Right. So this week I have Ella at my house and it is something I've been looking forward to for um...about a year. Seriously. When Ella was two I asked Summer if she could come to my house for a week in the summer like they do in sweet, homey movies and such. The answer was no, she is too young, but next year probably. GUESS WHO HAS A LONG MEMORY? ME, that's who. I am also trying my damndest to spoil Ella rotten so that she doesn't forget about this trip for a good long while and all Summer hears for the next year is, "Can I go backah Hope's house?" For me, that would be enough.
Today we hit up the zoo and it occurred to me as we meandered past the white tiger who wouldn't come out from the bamboo so that each parent was reduced to saying things like, "See, in BETWEEN the green stuff? The leaves? See the white bits? SEE, SEE?" until someone took them gently by the shoulder and led them towards the squirrel monkey exhibit and showed them that, not to worry, there are several of these little guys and they actually jump up to the glass! that parents are really the ones who want to visit the zoo. No, really. At Ella's age they are still easily charmed but because EVERYTHING is cool, she'd just as soon climb the little retaining walls and show me how she can jump from them. By the time they are old enough to maybe appreciate that poor huge gorilla behind the glass who is contemplating, now, as we speak, ways to take his own miserable life, they are so far past wanting you to believe you did something RIGHT. Please. So we had the tiny child contingent who's parent kept urging, "Let's go! Keep moving! We haven't even SEEN the giraffes yet!" while his or her child sat down on the ground to enjoy a piece of grass and the buses full of older children, shoving their way through the crowds, trying to figure out how to make a small flute into a blow dart, thus making a bunch of unhappy animals lives THAT MUCH WORSE. Fair.
The one part of the zoo, or at least one of the parts of the zoo that was supposed to be fun that Ella actually enjoyed, was the train ride. I can't blame her. We actually got to sit. And if that wasn't excitement enough, halfway through the ride I dug into my purse and pulled out the two lollipops I'd brought just to amp up the afternoon. Towards the end of the trip we meandered into the reptile house and I bent down to ask Ella if she was finished with her now-soggy-stemmed sucker. She informed me no. Then she closed her eyes in the way she does, momentarily, when she is getting read to tell me something important.
"This is my drink."
"Oh, that lollipop? Is your drink now?"
Solemn nod.
"Is it your coffee?"
"No, (sigh), it's my beer."
In other news, we also saw a pair of tortoise actively trying to get it on. Ella hypothesized that the more, ahem, aggressive of the two, was trying to wake the other one up. OR SOMETHING.
hhahahhahahahhaha wait until Browning hears that story!!! He tries so hard not to let her near, hear of or see beer!! That's what he gets!!! I wish you had a video of the apes and Ella's opinion!! =) So fun!!
Btw, without Ella here for some reason, Cutchin is a holy Dennisthemenace TERROR!!! into everything!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
Posted by: Summer | May 20, 2009 at 06:02 AM