I'm at the AGU annual meeting for the first time since 2004. It was too big for me in 2004 and by last year was 50% bigger. AGU is the scientific organization that has actually taken an official position on climate change...about 5 years ago: it is real and it is a problem. AGU is the American Geophysical Union, but it has become very international, and just passed 50,000 members. AAPG, American Association of Petroleum Geologists, as of a year or so ago had not taken a position and also gave their "journalism" award to Michael Crichton for his fiction novels including state of fear, which is more or less that global warming is a hoax. If I was an AAPG member, I would find that embarrassing.

I'll take a look through the online abstracts (www.agu.org) and figure out what I am going to choose from what may be 10,000 presentations. I'll try and report some that are of interest to the extent that I have time/feel like it. There will be a special session on the 2007 Sumatra quakes, for example.

Hey, I got some good news yesterday: with the lead P.I. C. N., and J. P. K., we will be funded for more scientific coring in Santa Barbara basin to take the high-resolution climate record back beyond 1 million years ago.
Also, I heard unofficially that I will be funded (as sole investigator) for some work in Ross Sea that is also related to ancient climate. I am going to have to get much more efficient to get things done and papers written....I'll post on that subject later (see what people, including Vidale, have to do to be efficient....I suppose how Cathryn gets things done will also be of interest. Does Vidale have to work 80 hours/week? I don't work that much.
Chris