Eat more cookies

We did something really cool the other day - took the kids to see “Sue” at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Natural History Museum (http://www.snomnh.ou.edu/) in Norman, OK. Sue is the moniker attached to the single largest, most complete, and best preserved Tyrannosaurus rex fossil unearthed to date. Discovered by Sue Hendrickson in South Dakota in 1990, Sue (the fossil) went on permanent display at the Chicago Field Museum (http://www.fieldmuseum.org/SUE/whoissue.asp) in 2000. Two traveling replicas are touring museums around the world, along with some neat interactive exhibits that give an idea of how T. rex walked, chewed, and sniffed out its prey.

In a word: AWESOME. At over 40 feet long and 12 feet high at the hips, we were able to compare her mass pretty directly to that of an imperial mammoth skeleton in an adjoining hall at the museum. The difference? The mammoth would surely kill you if it thought you were threat, but Sue would hunt you down and dispatch you with the efficiency of a lion eating a squirrel. Her head clearly displays the massive bones needed to support a massive musculature. Her jaws are lined with thick carving knives for teeth, at least one of which is a foot long! You can also see in her skull that her eyes faced forward, giving her enhanced depth perception. Modern predators like dogs, cats, and bears also have forward facing eyes, unlike herbivores like cows, horses, and deer. Oh, and those laughably tiny T. rex arms? They’re only small relative to the rest of the body. The arms bones, while short, were still at least as long as mine, and the humerus was probably twice the thickness of my femur. Those two fingered hands ended in some startlingly sharp meathooks, if you ask me.

For Oklahomans or anyone traveling to OKC, the Natural History Museum is definitely worth a visit. The permanent exhibits include Pleistocene recreations with the only short-faced bear skeleton I’ve ever seen in the “flesh.” (Truly, a stunning creature.) Their other dinosaur mounts include an incredible Apatosaurus (said to be the largest Apatosaurus skeleton mounted anywhere) fighting off an Allosaurus-type theropod that looks as lethal as Sue, and a Pentaceratops with an actual Guinness World Record plaque for the largest head of ANY terrestrial creature ever measured. It’s 11 feet long from snout to the tip of the neck frill!

So get out there and support your nearest museum - whether it’s fossils, works of art, or flea market knick-knacks. And keep your eye on traveling Sue - you will be amazed, and humbled. ~tjo