goin to the BIG SHOW!

Folks, I am about to get on the plane to go to AGU in San francisco and I can't remember the last time I was so excited. I got all the Christmas shopping done, cleaned the house for the housesitter (although he is my student and I did leave him a six-pack so who's complaining). I downloaded all the session info.

I used to think GSA was so much better than AGU. People wear field-fashion there and bring rocks to their posters for goodnessakes. Now I think they're just different. I like going to GSA when I want to reconnect with my geology roots and especially for teaching/education recharge. I like to go to AGU when I want to stretch myself quantitatively and party with everybody I ever knew in geology, ever, while spending a month's income on food and drink!

I like to give a talk when I want a lot of people to hear what I have to say. I like to give a poster when I want to hear what a lot of people have to say to me. Also talks are nice when you're flying from overseas, and say, not ready to go to print yet.

This year my needs/wants are perfectly aligned with my AGU/talk. There is a lot I love about being in South Africa but one of the drawbacks is a small community of very busy scientists working on very different things. In order to have the real exciting science discussions and challenging collaborations, I have picked up some very new and strange research directions. Now I have some great stuff going on and some very interesting people to work with on it. But I miss the energy and intensity of a being at a pumped-up research institution where everybody is jazzed about science all the time. Also, there are so many people available to talk to that questions get opened and answered all the time. Heavy trading on the ideas floor.

Bring on the BIG SHOW! I want to see all you friends of kodiak at thirsty bear on Tuesday night. I want to talk about SUBDUCTION and ACTIVE FAULTS with a beer in front of me that is made of BEER INGREDIENTS and not CORN! Ahhh the brew pub options within 3 blocks of Moscone center trounce the entire nation of South Africa subsaharan Africa.

If you're at AGU and you make it to Friday Afternoon I hope you'll check out my talk. Yahooo!