O.U.G.S and Archaeopteryx

Dear Diary,

I went to my first OUGS meeting this weekend and while the minutes of the meeting went over my head slightly due to being completely new everyone was so friendly and welcoming it was like a family gathering. Even if I wasn't interested in the subject I think I'd return just to be around such nice people again.

This is a huge deal to me, I'm not the worlds most social person and I find people hard to understand so end up annoying them without really meaning to, however, many of the people at the meeting are older than me and that's great for more than one reason; 

Firstly I've always got on better with older people, I was surrounded by them growing up and usually find I have more in common with older people than those my own age. 

Secondly, they've been members of OUGS for years, they've done the courses, they've been on field trips, they have the knowledge and they are so friendly they share that knowledge. 

Thirdly, there was no cliche that I could see, everyone spoke to me and I got to speak to everyone, it felt welcoming and friendly. It really was one of the best outings I've had in ages, and as someone who's had a lot of stress lately due to people treating me badly, it was sorely needed.

There was also tea, coffee and biscuits on offer, a library you can borrow books for for as long as you like as long as they know who has which book and the talks I mentioned in my previous post about OUGS.

I think my favourite talk was, "Archaeopteryx: The Bird-Like Dinosaur" purely because I followed it a bit better than I did the talk about "Manganese Mineralisation in North Wales", I found the second talk went over my head a bit, probably because I'm just starting and don't have the base line knowledge of what much of it was about.

Archaeopteryx casts from original fossils

It is amazing just how clear the feathers are in the fossil casts, they must have thrown people for a spin when they were first discovered back in the 1800s, Darwin had not long written his book on the origin of the species and people were having a hard time accepting that let alone what appeared to be a clear link between dinosaurs and birds.

I also found it fascinating that there is equipment available that can scan the fossilized bone structure, re-assemble it and then determine traits that this animal might have had from the shape of its brain pan..

It does make me wonder if people thousands of years in the future will do the same with us, and what they'll determine from their results though.