Re: Interest in dinosaurs (was Re: Third Jurassic Park Movie Co

[Pieter.Depuydt@rug.ac.be]

David wrote:
>   When I 3 or 4 years old, I opened a book that had a picture of the 
> Zallinger mural.  That just about did me in.  I drew all over that book, 
> trying to copy those images, I still have it, it cracks me up every time.  Of 
> course, I had to draw little people in the Tyrannosaurs mouth.
>   I also saw King Kong when I was about six. <<< snip>>>  And then, when I 
> was nine.......
> 

It's incredible, it's like reading the story of my own childhood.
Indeed, when I was 3 or 4 years old, my mother showed me the Zallinger
picture in a book called "The World we Live in" (Time-Life I think).
It seems I filled a whole drawing book by (rather stylized) copies of
that dinosaurs, often so huge they had no room on a single page and
continued for pages on...I also remember seeing an old movie called 
"Land before time" or something, with rather primitive robot-like 
dinosaurs, but which unless made a huge impression on my schoolboy's 
mind.  My whole childhood was dinosaur dominated; I read Halstead's 
'Dinosaurs, origins, evolution and extinction' when I was eight... 
Unfortunately, in my teens, my interest in prehistoric times waned 
(haven't we all experienced this) and at the age of eightteen I 
decided to study medicine... Five years ago, at the age of 24, I 
rediscovered my old passion and found out nothing had changed.

Best,

Pieter Depuydt MD
Department of Respiratory Diseases
University Hospital
De Pintelaan 185
9000 Ghent