AGU day 4 and 5

After a rather late return from Gary Danko we didn't have the enthusiasm for a morning run on a cloudy day, so just staggered in for some talks on data assimilation to hear about the latest new ideas. jules went to ocean acidification, which is perhaps of more general interest. Another working lunch followed - despite jules' cynicism, this year has been significantly enhanced by the number of people we've managed to meet. Last year we were a bit ill and knackered so it wasn't as productive. In the afternoon there was another session on the last millennium, in fact my talk might have fitted in a little better there than on Wednesday's session which was more generally covering paleo-for-future-predictions, but there was a strong overlap in terms of attendees and interests. Flagging a little after the previous splurge, we waddled off to the local Thai for a quick and early dinner - I'm not sure if it is really worth two meals there (and for the 2nd year running!) when SF has so much more to offer but it was just what we felt like.

This morning we managed a run and an 8am start - breakfast was the missing element, but eating is getting increasingly difficult. First session was interesting stuff on climate variability, with various wiggles in both models and data, some of which occasionally coincided to some extent. Lunch we managed to follow Eli's recommendation for Yank Sing which was definitely a cut above (jules said 3 cuts, in fact) the local place we have previously visited. As with last year, the organisers have kept some of the best till last, which may be a bit of a shame when so many leave early. There are sessions both on model-data comparisons, mostly modern data sets but also including jules's talk on paleo data, and also some more paleo modelling. Nothing outstanding, but it's useful to keep up with what is happening. I think the "new" obs4mips data sets are going to be particularly useful, as they are being designed to be readily usable even by numpties such as myself.