Older Than Troy

You just can't trust me with a blog. I'm liable to wander off and forget about it for a few days. In my defense, I've been helping with Science Alive, and event put on by the university at the local mall. The idea is to introduce science and the research that's going at the university to the general public. Basically what it amounted to for me was talking with kids about dinosaurs all day and helping them make plaster casts of fossils. Needless to say, it was great fun, and as usual I got my share of hilarious questions from children. The very first question I was asked was "Is it fun being a scientist?" (Answer: "Yes, especially when you study dinosaurs!") My favorite was the kid who was having a hard time wrapping his head around geological time. When I told him that the fossil he was looking at was 210 million years old, he gaped and asked "Is that older than Troy?" Clearly, a good time was had by all.