11 and tell you a bit more about what we are doing. Dr. Jay Gregg Greetings to all of the alumni and friends of the Boone Pickens School of Geology. From January until mid-August 30 on sabbatical leave in the Netherlands. (Actually, my sabbatical began in July of 2012.) I spent those seven and a half months working for Royal Dutch Shell on their Carbonate Research team in Rijswijk, The Netherlands. I commuted every day by train from the city center of Den Haag (The Hague) where I lived. Without going into too much detail, most of my work concerned mechanisms of dolomitization and dolomite petroleum reservoirs. I was able to complete several projects on that general theme for the company during that time. I was working with a great group that included both senior scientists as well as several newly minted PhDs. The experience was quite valuable and gave me a new perspective on the research direction and needs of a major oil company. This was not the first time that I have lived in a major European city. During 1995-96 I spent a year living in Dublin, Ireland with my family while a Fulbright Scholar at University College Dublin. In many ways living in Den Haag was similar to Dublin but culturally the two cities are quite different. And of course The Netherlands is very different from Oklahoma! Den Haag must be the most international city in the world. It not only is the seat of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, the seat of the Dutch government, it hosts many United Nations offices, and many international corporations. The latter includes the world headquarters of Shell which was walking distance from my apartment (though I worked in the research complex in Rijswijk). In Den Haag one can hear every language in the world spoken, sample every kind of food, and walk through neighborhoods with a mix of peoples of every ethnicity to be found on the planet. Further, as would be expected in a wellordered Nordic country (we expat Americans called it Germany-lite) the public transportation system was astonishingly good (I did not own or miss having a car) and there was almost no crime. Certainly no violent crime; I could walk in safety anywhere in the city. There were other aspects of the country that reminded me that I was not in Oklahoma. The Sky High “Coffee” Shop, was just around the corner from my apartment and I had to walk by the red-light district to reach a Turkish grocery where I could buy fresh baklava (I became addicted to baklava). And no, I did not partake in the other two vices that were on offer (even though quite legal in The Netherlands). Language was no problem as almost all of the Dutch speak very good English and English is the Lingua Franca in Den Haag, including at Shell. I tried to learn but I fear that the Dutch language just defeated me. Mein Niederländisch ist nicht gut, obwohl ich etwas Deutsch sprechen. Of course, I was working for Shell on the “European plan” which means that I got two months of vacation during the year! Mickey and I took several vacations. Aside from Christmas in Paris, the most memorable vacation was a riverboat cruse up the Rhine from Amsterdam to Basil, Switzerland. The photo that I provided with this report is of me enjoying a Beer in the town of Koblenz at the confluence of the Mosel with the Rhine. During the trip we visited Köln, Heidelberg, Strasbourg, Alsace, the Black Forest, and other towns and regions. All good things come to an end and last August I returned to Stillwater. As I officially stepped down as Head of the School on July 1, my duties now are just teaching, research and service. During Fall semester I taught a new advanced course in Carbonate Petrology and Geochemistry. Mike Grammer is taking over the introductory Carbonate course. In the Spring I am teaching the Historical Geology course. I am very busy with research now, particularly on work with the Mississippian Consortium. I am supervising two students, Sahar Mohammadi, a PhD student and Taylor Ewald a MS student, both on projects related to the Mississippian. I am hoping to add several other graduate students next year. I also have a very large backlog of research to publish. I just did not have time to do this during the past 12 years as an administrator so I am working on this now. It involves wrapping up work in Ireland and on the Isle of Man, publishing my results on work in the Porcupine Basin, and publishing, with former students, work here in Oklahoma. I am also working with a Chinese scholar on diagenesis of lacustrine petroleum reservoirs in China. Aside from AAPG in Houston where I will be teaching a short course on Dolomite with Hans Machel, I have no travel plans for this year. I hope to see many of you at the Geology Banquet later this spring and if you happen to be in Stillwater, please stop by. Dr. Todd Halihan For Dr. Halihan, 2013 was a year of juggling various jobs to try to move OSU BPSoG forward a little further. Robert Reynolds defended his M.S. thesis evaluating free convection using geophysics in a fault system in New Mexico. Four undergrads have also joined my group as the BPSoG tries to get undergrads more experience for working or heading to a graduate program. This summer, I acted as department head when the rest of the faculty were conducting research around the world. It is amazing how many forms need to be signed and reports given when Stillwater is fairly quiet. December 2013. Todd Halihan in Coal Creek Cave demonstrating that he is too big for some pore spaces. This was part of Kaitlyn Beard’s undergraduate research project that she is presenting at GSA South Central meeting in Fayetteville in March 2014. At GSA, I spent my year organizing the Hydrogeology Division for the 125th anniversary meeting in Denver. We had a great Legends dinner with over 70 members attending and our luncheon was over 200. I continued my role as Emcee at the student reception along with my duties as a board member for the Hydrogeology Division. I
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