Maggie the Research Kitteh

I can haz book on tricerotopz?

Bob and Tess from Dino Art often do research for their amazing paleontological paintings and other artwork. They have a helper kitteh named Maggie. The photo above shows Maggie doing some research in the paleolibrary.

Bob and Tess, your artwork is incredible! And thanks for sharing a picture of Maggie! Please feel free to send more pictures of Maggie helping with your paleontological work. 

Catslide! #2

My cats Zayna and Samira are somewhat strange kittehs. They enjoy sitting in chairs the way that people do. Zayna even sits on the bench when she visits the garden.

Samira and Zayna sitting on chairs on our porch.

Zayna in "her" office chair.

Zayna on the garden bench #1.

Zayna on the garden bench #2. 

Samira's favorite chair is the blue chair on our porch. Sometimes, though, she falls out of the chair a bit during a nap, and there's a catslide:

Catslide! 

Mafic Xenolith Kitteh #2

Mafic xenolith kitteh.

David Bressan's kitteh Mido is a mafic xenocat on a felsic bedspread. I like xenoliths, especially cute, cuddly, purring xenocats. 

Steep-Angle Subduction Kitteh

Here we have Irna's cat Momo illustrating an important concept in plate (or is that pan?) tectonics: steep-angle subduction:

Momo investigating the trench

The pan, of course, is the trench down which our cold slab of oceanic crust (Momo) will plunge.

Momo subducting

Steep-angle subduction occurs when the angle of the subducting slab is greater than 70 degrees. I haven't measured, but it looks like Momo's achieved at least that. Judging from the angle, Momo's trying to illustrate the Marianas Trench, the world's deepest and steepest. I suppose that makes this the Marinara Trench, eh?

Another view of the subducting Momo, now deep within the Marinara Trench

Steep-angle subduction occurs when the slab is very old, very cold, and not at all buoyant. I suspect Momo's actually young and warm, and possibly buoyant, but like all good performers has a wide dramatic range and does an excellent job playing the role.

Looking down into the Marinara trench

We never did get to see Momo completely subducted, which is the hazard of choosing smaller dishware for these sorts of demonstrations. Still, bravo, Momo! And thank you, Irna, for some of the cutest geokitteh action ever.
 

I'm indebted to my G+ crew, who came to my rescue when I couldn't get past the "Awww, kitteh in a pot!" reaction. Subduction won by popular vote, although impact craters and spelunking were also excellent suggestions. I especially loved Woozle's observation: "Definitely some kind of plate collision, anyway. Er, well, not so much "plate" as "dishware", I suppose. Unstoppable force meets inappropriate object." And Khristina put me on the right track with her comment: "I'd have to say somewhere extraordinarily deep in the oceans or in the crust of the earth where the tectonic movement happens! Because it's earth shaking how cute this is."

Schrödinger's Cat #8

Tryz poisons me? I kill you... wid my eyez.

Now available from Amazon.com: Schrödinger's cats.

Under Pressure #2

Lola demonstrates normal faulting through loading.

Callan Bentley sent me this great annotated picture of his kitteh Lola, who is applying some pressure and causing some normal faulting. I wonder how Lola ended up causing this loading. Perhaps she was recently erupted on top of the bag. 

Poikiloblastic Eyes

Pretty poikiloblastic eyes.

Patrick Donohue sent through the above picture a few months ago, and I'm finally posting it now. In the above picture, Patrick's parents' cat Annie has poikiloblastic eyes. Also hungry eyes. Kittehs are always hungry.