Happy VD!
Valentine’s Day! Attentive readers — examples of whom, I feel sure, will exist some day — may remember this as our wedding anniversary. Our second.
Year Two is the Big Mac anniversary, yes? Because we went to the zoo, followed by Mickey D’s. Because basically, both of us, when we turned eight our brains stopped developing.
To be fair, we tried to think of something more grownup to do, but so many things aren’t open in February. And some that are, aren’t open Mondays.
In the spirit of grown-uppedness, we’ll share a bottle of decent champagne tonight. We got two as a consolation prize because the inn which served our wedding supper screwed up our nephew’s vegetarian dinner. We looked it up and it’s suitably expensive, so WHA-HEY!.
Anyhoo, this is a wildlife park I’ve written about before, specializes in British aminals. I didn’t know there was a European lynx. Lovely pussies, seen here being a bit frisky — he’s giving her a playful head-butt, which I managed not to catch, quite. (Wire mesh erased courtesy of Photoshop, a thing it does creepily well).
Also, there’s a European bison. Who knew?
The stoats and weasels were all asleep (I managed to spot a little patch of weasel fur poking out of the straw, expanding and contracting as it snored). Likewise, the minks and otters. All the reptiles were in hibernation, with some of the rodents.
The wolves wouldn’t howl for me, but then an ambulance went by and they all tuned up their pipes. WooooOOOOoooo! That must’ve been effing spooking around the campfire, back in the days when you had nothing but sticks and rocks to drive them off with.
They seem to have a new batch of badgers. Three younguns. The underground sett is inset in various places with glass windows, so we watched Badger A chase off Badger B and dig himself a nice bed in the straw, while Badger C took a dump in the community latrine. Yeah. I was going to say I paid money for that, but I didn’t — they let us in free because we turned up late.
Last up always, we pass the cage of the Scottish wildcat, ounce for ounce the meanest bastard in the park. Really. They look like adorable hearth-rug moggies, but nobody’s ever successfully tamed one.
Solitary beasties, too, so we were shocked at how close this one was. Sitting on a high wooden platform, staring around with seething disgust. Didn’t even acknowledge us.
So, pretty much like Charlotte, then.
February 14, 2011 — 9:24 pm
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