Dinosaurs, sculptures, field jackets, museums and PhD's....

This has been one of those weeks that simply evaporated. I touched down in Newark last Saturday and it is suddenly Friday....there seems to have been a rip in the space-time continuum that has seemingly navigated me through several museums collections, an animal menagerie and a PhD committee meeting at the University of Pennsylvania. I am once again back at the American Museum of Natural History (New York) sat in the prep lab, being serenaded by the gentle hum of pneumatic pens as millions of years of sediment is gently teased from stunning dinosaur bones...all the way from Mongolia. At the far end of the prep lab sits a vast field jacket....fruits of our Summer labours in Montana. It was delivered last week (see image below) and the collections curator (Carl Mehling) was called by the delivery bay folks and told, "Your sculpture has arrived".... The 2575 pound field jacket is the largest to enter the AMNH in a few years...its secrets will soon be unlocked by the splendidly skilled preparators who work within these hallowed halls. My time in New York is nearly done, until the next visit, off to the airport again....

Prehistoric 'sculpture' arriving arrives at the AMNH!