This is apropos of nothing; however, since I love plate tectonics, I'm going to talk about them. The movement of tectonic plates is usually pretty slow - an interesting (and very rough) rule of thumb I learned in school is that North America moves away from Eurasia the height of a person in a human lifetime. But in Ethiopia, the land moved eight meters in a month. The process will probably open a new sea in a million years or so.

Yes, loving plate tectonics makes me a massive science geek. But I don't care. It means that I can be fascinated by the geological strata in a cut made through a hill for a highway pass. And anything that makes a long car trip more interesting is not to be sneezed at.