I’m struggling through the Precambrian eon for the cat-evolution series, but the mental exercise is really improving my grasp of science papers.

This became evident when I started to follow through on what I mentioned last week: updating the Decade Volcanoes book.

Nyiragongo, in the DRC, came first, and it erupted last year, so that was a good place to start.

I began rereading source material and understood much more of it, enough to see that this chapter, unlike the other ones (hopefully), needed to be completely rewritten.

I did that and it’s coming up soon as today’s Sunday Volcano. I also took down all old posts except the live blog of last year’s eruption.

In the book, this will be the last chapter, not the first, because AFAIK Nyiragongo is the only Decade Volcano where obvious dangers have actually increased.

So. That’s where I’m at right now (though part of me is still exploring the Precambrian supercontinent Rodinia and trying to see the tiny ancestors of all us eukaryotes in the shallow off-shore waters).

Thanks so much for your interest and support!

Featured image: David Carillet/Shutterstock