Geology, Transportation Engineering, and the Theology of Evil

 Given the forecast of more rain, it made sense to hang around in town on paved roads for another day or two.  But I ended up shopping too much, and that is nerve-wracking.  So I headed out to a favorite area in central Utah:

 

 Maybe I would get lucky with the mud.  The sky was fairly bright, actually, so I was optimistic.  But when you see tire ruts in the dirt road ahead, you know you are in trouble.

There were hardly any puddles, so the road didn't seem that wet.  So why was I losing traction and fishtailing on a flat road? 

  The traction control system lit up the dashboard like a Christmas tree.  It would then shut down the throttle, which is annoying to a driver.  I did better with the damned thing turned off. 

I really should have let some air out of the tires.  Trying to get the van tires over the most gravelly part of the road did more good than anything.  What an utterly perverse surface!  Both highway signs and maps said that "Roads may be unpassable due to storms."  The road was so flat, and not all parts of it were slippery, so I finally made it to my destination.

'Patience is a virtue' is a tiresome old platitude, most of the time.  But when something unplanned and surprising happens, an old platitude can become fresh and alive. 

This area, Moab, Grand Junction, Montrose and the Four Corners offer a lot of Mancos shale, which is what we were fighting, I guess.  Shale is mostly clay.  (Don't confuse shale with slate, the stuff shale turns into under heat and pressure and lots of time.) 

I spent some time on the internet trying to get a concise explanation of why wet clay is so slippery.  My goodness, geologists are terrible writers.  I could understand the cuneiform writing of ancient Sumeria on clay tablets easier than the gibberish of geologists.  And speaking of clay, maybe the best articles would be written by pottery hobbyists or the historians of ancient Mesopotamia.

Don't bore me with geological jargon.  Think of the physical properties of clay, the only building material that ancient Mesopotamia had since they had little wood or stone.  Think of the importance of clay pottery for moving, storing, and protecting food and drink.  Think of the plasticity of wet clay offering a medium for the first writing in the world.

Clay particles are so small and flat that they provide an enormous surface area for water to attach to.  Clay can take up 20-30% of its volume in water.  The tiny flat platelets can slide easily across each other.  On an observable level, that means 'slippery.'

Think of that mud-slide-fight scene in the movie McClintock, starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.  The star of that scene was Bentonite clay. 

  My little dog loves exploring slots and trenches through the Mancos shale:

There are three things in the western states that can be the apotheosis of Evil:

1. Relentless hot sun and drought.

2. Teddy bear cholla.

3. Wet Mancos shale in the roadway.