Left: Xenoposeidon proneneukos holotype NHMUK PV R2095 in dorsal view (anterior to top), from Taylor (2018: figure 1A). Right: FIFA World Cup 2018 logo. You can’t tell me that’s a coincidence. References Taylor, Michael P. 2018. Xenoposeidon is the earliest known rebbachisaurid sauropod dinosaur. PeerJ 6 :e5212.

I’m delighted to announce the publication today of my new paper “Xenoposeidon is the earliest known rebbachisaurid sauropod dinosaur”. This is the peer-reviewed version, in my favourite journal PeerJ, of the manuscript that became available as a preprint eight months ago — which was in turn a formalisation of a blog-post from 2015.

The most complete caudal vertebra of the Snowmass Haplocanthosaurus (Foster and Wedel 2014) in right lateral view: specimen photo, CT scout, 3D model, 3D print at 50% scale.

It’s been a bit since my last update. That’s how things go on the road. We got in some time for exploration and a little prospecting. We also had to close the quarry.

Ripple rock. Not from the Morrison, but from the overlying Dakota – Lower Cretaceous. Now this is from the Morrison. My son, London, spotted this tiny tooth of a Jurassic croc while working in the quarry. That’s my thumb and London’s index finger for scale. London’s index finger again, pointing at a different Morrison tooth.

Clouds over Black Mesa. Baby spadefoot toad, with my index finger for scale. Someone was here before us. Even though Black Mesa is best known for its Morrison exposures and giant Jurassic dinosaurs, there are Triassic rocks here, too, which have produced both body fossils and tracks, including these.

We all know that apatosaurines have big honkin’ cervical ribs (well, most of us know that). But did they also have unusually large neural spines? The question occurred to me the other day when I was driving home from work.

I’ve known who Peter Doson was since I was nine years old. A copy of The Dinosaurs by William Stout and William Service, with scientific content by Peter, showed up at my local Waldenbooks around the same time as the New Dinosaur Dictionary – much more on The Dinosaurs another time.

Years ago, the roof of our summer-house suffered some water damage and had to be replaced. So I converted it into a woodshed which I attached to the side of our house.

Exploded turtle skulls are cool, but what about exploding the entire turtle? (Not that way.) Folks at the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien roll hard. Or did – I assume these exhibits are old.

Many thanks to all of the good folks in the radiology department at the Hemet Valley Medical Center, especially John Yasmer, DO, my partner in crime, and Heather Salzwedel, who did all of the actual work of scanning while the rest of us stood around making oooh and aaah noises. Further bulletins as events warrant.