My job is great. It puts me in the path of interesting people and projects and because it is part-time, I have an afternoon to go see an experiment with fish in the Yolo Bypass. This is a snapshot of the Nigiri Project pond (a 5 acre flooded rice field) with holding pens to test different rice stubble treatment on the well-being of small Chinook salmon. Over a month ago 10,000 itty bitty salmon from the hatchery were released. They have really grown. (How do you like my really scientific explanation?) This week they are draining the pond, counting the salmon and releasing them into the Bay Delta.

I had a wonderful time (a longer article will appear in http://deltatourist.wordpress.com).

At the end of my field visit I had an interesting conversation with the farm manager John Brennan. We compared the level of trust among all of the interests in the Bay Delta discussions from 10 years ago to now. We agreed that the trust accounts are bankrupt. Serendipitously, when I got home and checked my e-mail I read my friend Mara Connolly's blog on trust. www.maravconnolly.com. Here is an excerpt, because we can all be more trustworthy and enjoy more trust:

If you haven't read "The Speed of Trust," I highly recommend it. For businesses it talks about the impacts financially to organizations that lack trust. Trust is tangible and measurable. Trust defines leaders. I especially enjoyed reading today the 13 Behaviors of High Trust Leaders. If we all did these 13 things just once more in our day, we'd be building stronger selves, stronger teams, stronger communities, stronger states, stronger countries, and a stronger world.

Talk straight
Demosntrate Respect
Create Transparency
Right Wrongs
Show Loyalty
Deliver Results
Get Better
Confront Reality
Clarify Expectations
Practice Accountability
Listen First
Keep Commitments
Extend Trust