toronto zoo and tattoos

the things we do to entertain ourselves. my past weekend involved the zoo and a tattoo. a virtual study in extremes.

first, i had a tattoo re-done on saturday. the poor thing (a bat on my upper arm) was done in august of 1993 and the artist that did it has died of a drug overdose. lovely. i now go to a new artist, one who does not seem like a heroin addict and he did a great job of making my poor sad and neglected bat look all shiny and new again. if you're interested in getting work done - go to jay at passage. he's incredible.

and for all those lovely individuals out there who told me that getting a tat retouched hurts because they're going over scar tissue - you're wrong. getting the damned thing feels exactly the same as getting any old tattoo. what should be said, however, is that the healing process is much longer, much more intense and generally not fun at all. i'm now just hoping that all the colour took - so i can avoid the healing again!

also - i ended up booking a new appointment for a new tattoo... :-) i'm getting it at the end of october. as long as the money holds out, i'll be inking myself.... i can feel the images attaching themselves to my skin as i tap away.

but the real reason for my post today is to put up some pictures of the animals at the toronto zoo. i went on sunday and it was an incredible day. the weather really couldn't of been better (sunny and clear) and it was a fantastic day. i ended up leaving just before closing. i walked my little feet off and was feeling a little strain around my left foot for days afterward!

this guy was the coolest thing ever. i seriously fell in love with him. he'd float over the the glass, stare at the silly humans standing there, practically wink at us, and then push himself off of the glass with his back paws. really quite dramatic. you go bear!

and here he is pushing off. brilliant.

this bear was playing with a giant rubber ball. he'd push down on it with his front paws until it went shooting across the cement pond. it looked like fun and made me laugh!

the zoo now has 2 hippos in their vastly improved habitat. they spent about 30 minutes wrestling with each other. and by wrestling, i mean opening their mouths and lip wrestling. seriously. :-)

i have admitted to myself that i have a thing for giraffe's. i really do. can't get enough of them.
as evidenced by the 20-odd images on my digital camera.

this is the matriarch - tara. we happened to hit the elephants at the same time the elephant keeper was doing a q&a. hence the knowledge of the name of the matriarch... ;-)

the rhino brigade. i love the fact these three large barrel shaped tanks are standing in front of the red rocks. it's like they know a good photo op when they see it.

nothing more graceful than a swan. and this one really knew his angles. i have a second picture of him with the only difference being the fact that he's looking the other direction. very very nice.

a flock of flamingos going though some pretty serious politics. they all seemed to be having a bad day.
a very bad day.

[music | nxl, "i got a lot"]