Octo-What?

Not sure if anyone is still playing the longest game of apocalypse bingo that we have ever had, but if you are, you can mark off "monster octopus discovered," pre-spring temperature switch up, and three course meals on planes like it's the 1980s for March. Maybe these are not parts of apocalypse bingo but a look in the past that could help us understand and change the future to be better. That will be for you to decide after reading a bit more about each of these topics.

Let's start with the cephalopod. Scientists recently discovered a ten tentacled octopus and named it Syllipsimopodi bideni, and yes that's bideni after our current president, Biden. The octopus fossil was discovered in Montana and is one of the earliest known relatives of current day octopi and vampire squid. The interesting thing about this particular octopus fossil is that it has 10 functional appendages, two of which are considerably longer than the others. What were they used for? It is assumed that the long arms were used to capture prey. To be clear, this fossil is about 82 millions years older than the earliest known animal within this group and changes what we thought we knew about cephalopods. What does this tell us about modern day cephalopods? This fossil tells us that at one point, octopi had 10 arms and evolved to losing two over time. The biggest question that we currently have no answers for is "why did they lose the two long hunting arms?"  Of note, all previous vampire squid fossils, which are generally not well preserved, just showed 8 legs, not 10. That may not sound like anything to you, but it changes how these animals are perceived as octopi and squids do not have bones so their fossils can be a bit more difficult than that of a mammal to understand. Speaking of things that are difficult to understand, we hope you enjoyed pre-spring because winter part II is coming.

Despite the beautiful picnic weather that we have had since last week, it looks like winter is not quite over. What is looking like a bomb cyclone is forming along the Artic front and will likely sweep toward the East Coast late Friday and into the weekend. What does that mean for us? Low temperatures. Expect to see something between 30 and 0 this weekend that likely won't let up for a few days. Is this normal weather? The answer is "kind of." The furthest back we can go with temperature related data is roughly 22,000 years. Keep in mind that a lot of that is generated data, and record keeping of the temperature started around 1880. That seems like a long time, but when put into perspective of the age of the earth, which is roughly 4 billion years old, that is not long at all. Have we seen weather like this before? The answer is yes. So, maybe it could be "normal" but there isn't a good way for us to know with 95% certainty. That being said, if you have already put your outdoor plants out, you may want to consider bringing them inside if they cannot survive low temperatures. Oh, and pull those winter sweaters back out if you've put them up. We blame the groundhog. 

We saved the best for last. Delta Airlines is bringing the good times back by offering three course meals on flights again. This will be exclusive to the international flights, but likely it will be a matter of time before meals appear on long mainland flights too. In addition, they are adding desserts and more options for the pre-flight beverages, so if you want a pre-flight mimosa and snacks, you may be able to get them now. Something to keep in mind is that taste is dependent on smell to some degree, so if things taste different or off while you are eating during your flight, that is likely why. The change will be effective as of March 15th, so if you plan to leave the country, plan to leave after this change has been made. Sounds good, right?