Giant Dinosaur...

Giant Dinosaur...

Today's Reading, this National Geographic story about the fossilized remains of a Giant Dinosaur.

I should note that the headline notes that a Giant Dinosaur was found in Argentina, and that's not exactly correct. I tend to think such a thing would show up on the Today Show, nestled somewhere between the Lebanon/Israel news and the interview with Lance Bass. I mean, finding a living breathing 130 foot long dinosaur, that would warrant some manner of media attention...especially on a day when Willard Scott's on the Today show.

But anyway, it's just the fossilized skeleton.

Or parts of the skeleton.

90 million years has a way of destroying a lot of evidence, so scientists are forced to extrapolate based on a scant few findings. Based on the size of one vertebra, which measures right at 3.5'x5.5', they figure that this dinosaur measured anywhere from 115 to 130 feet, and could have weighed in at upwards of 110 tons.

Though the polite thing would be not to talk about a lady's weight.

Yeah. Scientists are forced to extrapolate these things, because, like I said, there's just not a lot remaining after that passage of time.

Now, I'm not a scientist in the traditional sense, but I do have an idea or two I'd like to pass along concerning this new dinosaur Puertasaurus Reuili.

1.) This dinosaur must have had to ingest an incredible amount of food. Once, when I was a kid, I saw an artist's representation of what a zoo feeds an elephant over the course of a year, and it was a mountain of food towering over elephant and keeper. Considering that Puertasaurus Reuili's chest is the size of 1 elephant, I figure that it would take a mountain multiple times the size of the elephant's to feed such a beast. And we're not talking about one of those pissant Appalachian mountains. We're talking badass jagged mountains, like the Rockies, or even the Himalayas.

But when you consider the lack of food-saving technologies (refrigeration, freeze-drying, even vacuum packing) in the Early Cretaceous, I'd say that somewhat led to the demise of these gigantor beasts.

2.) This dinosaur, Puertasaurus, was not a badass. We all know that there is one true badass among the dinosaurs. Stegosaur was a badass. I've been over this before. Puertasaurus was too large, too immobile to change with the world. This is unlike the Stegosaurus, which evolved, and survives today, as the Ninja.

And seriously, how much of a badass are you if you're having to take the name of the scientists who discovered you?

When the first remains of the Stegosaurus were found, they were about to be called "Einsteinasaurus" or something like that. But the remains arose from the dead just long enough to say "I'm a Stegosaur, Bitch!" They slapped those scientists across their heads, and then returned to where all the stegosaurs went when they died: Valhalla.

Yeah. How frightening is that thought, when the final battle comes, the vikings will be riding out of Valhalla on the backs of Stegosaurs?

The stegosaurs would ride on the Vikings' backs, if it were practical, but even the Norsemen are pansies in comparison to the Stegosaur.