Yes, I am a Pirate...

...two hundred years too late.

This isn't a road song or a gold song or a geology song by any stretch of the imagination. Nevertheless, any explorationist worth their salt should have it in their repertoire.

Jimmy Buffet: A Pirate Looks at Forty (lyrics) Album: A1A, 1974

"Mother, mother ocean, after all the years I've found
My occupational hazard being
My occupation's just not around"

Geologists: The Cowboys of Science

A colleague of my former (deceased) husband once said, "Archaeologists are the Cowboys of Science." (I don't know if he actually said it in Capital Letters like that, but that's how it came across to me.) DH disagreed and said, "No, Geologists are the Cowboys of Science. Archaeologists don't even come close."

The first character that actually comes to my mind, for some reason, is Bret Maverick's brother Bart. He's not a geologist, but he goes off gallivanting around the countryside on his horse, somehow managing, often, to get into trouble. He reminds me of some geologists I know, who go off the same way in their 4WD pickups.

Also read:

Sherlock Holmes, Forensic Geologist

The Romance of Geology in Russia: A Tribute to Alexander Ainemer
Here's to You: Geological Heroes
Dust Hole (previous post)