Trips

Last week I visited Duke on Tuesday. They have a nice, small program in "earth and ocean science" focused on climate change. There's only one physical oceanographer there, but I like her a great deal, and there are some additional ones at UNC right down the road that I could take classes from. It's a pretty attractive option, actually, but I have to decide whether I want to do climate-related blue-water oceanography or not. (There's hardly any other kind of blue-water oceanography these days).

Then last Friday I flew out to Seattle to see U of Washington. I stayed with my friends Dave and Laurel over the weekend and visited the campus Monday and Tuesday. As expected it was a very impressive program, and they took us out on their impressive boat Tuesday afternoon and evening. It was a lot of fun. I'll post some photos later. I think the best option at UW would be coastal/estuarine oceanography, which is very interesting to me. I need to decide if I really want to relocate all the way out there, though, and live on a grad student's salary.

It's not an easy decision to make. When I was younger I didn't worry about moving too far away from family, but these days my parents aren't getting any younger and my sister's kids are growing up fast. As a grad student I won't have much money to travel home. And it's not like taking a job out there, where I could leave after a year or two -- it's about a six-year commitment.

Next week I'm planning to go out to UNC to talk to their faculty. They do mostly coastal work, and though it's not as large or well-known a program as UW, at least it's not so far away.