more NaNo-babble

[lesyeuxverts]

Eeep! It's winter already ... I need a hat, and possibly to give in and switch to my winter coat. I'm such a baby. :(

I've discovered a new character in my NaNo ... Anoinette's ex-bf, he's the occultist. I like him rather a lot already.





So, these are the leaves I was talking about. I'm clearly not a botanist but they look rather like the pic of locust leaves that Mord showed me. Are they from a locust? Who ever knew that tree identification was so confusing?

Also, how long does it take for a human body (female) to decompose? I assume it makes a difference if she had been buried in a coffin/buried in the earth/left in the river (where she drowned)? ...I know it's a really weird question, and I do not need gruesome details, just a general time scale, i.e. years/decades/centuries.



*snuggles you all, because y'all are fabulous*

Comments

On Decomposition

[r_grayjoy.insanejournal.com]

Yeah, it depends upon the manner of burial, and particularly, the type of environment.

In a river? Probably a matter of days -- fish and critters would munch away all the moist bits rather quickly.

In a really wet environment? Probably also a matter of days. The bones would take a little longer, but would still degrade pretty quickly. (There's a reason we don't find fossils in tropical environments...)

In a modern coffin/cemetery? Years. Centuries. Those things are sealed so tight, the bodies are prone to great preservation and mummification, even.

Give me more specific details about the type of burial and the environment, and to what extent you mean when you say "decompose", and I can probably give you a more precise answer.

Re: On Decomposition

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

Ah ha, I should have known to ask you. Silly me. :)

By "decompose," I mean ... the fleshy bits gone, or at least mostly gone. The burial ... probably not a modern coffin, but a coffin a couple of centuries ago, I guess. I'm still not really clear on what time period it was, tbh. Somewhere in Europe, so not too tropical.

Would clothes/paper/perishable non-fleshy things survive?

Re: On Decomposition

[r_grayjoy.insanejournal.com]

Depends upon the quality of the coffin and the amount of moisture in the ground. How well-off was this person? Would they have been buried in what amounted to a top-of-the-line coffin in that time, or your standard, cheap wooden box? Is it a wet season or a dry season?

In a standard wooden box with a fair amount of moisture, I'd say a few weeks; in a nicer coffin, it could probably take several months.

Non-fleshy things will last longer, but their decomposition is going to be affected by the same factors. After a few months, you'd likely still be able to find bones, hair, clothes... certainly glass or metal items... probably wood items... maybe paper items, depending.

To give you an idea -- I was involved with a historical archaeology project at this time last year. Our artefacts went as far back as the 1920s or so. We found a lot of glass, of course. Any paper that would have been on the glass was long gone. There was a lot of metal, although it was VERY rusted, some of it to the point that it crumbled to nothing if you tried to move it. There were a few animal bones, but only very dense ones remaining. In some of the upper layers (say, around the 40s or 50s) we found a few tiny scraps of fabric. There was some wood, but it was soaked and fragile and fragmented.

[fleurdeliser.insanejournal.com]

*hugs*

I have no idea about any of it, but I adore you.

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

*hugs* Right back atcha, sweetie ... I dunno what ever I've done to make you adore me, but I adore you so I reckon that's all right as we're even. :*

[gin_tonic.insanejournal.com]

You have a murder in your story? :O *jealous* Sadly enough I have no clue about decomposing. XD
I fear my whole story sucks. Okay, not the whole, but the last few thousand words. Not that I'm going to delete them. I am still 15,000 words away from the goal, still don't know what to write.
One of the characters is too nice and normal, but I don't want to make him a control freak (which would kinda fit), because he's with another character, who just deserves a good and nice boyfriend.
Waaaah.

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

*hugs* I totally hear you ... I've been convinced that mine sucked for the past week or more. I think that it's normal, but then again, on the other hand ...

Well, perhaps you can do something other than making him a control freak? He could have, I don't know ...something weird&quirky that was not control-freak-ish. He might refuse to eat anything other than eggs for breakfast, or believe that horseback riding is the One True Way to Salvation, or sekretly go around helping little old ladies carry their groceries to their cars - without letting anyone know that he's done it, because he's afraid of being nice.

Okay, ideas are probably useless since I know nothing about this character, but there you go! My pre-caffeine thoughts! Don't you feel blessed? haha :)

When I was stuck and unhappy, I caved and started an outline for the remaining plot. So far, it's helping, but I guess we'll have to wait and see. I'm not following it very well, so it might also just get me into trouble. :)

[gin_tonic.insanejournal.com]

I feel very blessed! :D
Hmm, he could very well be afraid of being nice. I already invented a family history for him that might be interesting, but since they are on holiday I can't very well let any of them appear. Not even a sister that he didn't know of before. ... Though someone could call him and ... I don't know ... XD
Maybe I should drink a cup of coffee. Or several and then wait what will happen. I already pity my poor family. *cackles evilly*

[svartalfur.insanejournal.com]

Decomposition: After three or four weeks the skin will skip off like a glove.

Decomposition in drowning victims:

The rate of decomposition is slower than if the person died on land.

Water temperature is the most important factor.

The first sign of decomposition is green discoloration of the skin.

As decomposition advances, gas is formed, increasing the buoyancy of the body, which will then begin to resurface (often after seven to fourteen days).

After resurfacing, the body will usually float, belly up.

Decomposition and putrefaction proceed at a rate determined by the water temperature. Cold and swiftly moving water preserves bodies; whereas heavy clothing and stagnant water hastens the rate of decomposition. Cold water retards rigor.

See here (http://209.85.135.104/search?q=cache:II0-UZs9nAcJ:www.moval.edu/faculty/simmermanj/homicide/chapter_13.htm+decompose+drowned+body&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1), but be aware that there's an image of an ugly eye on that page.

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

Ewwwww ... but umm. Thanks for the info, and all that.

*runs off to scrub brain with bleach*

Also a gross image. Perhaps I'll ever escape aahhhhh adsjkf;ladsjf;lkadsk!

[angela_snape.insanejournal.com]

I forgot about locust! That looks like the locust from my parents' backyard. Does your tree make big bean pods that dry out & rattle in the autumn?

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

Umm. I don't think so, actually.

Trees are so complicated... oh well.

[jennfic.insanejournal.com]

Those really look like the tree that we always called a honey locust. Are there great honking thorns on the larger branches? If so, then it's a thorny locust. Black locusts are the ones with the big noisy seed pods.

Huh. upon further investigation (here (http://www.oplin.org/tree/)), I discover that they're all the same species, but some subspecies have the thorns and seedpod bred out of them. Learn something new every day....

But then, this site (http://www.fw.vt.edu/dendro/forsite/key/compound.htm) says that black locust and honey locust are entirely different trees.

Whatever. You've got a locust.

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

Awesome, thank you. Trees just confuse me, I'm afraid ... most of botany does, really.

[snapesgirl_62.insanejournal.com]

honey locust

Kentucky Coffee

Black locust

ash

and more Germanic last names:
Esch
Yoder
Hostettler
Gott
Tressler
Mueller
Schmidt

[lesyeuxverts.insanejournal.com]

Awesome! Thank you so much!