After 14 long years on Mars, you'd think Curiosity would have seen it all. But no - this week, the rover stumbled upon something genuinely new: broad, shallow pits dotting the bedrock. Not the usual pits left behind when nodules or pebbles weather out - those are old news. These were wider, shallower, and conspicuously missing the objects that supposedly created them. Naturally, the science team got all excited, training MAHLI and Mastcam on the mystery holes in a desperate attempt to figure out what kind of rock drama left these voids behind.

The 'typical' bedrock, meanwhile, was anything but boring. Mastcam and ChemCam pored over layered rock packages that change texture and structure over short vertical distances - possibly evidence of depositional conditions changing faster than a teenager's mood swings. ChemCam, MAHLI, and APXS also examined gray, rough, resistant layers that clearly didn't match the host rock, hinting at some chemical exoticism. And because Curiosity can't resist a shiny pebble, ChemCam zapped one of the gray float rocks scattered around, hoping to learn where these little travelers came from.

Out in the distance, the 'Cordillera' butte got the paparazzi treatment with a full Mastcam mosaic, while ChemCam zoomed in on specific horizons. The 'Tolhuaca' and 'Potosí' buttes, further south down 'Valle Grande,' were also on the list, with ChemCam checking for crossbedding and examining the dark material capping Potosí.

And because Mars never lets you relax, the environmental science team kept busy monitoring a potential regional dust storm with a higher-than-usual cadence of REMS, Mastcam, and Navcam activities. By week's end, the storm seemed to be fizzling out - because even Mars's dust storms can't sustain the drama.

All this was accomplished despite losing a planning day to a lost downlink. Because what's a Mars mission without a little communication hiccup to keep things interesting?