Going to the Zoo
At some point in my childhood my father borrowed somebody's fancy stereo to dub three LPs on to cassette for road trips. I'm pretty sure that this happened in North Dakota, and I recall that we got our first stereo that had the LP->Cassette capability when I was in fifth grade,so this would have been around 2nd grade or so. This resulted in three albums that I recall being on cassette for all of our many road trips, and which are therefore burned into my brain at some deep fundamental level.
- The Muppet Movie soundtrack
- Harry Chapin's Legends of the Lost and Found
- Peter, Paul and Mary's children's album, Peter, Paul and Mommy
That last album features a Tom Paxton song called "Going to the Zoo" which features a repeated lyric "Daddy's takin' us to the zoo tomorrow." I had another day off yesterday as I continue to burn all my PTO by the end of the year and we had cooperative weather, so I sang snippets of this song throughout the day as M and I took Birdie to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. We limited ourselves to the outdoor areas, which had more than enough animals on display to amaze and confound a nine month old.
Birdie has a fancy convertible stroller courtesy of my mother, my sister and two maternal aunts. For most of our lake walks she has been in the car seat facing me, but she's now old enough to sit upright in the stroller facing forward. M did a little experimentation with that earlier this week, and for the zoo she looked forward except when she was held up to see the animals. She doesn't mind sitting in the stroller, and she certainly doesn't mind being held, but the transition where we put her in the stroller and buckle the seat belt is a little contentious right now.
In any event, the very first thing she saw was the elephants, which were not as compelling as the exotic geese that were in the water right by the fence. This was a repeated trend because ducks and duck-adjacent waterfowl (whether permanent zoo residents or local freeloaders) got a big reaction from her throughout the day. She certainly looked at the many other animals, including zebras, ostriches, rhinos, red pandas, snow leopards, Andean condors, tigers, sloth bears, grizzle bears, black bears and the like, but ducks were the clear winner. It'll be interesting to see if that's still true next time we go.
When we got home, Birdie fell asleep early. Apparently processing all these strange animal shapes and strange animal smells (or at least being outside all afternoon) was very tiring.
This only M's third visit to the zoo in Cleveland. I've been there more times than I can count as my fraternity did philanthropy projects there throughout college, but I've been there a lot less frequently in recent years, with the last visit being when M and I went to the Asian Lantern Festival in August 2018.
- The Muppet Movie soundtrack
- Harry Chapin's Legends of the Lost and Found
- Peter, Paul and Mary's children's album, Peter, Paul and Mommy
That last album features a Tom Paxton song called "Going to the Zoo" which features a repeated lyric "Daddy's takin' us to the zoo tomorrow." I had another day off yesterday as I continue to burn all my PTO by the end of the year and we had cooperative weather, so I sang snippets of this song throughout the day as M and I took Birdie to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. We limited ourselves to the outdoor areas, which had more than enough animals on display to amaze and confound a nine month old.
Birdie has a fancy convertible stroller courtesy of my mother, my sister and two maternal aunts. For most of our lake walks she has been in the car seat facing me, but she's now old enough to sit upright in the stroller facing forward. M did a little experimentation with that earlier this week, and for the zoo she looked forward except when she was held up to see the animals. She doesn't mind sitting in the stroller, and she certainly doesn't mind being held, but the transition where we put her in the stroller and buckle the seat belt is a little contentious right now.
In any event, the very first thing she saw was the elephants, which were not as compelling as the exotic geese that were in the water right by the fence. This was a repeated trend because ducks and duck-adjacent waterfowl (whether permanent zoo residents or local freeloaders) got a big reaction from her throughout the day. She certainly looked at the many other animals, including zebras, ostriches, rhinos, red pandas, snow leopards, Andean condors, tigers, sloth bears, grizzle bears, black bears and the like, but ducks were the clear winner. It'll be interesting to see if that's still true next time we go.
When we got home, Birdie fell asleep early. Apparently processing all these strange animal shapes and strange animal smells (or at least being outside all afternoon) was very tiring.
This only M's third visit to the zoo in Cleveland. I've been there more times than I can count as my fraternity did philanthropy projects there throughout college, but I've been there a lot less frequently in recent years, with the last visit being when M and I went to the Asian Lantern Festival in August 2018.