Academic has a certain magic that lets it consume one’s life beyond recognition. This semester, I only have three classes, plus research and teaching, and yet somehow the day ends later every day.

I got my top choice for teaching, and I love it, but I don’t know if it’s worth the effort sometimes. The class is Environmental Science, which I took last year, my first exposure to much of the field. But now, weekly I’m putting together big recitation-section lectures, and I just finished the grading the two inches of paper that made their first assignment.

My classes for credit each have their charms. Geophysical Inverse Theory has already proved useful, and takes place on the beautiful Lamont campus.
Environmental and Resource Economics is usually good for a shot of ideas and a bottle of math.
Sustainability Science has half good discussions, half bad discussions, and half aimless commentary.

In other news, my work on flooding from glacial melt got accepted for a poster session at the huge AGU conference in San Francisco, in December. My program should have some money to send me there.

I participated in “Data without Borders” last weekend, which was lots of fun. My team was pretty serious, the food was plentiful, and the people nice and interesting.

Now I need to sleep. Elinor Ostrom is lecturing Sustainability Science tomorrow!