yum

If you’re ever in Auckland, try out Orphans Kitchen – great food, great service, great ambience. Passes my orange juice test, and more!

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so this is what winter looks like

Wednesday lunchtime at the UCNC conference in Auckland, and the rain isn’t that heavy.  So I crossed over the road to Albert Park to have a stroll around during the lunch break.  I did have to dodge into the band rotunda during a typical, and typically short, shower: a downpour that lasted less than a minute.

I have to keep reminding myself that it is winter (going on spring, but still pre-equinox).  This outing didn’t help.

a magnificent magnolia tree

closeup of one of the flowers

There were a couple of interesting trees near the entrance (I believe they are Moreton Bay figs, Ficus macrophylla).  They look relatively ordinary from a distance:

But close up, their trunks are magnificent:

Eat your heart out, L-systems!

a room with a lunar view

The sky was clear this morning when I got up, letting me see Auckland in the dry.

Obligatory “view from hotel window”

But wait!  What’s that disc in the morning sky?  Zoom in…

7:13am, New Zealand summer time

Well, it’s the right shape and size for a (nearly) full moon.  But it looks … funny.

Enhance!

Rotate!

That’s better!

For comparison, the full moon “as observed from Earth on a clear night”, from Wikipedia is:

keep out

I’ve just arrived in Auckland, New Zealand, ready for the conference on Unconventional Computation and Natural Computation that starts tomorrow. It’s my first time in NZ, but it feels like home: the cars drive on the left, and it’s cool and raining (although I do have to keep reminding myself this is winter). One thing not like home: our luggage was X-rayed before we could take it away from the airport, to check we weren’t bringing in any food or critters.

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