walked my feet off

[redbird]

The power, which was supposed to be back at noon, was still off a bit after 1, when we'd finished lunch at the local diner, so I said "We could go to the Zoo!" And we did.

Lots of cool animals--pelicans and emus and okapis, oh my! Snow leopards and cranes and a baby white-faced titi. Also a little green heron and a cormorant, wild visitors rather than zoo exhibits, and a Goliath heron, which is huge, and otters and lemurs in the children's zoo. A fine time was had by all, except that I hadn't planned this, so I'd gone out wearing my sandals instead of my good walking shoes.

So I walked my feet off, and we left when the zoo closed, and I came home and sat down and cattitude brought me a cup of tea, and I won't be getting down to Rose's Turn to hang out with people. roadnotes, I think we need to make a definite date for this, some week when I tell you I'll be there, and therefore arrange my day so it makes sense to do so. I want to hear you sing.

Comments

[kiya]

Random zoo-related free-association:

When I was a fairly small, my parents took me to look at the reindeer that get kept on the Mall in DC in December.

I am told that my response was, "But where are the oryxes?"

[redbird]

An entirely reasonable question. We started late and were tired, and didn't get to the oryxes this time--but they're good oryxes.

[cattitude.livejournal.com]

The reindeer are up by the central zoo building, next to the elephants, the tapirs, and the new hairy (or Sumatran) rhinocerous. The hairy rhinocerous replaces the black rhinocerous that used to be there. The reindeer are only there in winter, so we didn't see them today.

The oryxes (orices? Nymph, in thy orices be all my sins remebered...) are at the southeast corner of the zoo. You can see them as you come in from the subway. There is generally at least one chipmunk in with them.

The Russian Chemist and the Pachyderms

[webbob.livejournal.com]

The Russian chemist Dmitri Ivanovich Mendeleev received his early education in Tobolsk, Siberia, where his exposure to many wonders of the real world was limited. Very much of his learning was at second-hand from sometimes-strange Decembrist exiles, fomenters of the Revolution of 1825. After he was accepted to the university in St Petersburg, Mendeleev liked to go walking in the zoo after a day of studies. Often Dmitri Ivanovich would stop in a café and watch others walk by in the long evening sunlight.

Mendeleev enjoyed a particular table at a particular café but found that every three weeks on Thursday evening, the best table at the front of the café was occupied by a party of large, grey pachyderms. After several months of this recurring inconvenience, Dmitri Ivanovich complained to the proprietor of the café, a Frenchman, who rebuffed the comment.

"Surely, Monsieur Mendeleev," rejoined the proprietor, "One must respect and admire Nature's innate order as demonstrated in the Periodic Table of the Elephants."

[red-queen.livejournal.com]

Tho' this be madness, yet there is a method to 't.

Bard to the bone, eh?