It’s Alive in Brisbane: Pretty Possum

Finally, I have been able to photograph something living in the Brisbane area that wasn’t a water dragon. I was getting worried they might have eaten everything else.

Actually, I have seen other living things, I just have not had my camera with me when I have seen them.

The rusty critter above was spotted at the QUT Kelvin Grove campus as I came home from the bus stop after ice skating. Possums are pretty common to be spotted on campus at night, and I have seen at least one during the day time.

Later on, closer to my unit, spotted one hanging upside down on a wire outside someone’s house. Thankfully they didn’t notice me taking flash photography outside their window, which may have been a little difficult to explain easily.

Something smells fishy about this sushi

Click frame for complete comic at Ménage á 3 (NB: comics can be NSFW).

One of the activities that has seen me diverted from blogging duties has been a Japanese language group I joined last year.

Despite Brisbane and Queensland in general being a popular destination for Japanese in Australia, the Japanese students and visitors I’ve met complain it is hard to find authentic Japanese cuisine. With sushi bars approximately every 200 meters, it may seem difficult to believe. But even I notice that many of the city’s sushi bars are actually owned an/or staffed by Koreans (complete with Korean signs, Korean pop star posters, and Korean community papers and zines on display etc.).

Korean restauranteurs posing as Japanese is not anything entirely new or restricted to just Brisbane or Australia (Ménage is set in Montreal, and here is an article with the Japanese government wagging a finger at L.A.). Why does it happen?

I can’t find anything exactly investigating the phenomenon. I don’t think it is because old war issues, because they are as likely to be with Japanese as Koreans. And I don’t think it is because people don’t like Korean food, because, at least in Brisbane there are still plenty of of Korean restaurants around. Anyone know of another suggestion? Perhaps it is just that there are some Koreans who open Japanese restaurants.

It’s Alive in Brisbane: Junior Dragon

Even the animals in Brisbane are friendlier than Sydney ones.

The waterdragons in the Mount Coot-tha gardens are not intimidated by some human company. Three waterdragons swam across the Japanese ponds to let some friends and I get a closer look, including this little juvenile:

Very sure these are Eastern Waterdragons – same as this one I saw in Lane Cove earlier in the year (I’ll also sheepishly admit that I may have thought the adults were frilled neck lizards when I first saw them – but quickly realised they weren’t).

Behold the UggCroc

Pic: UggCroc at the Valley Markets (yes, it’s what you think), originally uploaded by David Jackmanson. (Creative Commons by Attribution)

Pure Awesome.

Moving in pictures

From this:

Sydney

To this:

Brisbane

Linkdump and run

So tomorrow, having had recovered from the last few days of furious drinking, running and cleaning, I’ll be making the almost 1000km drive up the Pacific Highway back to Brisbane (in an awesome big red shiny car*).

So here is a quick linkdump to keep you amused – until I get housing, employment and classes fixed posting may become even more irregular than usual. Bear with me, on the positive side, I should be able to amp up the quality of my posts as I will now be (A) student with nothing better to do, (B) be in a better mood than recent months.

• I think this experiment explains why I think physics is insane and will cause your head to explode (you have been warned)
• With biology you get to have fun without creating a paradox that causes your brain to explode. Check out the TimeTree of Life. It’s always difficult frustrating to trawl through various papers that ultimately disagree on at least some level as to when certain clades diverged. This neat tool pretty much indexes all the relevant papers and can pop out divergence times at the click of the button, complete with reference. Protip: check that the name you are using refers to what you think it does (I had trouble when I used Echidna to represent Monotremata)
• Need to buy something in private?
• The future is NOW… in a bookstore near you
• I wonder if I would get in trouble for printing this out and taping it to a classroom wall?
• Are you a scoftic? You know who you are Mr Nobody-Needs-Vitamins
• via The Scientist’s forums – awesome stem cell micrograph flickr gallery
• Some of you may have seen this awesome optical illusion – but check out the examples of it in action by commentor Grand Dizzy – here, here, here, here and here

*FACT: Red ones go faster

Image credit: explodingdog

Just blew into the Windy City

Last Monday I moved to Brisbane.

Previously I was living on the edge of the tropics in the beach side pseudo-paradise of Yeppoon – near Rockhampton (as one of my fellow interviewees put it – “the place with the bull testicles“).

Why would I move from sunshine, surf and fresh air to the cold harsh soulless city? Well, mostly for the cash. I need graduate employment. A problem which appears to have been solved within three days of arriving.

Boring personal gibber below the fold.