A geologist's song 01
The Geologist's Come-All-Ye (a folksong) by Brenna Lorenz
Come all ye lads and you will hear
About the life that we love dear,
Refrain: With our diddle-air-re-oh, falling rock away, knock it down,
Fall-di-knock-a-rock-away, me laddie-oh!
Geologists all bold and strong,
We are the subject of this song.
We get up with the rising sun
And map until the day is done.
We walk two hundred miles a day,
And study rocks along the way.
We fight our way through brush and trees
And slog through bog up to our knees.
When flies are thick, then we don't walk,
They carry us from rock to rock.
We swing our hammers with a whack,
Take home an outcrop on our backs.
Nine hundred pounds of rock or more
Is just an average daily score.
If we run out of food to eat
There's always rock beneath our feet.
There's nothing quite like granite stew
'Though graptolites are some good, too.
In the evening to the clubs we flock,
To drink Dominion and Old Stock.
Here's to your health and our health, too,
May your life prove as good to you,
As our... |
A geologist's song 02
Sea-Floor Spreading Lament (folksong) by Brenna Lorenz
Refrain: Alas for the spreading of the ocean,
Alas for the spreading of the sea,
Alas for every year that passes by,
Taking you two inches more from me!
Oh, why did you leave our native plate,
Causing me to weep and to mourn?
With the plates diverging at such a rate,
To leave me alone and lorn?
If only the mantle would my counsel take,
If the Earth would but listen unto me,
I'd say, "Your convection cell remake,
And bring my darling back to me!"
So dive you down, you ocean dark,
Part of the mantle be-
Fire you up, you island arc -
Subduct my darling back to me! |
A geologist's song 03
The Marginal Basin Song by Chris Stillman
(melody: Lead us on, thou Heavenly Father)
On a margin runs a canyon down into the ocean dark;
There's a basin slowly filling with detritus from the arc.
Refrain: For the drifting causes rifting,
Opens basins mighty fine
Which strike-slip will close in time.
With volcanics there's no problem; they're erupting all the time;
Fill the thin with pillow lavas, sheeted dikes and serpentine.
Rising slowly from the ocean filled with gritties coarse and fine,
Are you fore-arc? Are you anti-arc? Are you just a geosyncline? |
A geologist's song 04
Newfoundland, My Newfoundland
(Oh, Christmas Tree, Oh, Christmas Tree) by Brenna Lorenz
Convection's cell was at thy door, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Thy ancient heart to pieces tore, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Great faulted blocks came crashing down, and flood basalts the land did drown,
And clastics coarse fell all around, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
Iapetus began to spread, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Detritus from thy coast was shed, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Thy slope was draped, so proud and great, with massive banks of carbonate,
Grand bank to meet so sad a fate, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
For flysch encroaching from the east, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Devoured thy margin like a beast, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
The ocean floor was raised on high, its mafic head reared to the sky;
Its chromous threat was drawing nigh, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
Your once-proud bank was bowing down, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Subduction did thy margin drown, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
The angry mantle did desire to smother thee with ash and fire,
And close Iapetus entire, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
The island arc with fiery breath, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Did shower all the land with death, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Until subduction's starving throat, on Grenville crust was made to choke,
The tyrant's rule collision broke, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
The land subsided in its pain, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Olistostromes in chaos reigned, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Then in Caradoc time there came a shale everywhere the same
That blanketed thy wounds and shame, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland!
Behold! Upon thy ancient shore, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
A landmass was annealed once more, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland,
Alas! Thy trials go on and on, for rifting struck the Avalon -
The cycle must repeat anon, Newfoundland, my Newfoundland! |
A geologist's song 05
Graptolites (Melody: Danny Boy)
by Brenna Lorenz
Oh, graptolites -
Your stipes, your stipes are calling
From every shale in every ancient land;
Oh, graptolites -
Through dream's dark oceans falling,
Your rhabdosomes with grace in every strand.
Oh, take me back to Cambro-Ordovician days,
With all your youth and glory in full blaze -
You lived to see a mighty ocean wax and wane,
But modern oceans spread for you in vain.
Dendroidea -
Your autothecae smiling,
Through Tremodocian trials they would last -
Dendroidea -
Your bithecae are crying,
For when you fade, alas, they too must pass.
Why did you leave the ocean bottom safe and wide
To drift with plankton on the roving tide?
Oh, Dictyonema, from thy thecal loins emerged
Proud Graptoloids, that from their past diverged. |
A geologist's song 06
The geology poem
Ode to Olivine in Thin Section, a poem by Brenna Lorenz
In basalt a lurid green
Bespeaks the savage olivine;
Mantle's child, born of fire,
Restless in the open air,
Little beads of anger bear
The torture of desire.
Silica upon its face
It suffers, helpless, in disgrace,
Its powers of reaction bound
By solid's bond and cage,
In agony confined to rage
Unstable and unsound.
Its birefringent power plays
The sifted light to rare displays;
The haunting, primal colors tell
Of fire and fury's flag unfurled,
Flag of fluid, nether world,
Beneath the fragile shell. |
A man and his wife
Florence Flask was ... dressing for the opera when she turned to her husband and screamed, "Erlenmeyer! My joules! Someone has stolen my joules!"
"Now, now, my dear," replied her husband, "keep your balance and reflux a moment. Perhaps they're mislead."
"No, I know they're stolen," cried Florence. "I remember putting them in my burette ... We must call a copper."
Erlenmeyer did so, and the flatfoot who turned up, one Sherlock Ohms, said the outrage looked like the work of an arch-criminal by the name of Lawrence Ium.
"We must be careful -- he's a free radical, ultraviolet, and dangerous. His girlfriend is a chlorine at the Palladium. Maybe I can catch him there." With that, he jumped on his carbon cycle in an activated state and sped off along the reaction pathway ...
-- Daniel B. Murphy, "Precipitations" |
Asked in science class
REAL QUESTIONS ASKED IN SCIENCE CLASSES
Are the rivers flowing up the mountain or down the mountain?
Is that the ocean? (Asked while on a field trip to Marine Lab Beach on Guam (a small island in the Pacific).
How can the river be flowing north? That's uphill!
How can mass wasting be an agent of landscape formation on the Moon? The Moon has no gravity!
How do I get water into this beaker? |
Biologist experiment
There was this biologist who was doing some experiments with frogs. He was measuring just how far frogs could jump. So he puts a frog on a line and says "Jump frog, jump!". The frog jumps 2 feet. He writes in his lab book: 'Frog with 4 legs - jumps 2 feet'.
Next he chops off one of the legs and repeats the experiment. "Jump frog jump!" he says. The frog manages to jump 1.5 feet. So he writes in his lab book: 'Frog with 3 legs - jumps 1.5 feet'.
He chops off another and the frog only jumps 1 foot. He writes in his book: 'Frog with 2 legs jumps 1 foot'.
He continues and removes yet another leg. " Jump frog jump!" and the frog somehow jumps a half of a foot. So he writes in his lab book again: 'Frog with one leg - jumps 0.5 feet'.
Finally he chops off the last leg. He puts the frog on the line and teels it to jump. "Jump frog, jump!". The frog doesn't move. "Jump frog, jump!!!". Again the frog stays on the line. "Come on frog, jump!". But to no avail.
The biologist finally writes in his book: 'Frog with no legs - goes deaf' |
Blondes to the moon
At a press conference the Brunettes announce they are going to make a trip to the Moon. The Redheads speak up "That's been done before, we're going to go to Mars". The Blondes speak up "That's nothing, we're going to be the first people to go to the Sun". One of the reporters says "Don't you idiots know that you'll burn up?" The Blondes say "NO WE WON'T; WE'RE GOING TO GO AT NIGHT!"
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Chem one-liners 01
Organic chemistry is the chemistry of carbon compounds. Biochemistry is the study of carbon compounds that crawl. -- Mike Adams
Chemicals: Noxious substances from which modern foods are made.
Remember, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate!
There is the joke about the homeopath who forgot to take his medicine and died of an overdose.
How many physical chemists does it take to wash a beaker?
None. That's what organic chemists are for!
It is disconcerting to reflect on the number of students we have flunked in chemistry for not knowing what we later found to be untrue. --quoted in Robert L. Weber, Science With a Smile (1992)
Physical Chemistry is research on everything for which the negative logaritm is linear with 1/T -- D.L. Bunker
Q: What weapon can you make from the Chemicals Potassium, Nickel and Iron?
A: KNiFe. |
Chem one-liners 02
Q: How many physical chemists does it take to change a light bulb?
A: Only one, but he'll change it three times, plot a straight line through the data, and then extrapolate to zero concentration.
"A super-saturated solution is one that holds more than it can hold."
Isaac Asimov said that if you want to find a chemist, ask him/her to discuss the following words: 1) mole 2) unionized. As he so eloquently put it, "If he starts talking about furry animals and organized labor, keep walking."
Make it myself? But I'm a physical organic chemist!
Definition: (Fe)male: Male with iron added, for greater strength, ductility, and magnetisim.
Acid is base.
Q: Why do chemists like nitrates so much?
A: They're cheaper than day rates.
"Scale keeps forming inside the kettle", complained Tom, recalcitrantly. |
Chem one-liners 03
Have you heard the one about a chemist who was reading a book about helium and just couldn't put it down?
What's the formula for water? -H-two-O What's the formula for an ice cube? -H-two-O-CUBED
Q: What do you get when you combine Al Gore with O2?
A: Oxymoron
The best chemists would definitely not be pet owners.
Their idea of a catalyst:
2 bags of cat litter
3 cans of cat food
1 can of flea powder
1 collar
Q: How do you get lean molecules?
A:Feed them titrations.
Q: And why does a white bear melt in water?
A: Because it's polar.
Did you hear about the industrialist who had a huge chloroform spill at his factory?
His business went insolvent.
Q: What's the most important thing to learn in chemistry?
A: Never lick the spoon. |
Chem one-liners 04
Q: What kind of ghosts haunt chemistry faculties?
A: Methylated Spirits!
Q: How many atoms in a guacamole?
A:Avocado's number.
Q: What do chemists use to make guacomole?
A: Avogadros.
Free radicals have revolutionized chemistry.
These were printed on bumper stickers and given out at an American Chemical Society meeting 10 or 12 years ago: It takes alkynes to make a world.
"Take plenty of the dark purple solution", Tom offered, managnimously.
"This old pipe is rusty", said Tom, ironically. |
Chemist's fast prayer
Chemist's fast prayer:
Dear Lord, if I mix sodium
with concentrated HNO3,
and add to it Plutonium,
would you take care of me? |
Chemist's last words
The last words of a chemist:
1. And now the tasting test.
2. May that become hot?
3. And now a little bit from this...
4. ... and please keep that test tube alone!
5. And now shake it a bit.
6. Why is there no label on this bottle?
7. In which glass was my mineral water?
8. The bunsen burner *is* out!
9. Why does that stuff burn with a green flame?!?
10. *H* stands for Nitrogen - and that does *not* burn...
11. Oh, now I have spilt something...
12. First the acid, then the water...
13. And now the detonating gas problem.
14. This is a completely save experimental setup.
15. Where did I put my gloves?
16. O no, wrong beaker...
17. The fire alarm is just being tested.
18. Now you can take the protection window away...
19. And now keep it constant at 24 degrees celsius, 25... 26... 27...
20. Peter can you please help me. Peter!?! Peeeeeteeeeer?!?!?!?
21. I feel it how long 15 seconds are!
22. Something is wrong here...
23. Where do all those holes in my kettle come from?
24. Trust me - I know what I am doing.
25. And now a cigarette... |
Chemistry song 01
Chemistry Christmas
'Twas the night before Christmas,
The lab was quite still;
Not a Bunsen was burning
(Nor had they the will).
The test tubes were placed
In their racks with great care,
In hopes Father Chemistry
Soon would be there.
The students were sleeping
So sound in their dorms,
All dreaming of fluids
And Crystalline forms.
Lab-Aids in their aprons
And I in my smock.
When outside the lab
There arose such a roar
I leaped from my stool
And fell flat on the floor.
Out ot the fire escape
All of us flew.
What was the commotion?
Not one of knew.
The flood-lights shone out
O're the campus so bright
It looked like old Stockholm
On Nobel Prize Night.
My fume-blinded eyes
Then viewed (dare I say?)
Eight anions pulling
A water-trough sleigh.
And holding the bonds
Tied to each one of them
Was a figure I knew
As our own Papa Chem.
With speeds in excess
Of most X-rays they came.
As they Dopplered along
He called each one by name.
"Now Nitrite, now Phosphate,
Now Borate, now Chloride
On Citrate, on Bromate,
On Sulfite and Oxide.
Forget what you know
Of that randomness stuff,
Let's go straight to that roof,
If you've quanta enough."
As fluids Bernoullian
Behave in a pinch,
Those ions said "Alchemist
This is a cinch."
So up to the lab-roof
Those "chargers" they sped
With Pop Chemistry safe
In his water-trough sled.
Just a microsec later
Electroscopes showed
Charged particles coming
To our lab abode
We raced back inside,
And what d'ya think?
Down the fume-hood Pop Chem fell,
Right into the sink.
He was dressed in a lab-coat,
Quite ragged and old,
With removable buttons
(The style, we're told)
A tray-full of beakers
He clutched to his heart--
And under his arm
Was an orbital chart.
His eyes through his goggles
I just couldn't see
His hands were all yellow
From H-N-O-3.
His head was quite bald
With a fringe all around
Like a ring test for iron,
That same shade of brown.
He puffed a cigar
With a smell not at all
Unlike the organic lab
Right down the hall.
The smoke billowed forth
From his angular face
And with Brownian Movement
Enveloped the place.
He was thin as a match
And not terribly tall
He wasn't the type
I'd expected at all
But a look at his clothes,
In the lab's harsh white light,
With their acid-burn holes--
He's a chemist all right!
He didn't say much
(He had no time to kill)
And filled all the test tubes
With nary a spill.
Then placing them bak
On the benches with care
He dashed to the fume-hood
And rose through the air.
He called to his team
And his ions took off
And kinetics took care
Of Pop Chem and his trough,
But I heard him cry out
As he flew down the street
"Merry Holidays to all!
May your stockrooms stay neat!"
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Chemistry song 02
The Chemistry Teacher's Coming to Town
You better not weigh
You better not heat
You better not react
I'm telling you now
The Chemistry Teacher's coming to town.
He's collecting data
He's checking it twice
He's gonna find out
The heat of melting ice
The Chemistry Teacher's coming to town.
He sees you when you're decanting
He knows when you titrate
He knows when you are safe or not
So wear goggles for goodness sake.
Oh, you better not filter
And drink your filtrate
You better not be careless and spill your precipitate.
The Chemistry Teacher's coming to town. |
Chemistry song 03
I'm Dreaming of a White Precipitate
I'm dreaming of a white precipitate
just like the ones I used to make
Where the colors are vivid
and the chemist is livid
to see impurities in the snow.
I'm dreaming of a white precipitate
with every chemistry test I write
May your equations be balanced and right
and may all your reactions be bright. |
Chemistry song 05
Deck the Labs
Deck the labs with rubber tubing
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Use your funnel and your filter
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Don we now our goggles and aprons
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Before we go to our lab stations
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Fill the beakers with solutions
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Mix solutions for reactions
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
Watch we now for observations
Fa la la la la, la la la la.
So we can collect our data
Fa la la la la, la la la la. |
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