"Joy and pleasure are as real as pain and sorrow and one must learn what they have to teach. . . ." -- Sean Russell, from Gatherer of Clouds

"If you're not having fun, you're not doing it right." -- Helyn D. Goldenberg

"I love you and I'm not afraid." -- Evanescence, "My Last Breath"

“If I hear ‘not allowed’ much oftener,” said Sam, “I’m going to get angry.” -- J.R.R. Tolkien, from Lord of the Rings

Saturday, December 09, 2006

New Blog, Old Animals

Well, new to me -- he's actually been blogging longer than I have. Olduvai George, with thanks to PZ Myers at Pharyngula for the link. A natural history illustrator who does a fair amount of reconstruction of extinct animals, apparently. With, as you might expect, some fascinating insights into evolution and its meanings. Myers linked to this post, with a stunning portrait of not only Brontops, but also Hyracodon.. Brontops was related to horses, tapirs and rhinos, while Hyracodon was already in the early rhino line. (Tapirs and rhinos happen to be among my favorite contemporary animals -- there is something so early Eocene about them that I find them hard to resist.) (If you click on the image, it will take you to a window where you can run a slide show of his paintings and drawings. Check it out.)

I just love shit like this. Suddenly I'm back to being about seven or eight years old wandering around in the tiny woods near our house thinking about what it was all like back when. I mean, I have nothing against dinosaurs, I think they're great, but the ones that really get to me are the early mammals. Fascinating.

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