One Day We'll Curse in Fluent Kangaroo

We took NJ to the zoo on this very sunny February Saturday. A zoo trip has been talked about here for weeks, both me and The Wife and with our PEPS group friends. In fact, a trip two weekends ago was canceled because of wet, cold weather. I have been ambivalent about the whole thing, because I don't think six months is old enough to appreciate the zoo. Nevertheless, the weather is gorgeous and we've been cooped up in the house so many weekends in a row because of rain or illness that we had to get out of the house. And Woodland Park Zoo was the destination.

Now, NJ had a good time. She loved watching the crowds walk by, and being out in the sunshine (when it wasn't making her squint), and being passed back and forth between her mom and dad. But I don't think she saw any animals, or cared much about them if they did. Not even this guy, who reminds me of her uncle:

Here’s another thing a monkey won’t do
Go out on a night and get all in a stew
Or use a gun or a club or a knife
And take another monkey’s life
Yes, man descended, the worthless bum
But, brothers, from us he did not come

I know she saw an orangutan, because his big, flat face was two inches from the glass and I held NJ up two inches from the glass, too. She had a thing or two to say to him, but I doubt he heard. It was nothing like being at home when one of the Two Idiots roams the great hardwood savanna and is within reaching distance -- now, that's exciting. She wasn't the youngest child I saw there, but she was among the youngest. She'll love the zoo one day, but today it was just another outing with the folks. Which is pretty good, too. But not quite as good as when you know you're six inches away from an orangutan that could, if not for the glass wall, snatch you up and carry you off.