Just Look for the Good Looking Guy on the Harvard Website

So before this blog turns into the Noah Blog, I thought I'd tell you a non-Noah funny story.

About a week ago, Nathan got a funny phone call in his office. It was a woman calling from a production company in London who wanted him to consider being the geological expert on a show they're putting together on ghost towns. She explained that they're putting together a team of experts in several different fields (archaeology, geology, etc.) to do testing at the sites of different ghost towns to figure out why the people left (e.g. there was sulfur in the soil, etc.). So she was calling to find out if Nathan would be interested in being their geology expert, doing soil samples, etc.

She opened her pitch by telling him that she had found him on the Harvard website and thought his research would match up perfectly with what they were doing. What's funny is that, I'm sorry, but no lay person can decipher what it is exactly that Nathan does based on the description of his research online--it's just too technical. It was apparent that she didn't understand exactly what he does, because what he does doesn't match up with the type of research they want done on these ghost towns.

Let's see if you understand what Nathan does, as described on the Harvard Earth Science Dept website:
"I am a fourth year Ph.D. student focusing on numerical modeling of blind-thrust faults, including the influence of mechanical stratigraphy on the development of fault-related folds. I primarily use the Discrete Element Method in my modeling approach."
Yeah, I didn't think so. I don't know what it means, either. He has to dumb it down for me a good bit for me to get a general grasp on what it is that he does.

So after she finished telling him what they were doing, he said, "Well, this looks like a very interesting project, but I have two concerns. First, I am working on my Ph.D. and will be spending my time on my own research for the next year and a half. I don't know what your time line is, but I wouldn't be able to be involved until then. Secondly, the type of research you want to do is not what I study. You really need an environmental geologist, and I work on large-scale fault systems."

But she was not about to give up. "So when will you be done, exactly? June 2009? Okay. And as for the type of research you do, even though soil samples are not what you concentrate on, I assume you've been trained in that area, too." Which is kind of a naive assumption, since Nathan has had only a touch of that type of training, and only at the undergraduate level. I thought they were looking for an expert, here!

So then she told him they'd be using "guest stars" (not "guest experts"--this also cracked me up) for certain episodes. The example she gave was employing a diver if they find a ghost town under water. So Nathan gave her permission to keep his number on file in case they want to use him as a "guest star" later on. Nathan later pointed out to me that if a town is under water, he is pretty sure he can figure out why everyone left. Ha!

So here is what I think: I think they said, "We need a geology expert. Where do you find experts on anything? Harvard. Go look at the Harvard website and pick out the best looking person." And I think that is why Nathan got that call. Which cracks me up.

Here is the site, in case you want to take a look.