Insane Entropy.

It's unavoidable. It happens every time. Like clockwork. I know this all too well, but somehow am still surprised with each new occurrence. Albert Einstein once said “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Perhaps the universe knows it can tease out the best effort and performance when you're already in a flurry. It has learned throughout it's 13.7 billion year life (depending upon which age of the universe theory you may subscribe) that it cannot otherwise depend on idleness. So, here we have it, as expected, 48 hours before departure to the Third World with so much to do, now an RFP invite for a very VERY cool collaborative design project with two amazing architects. Bring it on.



[Image Credit: Loess Hills, photo by Iowa State]

The project is the redesign of a science day camp in one of the only fragments of the Loess Hills west of the Missouri River. The camp handles about 3000 elementary students each summer. The city is planning to demolish the disintegrating existing facilities and replace with a new structure and alternative energy that provides environmental education curriculum - thus facilities that ARE landscape? Drool.




The Loess Hills are a landscape wonder in Iowa that Omaha peers at across the muddy Missouri River. 10,000 acres of this land have been selected by the U.S. Department of Interior, National Park Service as National Natural Landmark sites. The only other place where a similar landform and ecology exist are the Rhine Valley in Germany and central China. For the sake of time and brevity, a little help from our friend Wikipedia on the formation of Loess Hills:

During the last Ice Age, glaciers advanced into the middle of North America, grinding underlying rock into dust-like "glacial flour." As temperatures warmed, the glaciers retreated and vast amounts of meltwater and sediment flooded the Missouri River Valley. The sediment was deposited on the flood plain, creating huge mud flats. When meltwaters receded, these mud flats were exposed. As they dried, the fine-grained silt was picked up by strong prevailing westerly winds. Huge dust clouds were moved and redeposited over broad areas. The heavier, coarser silt was deposited close to the Missouri River flood plain, forming vast dune fields. The dune fields were eventually stabilized by grass. Due to the erosive nature of loess soil and its ability to stand in vertical columns when dry, the stabilized dunes were eroded into the corrugated, sharply-dissected bluffs we see today.




[Image Credit: Formation of Loess Hills, image from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources]

So, here is to what I suspect will be an all-nighter in search of some hefty conceptualizing. This profession is truly amazing - what better inspiration than the power of nature and land formation to motivate, encourage, and educate.