One more Madison lake picture

Taken on my way out - Lake Mendota was looking quite lovely! 

Pest inspection

My day was so full and busy that I didn't capture lakeside terrace views or nice food trucks or anything else. I did find this notice when I got back to my room, which I initially thought indicated I was entered in a contest. 

I suppose if they had found pests, they would have done something more than just leave a note!

At a science meeting

I'm running a bingo competition for students at our science meeting - my wonderful co-conspirators found s bunch of prizes! 

And our opening reception featured a sunset over Lake Mendota. Seriously pretty!

The end of the conference

I'm pretty tired after several days of conferencing. My final conference-related picture is the AAS logo display:

Scenes from the astronomy conference

More hotel ridiculousness

Koi pond:

Card games

I ended up playing card games with Kepler people late at night; this is my card for werewolf. 

Absurd

Now at a conference held in the most terrible convention center: Gaylord palms in Kissimmee, Florida. My room is located in the vicinity of this decoration:

At the conference

I grabbed this panorama of the main auditorium of the conference during the break before my talk. It's not too big, and I like how funky the yellow seats are. The talk went well, and I head back to Berlin tomorrow!

Conference Banquet

Most conferences have a nice dinner on one of the nights to celebrate all the excellent science - this one included a fancy ceiling and a piano player. I snapped this picture from my seat:

No time for anything more exciting, I've been brushing up the talk I'm giving tomorrow!

Madrid at night

I had a busy day at the conference (and hot - some of the AC stopped working) and I totally forgot to take a picture until I was nearly back at my rental apartment for the night. Ambulances look different here than they do in Germany, which is different than they look in the US. Also, you can see some of the architecture details in the buildings behind.

My next two days are also going to be pretty full, but I'll find *something* to post!

Conferencing, day one

I'm in Madrid for the rest of the week, attending the SDSS-IV meeting at the If you like science via twitter, you can follow along on twitter #sdss15. The meeting isn't in downtown Madrid, it's in the outskirts. It's in this building (it's a bit more lonely and hot than it looks).

I also snapped this picture of the Madrid skyline in the distance:

Not pictured: after today at the conference I joined some collaborators for dinner and drinks - very delicious!

PS: David has started posting too, so more pictures for you!!