Holy Crap, Lions!

'Sup people. Today we wrapped our work day up with bottles of Bucks Fizz, strawberries and scones. Ribbit drank about six glasses, and Jojo got her digital camera out, which was not good. She has lots of pics of Potter with his hands over his face now. This was a special 'treat' for some hard work that's been put in recently on a big book move. What we all secretly wanted to say was, "Can't you just hand us a strawberry on the way out and let us go early?" I sat next to the newest addition to the team, who is above us but seems really nice. Next week I start doing some late nights.

Last weekend was a really good one. Saturday I went shopping and bought Mowgli (the nephew) some cute baby socks and a winter hat and gloves since my niece is pretty sorted for newborn-size clothes. Then we went to see Crash, which was brilliant - one of the best films I've seen for ages. The representation of racism was really compelling; it shows you rather than telling you, so it isn't overly didactic. Because we're so used to getting a politically correct version of things it shocks you when it first starts even though most of us probably hear stuff like that all the time in real life. Boyfriend would've enjoyed it more if some girl wasn't sitting behind him narrating themovie. She also kept laughing at the weirdest parts. Even her boyfriend shushed her at one point :P

Sunday brought a trip to Chester Zoo, which was really fun as I haven't done anything like that with my boyfriend for ages. I've been before when I was a kid and so has he but this was the first time we'd been together. The first thing we saw after we paid in and donated to the Orangutan fund :) was the elephants!

Look how cute the baby elephant is! You can't see in the photo but he's standing next to a big waterfall. From the elephant enclosure we went to see the monkeys, which were springing about all over the place. We got a glimpse of a little tiny baby monkey being cuddled by mummy and daddy monkey too. They were very protective and shoved any other monkeys off the platform when they came near. There were lots of other animals in this part of the zoo to see, including ostriches and zebras, but by far the best thing we did was the Bat house! How cool was this! You enter this building and it's all really dark, you can't see at first where you are going. The first thing we saw was a massive shadow overhead, and looked up to see something the size of a seagull. "That wasn't a real bat!" said the Boyf. But he was wrong. The hugest bats I have ever seen were swooping over our heads, landing on wire type things and walking along them in their own freaky little style. Ace Ventura would've hurled. There were also small bats zipping around us through openings in the mock cave we were walking through, and hanging upside down in the trees. One brushed Boyf's face as we walked around. I wrapped my hair up really tight because that fear of them getting tangled in your hair that's in films? That isn't made up! One of the other best things was the Meerkats. They are so funny looking!

There were lots of them running around, and when two helicopters flew over, they all ran to the top of the hill and watched them. Cute! We saw the rhinos, the penguins and seals swimming around, and a lion having a snooze in the grass. The Jaguar house was cool; they are amazing. We watched one of them dragging what appeared to be a treetrunk around with the minimum of effort. It was so powerful.

We ambled down towards the tiger enclosure, passing the orangutans on the way. There was this one Orangutan just sitting off on the grass in the sun, watching people pass by and shading his face with his hands. It was funny because there were people walking towards us doing exactly the same thing, only they were less hairy :P

There he is, as promised! I'm probably overloading you with info here but it was such a good day out! We are both animal lovers and it was a lovely way to spend a day. We hung around watching one of the baby monkeys feeding and hit the reptile house before going back to see the tiger again. He was practically posing for photographs and was very proud looking. He even roared a few times, if tigers do actually roar :P Then he found a sunny spot and stretched out, rolling around on the grass.

Other highlights include watching a pelican catch a fish, the very gentle looking deers and giraffes, and crawling through some tunnels to look at guinea pig type things. It was a much better day than Monday, which I spent at work and then applying for a job I really want, which took up my whole day. It would be kind of cool to work at the zoo, apart from all the poop! I'm off to get ready for Most Haunted!