The onset of Fall

Fall is the best time of year...just when you are getting tired of the summer - the dog days of summer - the suns angle declines on the horizon enough to allow the air a chance to breathe and provide enough of a chill to make things comfortable once again. I think people would really treasure the season if fall didn't lead into winter. In other words, if there was some sort of rheostat on the fall season.

The weather has begun to change from 95 degrees everyday here in Reno. Believe me, it is a welcome change as I was hoping to get a little more variety in the weather department that 72F and sunny southern california. Reno has quite a nice skyline surrounded by mountains, and since you can quickly be up above the city (as in my office) you can get a great perspective on the forecoming weather. Henceforth, the link of the week is the webcam that sits about 20 feet from my desk. I do not have such a view as I am barricaded in my cubicles...but perhaps that allows me to focus better??
I have been developing a method to remove inhomogenities in climate records for the state of California. As an example if you look at the temperature record (max temp) for Yosemite valley there is a dramatic drop in temperatures in the 1960's and 1970's that is not seen by any nearby station. This kind of error in the dataset can lead to a whole mess of bad results.

Since I am held captive all week long, I am trying to get out and explore every weekend. This past weekend I had a chance to go hiking with a couple people from work. We headed out to Thomas/White Creeks on the east side of Mt Rose Wilderness. Our goals was to check out the Aspens that turn golden this time of the year. In the pictures to the left you see the forest, and if you look closely a patch of yellow. I figured these were trees that the bears use an outhouse, but actually they are groves of Aspen.

We had a nice hike along the creek, where the dogs outnumbered people. This was primarily due to the fact that a doggy day care lady had brought like 12 dogs with her on a romp through the woods. It was pretty funny as each dog (think student, for the teachers in the reading audience) was dressed in a uniform (Caltrans orange vest) and had its own name tag on it. The name tag part really through me...what like if these dogs get called Spot rather than Rusty will they complain and not want to go back to this Day Care center. Me thinks not.