Wonderful

Did a totally new area on Sunday, which of course means a new one of these blog post thingys.

Got shifted to anteater this week, which actually means capybara, llama, tortoises, rheas, flamingos, andean bears, and anteaters.  It was cool to see all of these new animals and all the different night houses that they have. Everything is more or less the same, cleaning and hosing out the houses, feeding the animals either in the back or out on exhibit, cleaning the yard, trying to do some training if there's time.  The one new thing that I did was clean the anteater pool, which was kind of gross because they only poop in the pool.  But those kinds of animals and night houses are what I imagined the entire zoo was like, not just that area.  So I hope I get to be on that area more this semester to get some more experience with those kinds of things.  Pretty sure I've done everything except polar bear/lion and macaques/mandrills at this point, and with lots of things changing at the zoo maybe I'll get to, maybe not.

Also found out that two apprenticeship spots open in September, so I'll have to find something to do this summer, although there is a thing in Boston that I'm going to apply for I think.  It seems like the perfect thing that I would need, and it's only from the end of May through September, so it works out perfectly.

Since my last post, the whole world now knows where Tucson is on a map, and I've seen every president I've ever voted for in person (one), and both for bad reasons.  But Rep. Giffords is making huge progress, and the whole tone of this community has changed, and I'm kind of glad to say that I've lived here for 3 and a half years now.  Just sitting here watching the news on January 8th was one of the most surreal things I've ever experienced.  Things kept happening and changing (CNN had Giffords dead for half an hour), and the nation was focused on this town that most of the country probably doesn't even know exists.  Then President Obama showed up, and I waited in line outside McKale all afternoon to see him speak, and to see all of that political power, all sitting together on the floor that the basketball team made famous.  It was crazy.

Four months til graduation! :)

How can you smile with all those tears in your eyes, and tell me everything is wonderful now?

Mysterious Ways

So, originally I decided I wasn't going to do Tuesdays on here by themselves, but this Tuesday was so much fun I thought I would go ahead and post it, all be it two days late (physio and ochem raped me this week)

When I showed up in the morning, no one was in the keeper's quarters, so I just signed in and went straight to the kitchen, where there was tons of action and lots of stuff going on, but nothing for me to do.  So we went back to the other room for the meeting, where I learned the baby zebra almost died over the weekend :( but he was starting to pull through Tuesday so hopefully there is still a baby there when I show up Saturday morning.

So once morning rush was over, I got to help do monthly inventory instead of make diets.  It was interesting to see how little of each different food the zoo uses, and it was freezing cold having to stand in the freezer for like ten minutes counting mice and rats and all kinds of weird stuff.

When we finished inventory we did worms and crickets, which is always exciting.  But after that, we got to go work giraffe feed.  Climbed over the fence into the zoo and stood there in the giraffe feeding area, fed some giraffes, and gave biscuits to little kids that threw their's so they could actually feed the giraffe two biscuits.  About halfway through feeding time, the male zebra started following close behind one of the females, and then we realized what was happening.  Let's just say he was up and at em.  He never actually jumped up to mount her (which I think would have been awesome to see), but he did do enough to disgust me, and I'll just leave it at that haha.

On our way back, Cassie, the keeper that I see the most that I don't actually work with, needed help moving the giant ball that I saw in the elephant yard on Saturday across the zoo from tiger to lion.  So we rode over to tiger with her, picked up the ball, and drove over to lion.  I didn't see lions, but that's ok.  Then she drove us back to the kitchen, where I helped do capybara and tapir diets before I had to leave.  Overall, much better than normal, especially because I got to feed some giraffes :)

It's alright, it's alright, alright. She moves, in mysterious ways