Miscellaneous

Courses:

• Applications of Natural Language Processing (reading course)
• History of Statistics (reading course)
• Surveys, Sampling and Observational Data (STA304)
• Worlds Become Data (INF312)

Various things to do in:

• Brisbane, Australia
  • Free BBQs at Kangaroo Point cliffs. Buy things to cook for an early dinner and watch the night close in.
  • The Barra Boys, 1007 Stanley St. Great fish and chips.
  • Pizza Caffe at the University of Queensland. Great pizza and you can walk around the uni - don't miss the Ig Nobel winning pitch experiment.
  • Go for a run along the river. Start at about the Southbank Ferry Terminal, then cross the Goodwill Bridge, then either turn left for a shorter run (cross back on Kurilpa Bridge which will be about 5 km) or turn right and stick along the river and keep going until you get too tired---making it to Sydney Street Ferry Terminal is great, but even better to try to get to New Farm Park Ferry Terminal---then get a City Cat back to Southbank. That will end up about 10-15km depending on specifics.
  • Go to the Sunshine Coast. Hire a car the day before, then starting early in the day, drive an hour north to Moffat Beach (not patrolled) then Dicky Beach (patrolled), and finally Kings Beach (patrolled). (Train + bus works also.)
• Canberra, Australia
  • The Cupping Room, 1 University Ave. Great coffee.
  • Rizla, 24 Lonsdale St. Great food and Riesling.
  • Volstead Repeal, 32 Mort St. Great drinks.
  • ONA Coffee House, 68 Wollongong St. This is in Fyshwick, but it's worth the trip. There are second hand book shops across the road that are worth going to also.
  • Cosmorex, 47 Kembla St, Fyshwick. Again, in Fyshwick, but worth the trip.
  • A run from Civic down to the lake, and ideally making it across both bridges is pretty great. Will end up at about 8-10km depending on where you're leaving from in Civic.
• Melbourne, Australia
  • Patricia Coffee Brewers, Rear of 493-495 Little Bourke St. Incredible coffee.
  • Flora Indian Restaurant, 238 Flinders St. Cheap but great Indian food.
  • Brunetti, 250 Flinders Ln. Over the top cakes and pastries.
  • You can book a meeting room at the State library if you're a member (free to join).
• Sydney, Australia
  • Campos Coffee, 193 Missenden Road, Newtown. Great coffee. Get an affogato. And a flat white. And a long black.
  • Go to Manly. Take a ferry from Circular Quay to Manly Ferry---get the commuter one, not the "fast" one. At Manly you can go to the beach, get coffee, and the walk to Shelly Beach is nice.
  • "Central" station isn't actually that central---you'll likely want Wynyard.
• San Francisco, California
  • Twin Peaks. Brilliant views of the city. Pick a clear time of day (early afternoon is safest if you're not flexible). You could walk up, but it's a bit of effort.
  • Baker Beach. Great beach for views of the Golden Gate Bridge. Can be a bit breezy.
  • Ike's Place, 3489 16th St. Brilliant sandwiches. Go early or late or call to avoid large lines. Get the Dutch Crunch bread.
  • Bi-Rite Creamery, 3692 18th Street. Nice ice cream. Don't miss the lavender one.
  • Tartine Bakery, 600 Guerrero Street. Very nice cakes. Avoid peak times otherwise there's big lines and it's hard to get a table.
  • Sightglass, 270 7th Street. Nice coffee. Nice place to sit down and see the SF people. No Wi-Fi.
  • La Taqueria, 2889 Mission Street. Carnitas burrito is better than beef burrito. Get sour cream but not super. Carnitas taco is better than chicken taco but both are great.
  • Taquerias El Farolito, 2779 Mission Street. Enormous burritos and delicious tacos. Everything is great.
• Berkeley, California
  • Bobby G's Pizzeria, 2072 University Ave. Great pizza. Sometimes has Pliny on tap!
  • Cheese Board Collective Pizzeria, 1512 Shattuck Ave. One type of pizza each day. Always vegetarian. Always great.
  • Hotsy Totsy, 601 San Pablo Ave. Great dive bar.
  • Tacos El Autlense, taco truck that parks in the Hotsy Totsy car park. Brilliant food. And you can take the food into the bar.
• Toronto, Canada
  • California Sandwiches, 244 Claremont St. Great but cheap sandwiches.
  • Good Egg, 156 Augusta Ave. A book shop in Kensington Market that is focused on kitchen books. It sounds niche, and it is, but it's also great. [HT: Ryan Briggs].
  • Vietnam Lovely Noodle, 378 Bloor St W. Great but cheap noodles.
  • Evangeline Toronto, 51 Camden St. This is a bar on Level 14 of the Ace Hotel. Go early on a nice evening and try for the outside table around the corner for a great view.
  • Tap Phong, 360 Spadina Ave. This shop in Chinatown provides an incredible selection of kitchen supplies at decent prices. Again, sounds weird, but it's a Toronto institution.
  • The best pizza in Toronto is Pizzeria Badiali, 181 Dovercourt Rd; the best value pizza in Toronto is Fresca Pizza and Pasta, 302 College St.
• Oxford, UK
  • Good coffee: New Ground Coffee Oxford, Ship St (some seating, eduroam works); Society Café, 12-16 St Michael's Street (much seating); Missing Bean, 14 Turl St (some seating, limited space but high turnover, eduroam works).
  • Good tea and scones: The Independent Cafe, 85-87 St Aldate's, (much seating); Vaults and Garden, 1 Radcliffe Sq (try to go in the morning on a weekday to avoid huge crowd).
  • You can get inexpensive access to the Bodleian Libraries with a 'Reader' application.

The best books that I read in:

• 2024
  • Alammar, Jay, and Maarten Grootendorst, "Hands-On Language Models"
  • Huyen, Chip, "Designing Machine Learning Systems"
  • Macdonald, Helen, "H is for Hawk"
  • Rebanks, James, "The Shepherd's Life"
  • Seth, Vickram, "A Suitable Boys"
  • Zuckerman, Gregory, "The Man Who Solved the Market" [HT: Michaela]
• 2023
  • Bouk, Dan, "Democracy's Data" [HT: Emily]
  • DeWitt, Helen, "The English Understand Wool"
  • Kellaway, Lucy, "Re-educated"
  • Loftus, Peter, "The Messenger"
  • Miller, Chris, "Chip War"
  • Sturge, Georgina, "Bad Data"
  • Wulf, Andrea, "The Invention of Nature"
• 2022
  • Efron & Hastie, "Computer Age Statistical Inference" [HT: Monica]
  • Kuang, R. F., "Babel, or the Necessity of Violence"
  • Light, Singer & Willett, "By Design"
  • Mindell, David, "Digital Apollo" [HT: Dan]
  • Morange, Michel "A History of Biology"
• 2021
  • Another baby was born in 2021.
• 2020
  • There was a pandemic.
• 2019
  • The baby was born in 2019.
• 2018
  • Agassi, Andre, "Open"
  • Carreyrou, John, "Bad Blood"
  • Chozick, Amy, "Chasing Hillary"
  • DeWitt, Helen, "Some Trick"
  • Green, Joshua, "Devil's Bargain"
  • Petzinger, Thomas, "Hard Landing"
  • Price, David A, "The Pixar Touch"
  • Waldrop, Mitchell M, "The Dream Machine"

Something to read:

• Boyd, Flinder, 2013, "The Re-Education of Chris Copeland", SB Nation, 11 April.
• Brooks, David, 2011, "Social Animal", The New Yorker, 17 January.
• Deresiewicz, William, 2010, "Solitude and Leadership", The American Scholar, Spring.
• Dickman, Kyle, 2018, "A Rattle with Death in Yosemite", Outside, 20 June.
• Fagone, Jason, 2014, "Dropped", Grantland, 18 March.
• Foster Wallace, David, 2006, "Federer as Religious Experience", The New York Times, 20 August.
• Gawande, Atul, 2011, "Personal Best", The New Yorker, 3 October.
• Graham, Paul, 2005, "What You'll Wish You'd Known", January.
• Harrington, Walt, 1986, "Born to Run", Washington Post, 28 September.
• Harrington, Walt, 2011, "Dubya and Me", The American Scholar, Autumn.
• Henderson, Bob, 2016, "What Does Any of This Have To Do with Physics?", Nautilus, 19 December.
• Hill, David, 2014, "The Board Game of the Alpha Nerds", Grantland, 18 June.
• Lehrer, Jonah, 2009, "The Secret of Self-Control", The New Yorker, 18 May.
• Lewis, Michael, 2012, "Obama's Way", Vanity Fair, 11 September.
• Mahler, Jonathan and Jim Rutenberg, 2019, "How Rupert Murdoch's Empire Of Influence Remade The World", The New York Times, 2 April.
• Mahler, Jonathan and Jim Rutenberg, 2025, "'You've Blown a Hole in the Family': Inside the Murdochs' Succession Drama", The New York Times, 13 February.
• Parker, Ashley, 2010, "All the Obama 20-Somethings", The New York Times, 29 April.
• Paumgarten, Nick, 2019, "Inside the Cultish Dreamworld of Augusta National", The New Yorker, 14 June.
• Salvatier, John, 2017, "Reality has a surprising amount of detail", 13 May.
• Schulman, Michael, 2018, "Daniel Radcliffe and the Art of the Fact-Check", The New Yorker, 8 October.
• Smith, Zadie, 2010, "Generation Why?", New York Review of Books, 25 November.
• Smith, Zadie, 2012, "The House that Hova Built", The New York Times Style Magazine, 6 September.
• Somers, James, 2017, "Torching The Modern-Day Library Of Alexandria", The Atlantic, 20 April.
• Thompson, Wright, 2013, "Jordan Has Not Left the Building", ESPN, February.
• Weingarten, Gene, 2007, "Pearls Before Breakfast", The Washington Post, 8 April.
• Witteman, Holly, 2009, "The B Lane Swimmer", 29 April. [HT: Vicky Boykis].
• Wolchover, Natalie, 2021, "The Webb Space Telescope Will Rewrite Cosmic History. If It Works.", Quanta, 3 December.