faith and science

Took a daytrip up to Mt. St. Helens today. It was a beautiful ride. I'm glad we took the bike because if anything bad happened, we could have slipped past the clusterfuck of onlookers racing from showers of falling magma. There were all kinds of people up there. Carloads of brave and stupid souls (like us) waiting for the big event. The geologists speak, like GWB, with such certainty. But I wonder at the random universe, and how much is unknown compared to what is known. I mean, we could have been blown off the map in a cataclysmic geologic event heretofore unforseeable. And the news would have read: Unpredictable eruption Takes out motorists up to 10 miles away.

Everyone is an expert at these things. Everyone has a fact to share, like:
"The eruption at Mt. Mazama was 39 times the 1980 St. Helens eruption," and,
"...see that rock up there? the one that looks like a snaggletooth? It wasn't there an hour ago,"
and, "the ash cloud was moving at 300 mph, so you couldn't outrun it if it happened, "
and, "the force of the explosion was 47 times the energy of an atom bomb."

Really. That's pretty big. Anyway, how would he know? Just because that guy had badge hanging from his neck that read something like: US Department of Defense, Non-uniformed Division, gave him no credibility in my book. Especially when, in the background, I continued to listen to him drone on to anyone who could hear: "The difference between necromancers and magicians is...." Jeez... Shut the fuck up. Just another nutbag with a homemade badge.

There was an actual scientist up there with a huge telescope in the back of his truck. I'm sure there were many others, but this guy had some real information.

We passed through the ominous shadow of the Hanford (?) nuclear plant twice. That was creepy. I think it is dead now. I don't know. I know some guy who had to have tests done becuase he lived nearby. Silkwood.

It is now Tuesday. The mountain has blown off steam twice. The media is frantic in the absence of human suffering. I thank a. for her posts relative to geologic time. We raced a red cadillac home and lost. He passed us going 100 like we were standing still.