Two navel-gazey announcements: book signing in Pittsburgh this Sunday, and Medlife Crisis video
March 5, 2019
This one.
No time for a long post today, but there are a couple of cool developments I wanted to let you know about. The folks at the Barnes & Noble Settlers Ridge store in Pittsburgh got in touch and asked if I’d give a short talk and do a book signing while I’m in town. That will be this coming Sunday, March 10, at 1:00 PM, in the children’s section at that store, which is located at 800 Settlers Ridge Center Drive. They’ll have copies of my big sauropod book with Mark Hallett, and my kid’s book that came out last fall. Come on out if you’re in the area and interested.
And this one.
In other news, the excellent Medlife Crisis channel on YouTube recently did a video on the recurrent laryngeal nerve and gave a nice shout-out to my 2012 paper. The video is five minutes long and — in my heavily biased opinion — well worth a watch:
Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week 
March 6, 2019 at 3:30 am
I’ll definitely be there! Will there be time to ask a few sauropod-related questions after the talk and signing?
March 6, 2019 at 7:10 am
Devin, that’s great news! Yes, of course we’ll hang around a while afterwards to chat to anyone who wants to.
March 6, 2019 at 7:53 am
What Mike said. I will speak – briefly – but there will be lots of time for Q&A. We’ll look forward to seeing you there!
March 6, 2019 at 11:21 am
Glad to hear it. This is my first book signing and I have to ask, will there be any problem with me bringing a copy of The Sauropod Dinosaurs which I already own to be signed? I’m planning on picking up Totally Amazing Facts about Dinosaurs for my son while I’m there, but bringing your own book seems like it could be bad etiquette, or at the very least could lead to some confusion. I’d hate to make them think I’m trying to steal the book I brought myself!
March 6, 2019 at 5:03 pm
It’s not bad etiquette at all – bring your book. People do it all the time at these events. On the extremely unlikely chance that anyone hassles you about it, I’ll whip out my phone and show them this comment thread. :-)
March 7, 2019 at 1:48 pm
Hahaha, that video was pretty great! Excellent sci-comm, and quality dad jokes.
March 11, 2019 at 3:42 am
Thanks again for signing the book and talking with me! I had a great time and really appreciate the answers/discussion of my questions, hopefully you did too! Thanks too for the compliments and suggestions for my art, I’ll be sure to send a picture of the Jobaria stomping Afrovenator as soon as I get around to drawing it!
Here’s a great discussion on structural color in non-avian dinosaurs, hopefully it’s helpful.
https://hummingdinosaur.wordpress.com/2018/04/25/how-birds-get-their-color-zoology-for-paleoartists-part-i/
There’s a paper on it which I’m about to start reading. Seems there’s just one known example of blue caused by a pigment in all of Vertebrata!
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1600-0749.2006.00360.x
And finally, the source for that incredible fire-starting raptor behavior I mentioned.
https://bioone.org/journals/journal-of-ethnobiology/volume-37/issue-4/0278-0771-37.4.700/Intentional-Fire-Spreading-by-Firehawk-Raptors-in-Northern-Australia/10.2993/0278-0771-37.4.700.short
March 11, 2019 at 11:58 am
Thanks for these links, Devin. It was great to meet you!