/groundwater_5_lg.jpg

The Kane County Forest Preserve gives an e-mail address for further information:
[email protected]

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@dyslexia,

One of the first places west is to visit my old haunts at Kirtland. I will make sure that you guys are on our must see list. (i will also be taking pix of any significant fossils)

1 Reply

@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

(i will also be taking pix of any significant fossils)

Then you absolutely can't miss seeing the Dys.

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@littlek,

Ophiolitic sequences are rare in their entirety. I will be looking for the entire shear, serpentinnes, and ophiolites and pillow basalts that make up a complete sequence. I shall be collecting those from as many places as I get permission to go. (There is a huge ophiolitic sequence from Canada, Vt to Rhode Island and thenSouth to NC , the only problem is that its not complete. Here in Pa we have a huge sequence of piullow basalts right overtop a serpentine and asbestos complex

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@wandeljw,

Im gonna make sure that my glacial features section contains these water bvorne and ice formed glacial terranes. Thanks fer the map. We are going to make our first trip in March and will head South to Patrick Co. Va to look at the flex point of the piedmont to the Blue Ridge

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@farmerman,

Are you familiar with Dr. Fred M. Phllips at NM Tech at Socorro NM, farmerman? Whenever I've needed to know about fault lines, earthquake probability, and other critical geological features in my work, he has been my number one resource and has been a fantastic and most approachable well of information. He has also done some interesting work on glacial produced geological formations throughout the west.

You might want to add him to your resource list. You can get addresses, etc. just by googling him.

1 Reply

@Foxfyre,

yep, will probably contact a number of colleagues in mapping in the desert west to try to get access to some of the most extreme , as ell as typical structural elements. But remember, the main purpose of this is to photographically document some of the major time boundaries in the rocks. Out there are the contacts between the Permian and the Triassic, as well as the KT.

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