The view from my table at the Dubai Cheesecake Factory

This past weekend I made a fast trek to visit Dubai for the weekend, just for a must-needed change of pace. I'm not much of a mall rat, but I must say that the Dubai Mall is the most gigantic and impressive monument to consumerism that I have ever visited. However, perhaps the most impressive thing I witnessed at the Dubai Mall had nothing to do with shopping, but instead was the gigantic dinosaur I admired as I ate my cheesecake.

The diplodocus on display is the most intact and well-preserved diplodocus in the world. This particular diplodocus was unearthed in Wyoming in 2008 and virtually all of its bones are perfectly intact. The diplodocus was a vegetarian almost 80 feet in length and 25 feet high that mercilessly shredded the vegetation from tree-tops in a relentless search to satisfy its endless desires and appetites. Sounds like some of the shoppers I encountered in the Dubai Mall, come to think of it. Of course, this pea-brained creature could not have imagined 150 million years ago, when she met her death in a Wyoming quarry, that her afterlife would consist of having her remains grace the world's most opulent shopping center for the satisfaction of those us who think it might be a fine idea to munch down a piece of cheesecake at three in the afternoon. It just goes to show that anyone can be a late-bloomer and attain fame and notoriety even millions of years after one thinks their best days are in the rear-view window, with bones proudly on display in the atrium outside The Cheesecake Factory.