M is for Marvelous

Conference day two. Today is the day I have to upload my talks to the conference portal. I was planning to do some work on them before the conference started but somehow by the time I got up, had a shower, and ironed my shirts, it was time to head out for breakfast and the Plenary Lecture starting at 8:30am. 

Today was 'T-cell' day, it's a bit of a shame the microbiota didn't land on the 'M' day, but that's life. Put simply T-cells are the cells of the immune system that do the killing in type 1 diabetes, all the other cells of the immune system 'just' help them do it. 

I spent most of today trying to finish my talks whilst listening in for anything particularly interesting. Such as, the harmonisation of pancreas specific immune cell assays between laboratories (measuring the cells that home to the insulin producing cells specifically). 

By the end of the day I had succeeded in uploading one talk to the conference portal, with one more to go. 

That did mean I could enjoy the Rising Star Award Session, all early career researchers presenting their work, with an award of travel money, certificate, and a conference dinner ticket! These were nice, novel, well explained presentations. 

This evening I only had to stay at the conference centre to talk with my committee till 7:15pm. Then we found my other colleagues for some food. 

Back to the hotel room and practice my finished talk for tomorrow...

L is for Lick...

 The slow posting is because on Monday (letter L day) my conference started. L could also stand for long day, though not as long as the rest of the week. Today we started at 10am with registration and 11am for the Welcome. 

Today was mainly about the early life origins of type 1 diabetes, mainly microbiota. The most memorable talk, the sharing of gut bacterial strains between infants and their families. Obviously, babies start of with strong sharing of strains with their Mum's, persisting as long as they are breast fed. However then their strains start to shift towards their older siblings, it's not clear why, possibly because their guts have a more similar bacterial niche (environment), such as a more similar diet. Then children start nursery and their bacterial strains shift again to shared strains with their peers. Ick!

We finished the conference about 5:30pm but I was at the conference venue until 9pm working with my committee on our presentations for Wednesday. 

We left to find food but all the restaurants kitchens were closing so eventually we ended up in the central shopping area having Mc Donald's at 10pm. Raspberry Fanta - yum! 

K is for KOALA, KOALA, KOALA 🐨 (lots of videos!)

Finally the day has come. It's Koala day 🐨

I started the day with breakfast in the hotel and a trip around the corner to Hillsong Brisbane City. This campus is an old movie theatre. It was good to worship God with a few hundred (?) others. The music was so loud 🤣 two keyboards, drums, 3 guitars and four singers. Good mix of songs I knew and modern songs that had such obvious chord progressions I could sing them without ever hearing them before 👍🏼😁.  The sermon was from the Sydney Hills campus, being sent across Australia this Sunday. 

I then made my way across the river for the coach to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. 

I took 235 photos/videos - I have edited these down 😅

I saw Koalas, Kangaroos, Platypus, Echidna, Tasmanian Devil, and a Quokka. 

Koalas

What do Koalas do? 

They sleep...

They Eat

What's better than one Koala eating? 

Three Koalas eating. 

They also jump!

Kangaroos (and Wallabies)

You could feed them and pet them (though I let them be as I did not feel the need). 

Tree Kangaroo

Platypus

The platypuses were in a dark room and one was sleeping. But, I did manage to get a few seconds of video - slowed down. 

See the little white eye lids? 

Echidna

I almost missed the Echidna as I was looking for Wombats. 

The little pink blur in the photos is it's tongue! The video is clearer

Look at him amble!

Tasmanian Devil

Quokka

When I first found the Quokka (Quincy) he was having a nap, which was cute.

But when I went back later he was up and about. 

Then he heard his keeper and hopped over!

Some other bits and bobs

Dingo

Salt water crocodile

Me and my new little friend (Piney)

All in all a really lovely day! 

 

J is for Jaunty

So, I'm failing fairly terribly at the finding a word of the right letter that describes the day 'game'. However on this occasion co-pilot helped me out. 

The day started with moving from the apartment I stayed in last night to the hotel I booked through work. Bonus 1: happened to turn up as the same time as others from Bristol/Cardiff. Bonus 2: we could check-in when we arrived (around 10:30am). Bonus 3: I got a room on the waterfront. 

We went out and found a iced latte around the corner in this garden hidden in the middle of the block. 

Next door to the Hillsong City campus - which turns out to be 190m from my hotel!

This afternoon I went up to Mt Coot-tha for a view across Brisbane. 

This is the ~ 160° view.

This is looking South (ish) 

Moving towards the East

And this is the central business district 

This is a bit closer in. My hotel and conference are around the big wheel. 

Following this I popped into the Botanical Gardens for a few hours. It was very vibrant and bright!

I particularly enjoyed the cacti. 

This one is an Eurphorbia ingens

I also met a few creatures ... This is a slightly fuzzy photo of a bushturkey. 

This is a water dragon (front and back)

Some bees

And... trigger warning for spiders!

A Golden Orb-Weaving Spider (female) surrounded by little red spiders (males) 

I got back to the hotel in time to catch the last of the light. 

Tomorrow is day 11 of my trip and letter K and we all know what K stands for...

            ... Koala day! 

                            Koala day! 

                                           Koala day!