current events: AiML
Sep. 11th, 2008 11:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aryanhwyI'm going to go at this from both ends.
Tuesday evening I got into Nancy around 6pm, got to my hotel with no trouble and figured I'd do what I needed to do to find out how to get to where I needed to go for the conference Wednesday morning, and then go to bed, and finally catch up on sleep. It turns out that my hotel has free WiFi access---but I couldn't ever find a spot close enough to an access point where I could see the network long enough to log in. So the nice lady at reception pointed out an internet cafe to me on the map and I went off to find it. I hadn't gone a few blocks when I saw a sign for the Musée Lorrain, which made me go "Hey, wait a minute, isn't that where the opening reception was going to be?" I walked over to the museum and saw a couple people I recognized, and it turns out that I got to the reception only about 10 minutes after it started. So at that point I figured I'd stay and chat. There were two short tours (45 min.) of the museum, which included a room of etchings and copper plates by Jacques Callot which were very interesting; I like etchings. Then there were some nibbly bits downstairs, and a little bit before 9 a group of us went off to find dinner. We ended up at a place which was rather expensive but the saffron risotto with cured ham that I had, with a very unusual take on tiramisu for dessert, was quite good. Unfortunately, this means I did get back to the hotel rather later than planned!
At breakfast yesterday morning I ran into Clemens, who had been at the ILLC and is now at CWI, and he was sitting with Robert, from Darmstadt, who is also attending the conference, so that made figuring out how to get to the site easy, I just followed them. The selection of talks is in general more mathematical than I can easily follow if I'm tired, so I used some of the time to catch up on my email and work on the slides for my talk this afternoon. Lunch was fantastic; lots of little nibbly bits plus two hot dishes, and for dessert little glass cups with a layer of raspberry puree, then cream, and then a raspberry. Ooooh, superb. I had two. :)
Then for dinner 11 of us met in Place Stanislas (the main square) and went to find a place nearby; it has hard to find a place that could seat 11 outdoors but the place we found I was happy with. I had the quiche Lorrain (wow was that the best quiche I have ever had), and then trout with almonds (also very good). We weren't entirely sure of the translation of some of the dishes on the mneu, so three people ended up ordering tête de veau, which was, yes, veal brain (complete with the outer facial skin with hair on it still). Eeww.
I ended up leaving right after dinner so that I could go back to the hotel and work on my slides some more. I have them mostly finished, which is good because there's one more talk (just about to start), then lunch, and then my talk.
Time to go!
Tuesday evening I got into Nancy around 6pm, got to my hotel with no trouble and figured I'd do what I needed to do to find out how to get to where I needed to go for the conference Wednesday morning, and then go to bed, and finally catch up on sleep. It turns out that my hotel has free WiFi access---but I couldn't ever find a spot close enough to an access point where I could see the network long enough to log in. So the nice lady at reception pointed out an internet cafe to me on the map and I went off to find it. I hadn't gone a few blocks when I saw a sign for the Musée Lorrain, which made me go "Hey, wait a minute, isn't that where the opening reception was going to be?" I walked over to the museum and saw a couple people I recognized, and it turns out that I got to the reception only about 10 minutes after it started. So at that point I figured I'd stay and chat. There were two short tours (45 min.) of the museum, which included a room of etchings and copper plates by Jacques Callot which were very interesting; I like etchings. Then there were some nibbly bits downstairs, and a little bit before 9 a group of us went off to find dinner. We ended up at a place which was rather expensive but the saffron risotto with cured ham that I had, with a very unusual take on tiramisu for dessert, was quite good. Unfortunately, this means I did get back to the hotel rather later than planned!
At breakfast yesterday morning I ran into Clemens, who had been at the ILLC and is now at CWI, and he was sitting with Robert, from Darmstadt, who is also attending the conference, so that made figuring out how to get to the site easy, I just followed them. The selection of talks is in general more mathematical than I can easily follow if I'm tired, so I used some of the time to catch up on my email and work on the slides for my talk this afternoon. Lunch was fantastic; lots of little nibbly bits plus two hot dishes, and for dessert little glass cups with a layer of raspberry puree, then cream, and then a raspberry. Ooooh, superb. I had two. :)
Then for dinner 11 of us met in Place Stanislas (the main square) and went to find a place nearby; it has hard to find a place that could seat 11 outdoors but the place we found I was happy with. I had the quiche Lorrain (wow was that the best quiche I have ever had), and then trout with almonds (also very good). We weren't entirely sure of the translation of some of the dishes on the mneu, so three people ended up ordering tête de veau, which was, yes, veal brain (complete with the outer facial skin with hair on it still). Eeww.
I ended up leaving right after dinner so that I could go back to the hotel and work on my slides some more. I have them mostly finished, which is good because there's one more talk (just about to start), then lunch, and then my talk.
Time to go!
