Blogging Wish List

I have thought of so much I would like to write about in this blog over the past few days. I would like to start with an article I am writing for a newsletter I edit. I wrote it about a talk I went to on Wednesday on the UCLA campus called: "The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Challenges of Climate Policy, Equity & Ethics", given by Richard Somerville, a researcher from Scripps Oceanographic Institute and lead author of the most recent IPCC report. Unfortunately, now that I have gotten you all excited about my wonderful article, you will have to wait to read it because it is stored on my work computer and it is now the weekend.

But it was his talk and a few others at a conference I was at this week that got me inspired to make a conscious effort to live more responsibly. Well, honestly I think about this from time to time but I guess I received enough stimulation at this conference to finally take the plunge. The conference was for the Center of Multiscale Modeling of Atmospheric Processes (CMMAP) - it is a Science and Technology Center funded by the National Science Foundation. CMMAP's research aim is to improve the representation of clouds in climate and weather models, which would improve our simulations of future climates. I focus on land-atmosphere interactions in climate models. One of these days I will give a little summary of that, but not on a Friday night!

Now to the subject of this post ... there is a lot that I want to write about! Here are some things I have come across just in the past few days ...
- I want to decrease my food carbon emissions, for example by eating less meat and less food that is shipping and packaging intensive
- I read a shocking article in National Geographic regarding electronic waste that is shipped from the developed world to developing countries. The worst part about it is that people burn the parts (TV and computer monitors, hard drives, copper wires) so they can sell the metals but in doing so expose themselves to carcinogens and lead poisoning - there was a picture of a man melting lead in a pot that he also uses to cook dinner for his family. Anyway, more on that to come ...
- calculate my carbon footprint
- a friend of mine is looking into making her own household cleaners that are more environmentally friendly and safe (she is having a baby in June)
- well, maybe that is it but it felt like a lot when it was still in my head.

Thanks for reading! Goodnight :)