Beside The Star: Our neighbors have company

I walked up to the Anniston Museum of Natural History today, as I often do at lunch to munch my sandwich and chips in their garden (just one of the many reasons it's cool to have a nature museum for a next-door neighbor). As I rounded one corner of their concrete building I encountered something that's not normally there: a six-foot-high wooden crate, bearing a sign that read "Pelvic bone." That was my first clue that, at long last, Sue's here.

If you've read The Star at all for the last couple of weeks, you know our neighbors at the museum are playing host to a fascinating traveling exhibit, "A T. Rex Named Sue." Its highlight is a cast of the most complete Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton ever found. The museum closed on Saturday for a week to prepare the new exhibit.

This is a pretty big deal, not just as in the importance of the exhibit, but in size, too. As I rounded another corner of the building on my way back to The Star after lunch, I found about a half-dozen more crates, emptied of their contents. Just about then a tractor-trailer pulled into the parking lot, carrying what I assume was even more of Sue's luggage.

The exhibit opens to the public Saturday, and runs through Jan. 6. We've got a whole section of our Web site devoted to Sue. You can find it at annistonstar.com/sue.