7 Quick Takes (XLII)

1. So we were at the Valley Zoo on Saturday. There were tigers and Arctic wolves and capybaras and an elephant and sea lions and wallabies and other things. It's not a terribly big zoo, but it's nice enough. I'm always concerned about caging animals at all, but in general these are animals that could not survive in the wild.

Oh, and did you know that once upon a time capybara were classified as fish by the Catholic Church? This means that they could be eaten during Lent; apparently large populations of South American peoples live primarily on capybara, and banning these delectable rodents would guarantee the starvation of whole indigenous peoples, or something like that. The RC Church was therefore under considerable pressure to declare that the world's largest rodent, being amphibious, was in fact a fish. I'm not sure what the status is now, other than that it's OBVIOUSLY a super-awesome adorable rodent.

2. Sunday was Mother's Day, but my own mother was at work. This means we did the mother's day stuff on Saturday, while at the zoo and in Edmonton.

I finished reading Paradise Lost and this edition's introduction, and then commenced The English Opium-Eater.

3. Due to basic workplace confidentiality, I can't really say any details or anything, but I got some bad news on Monday which made Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday rather miserable for me. At points throughout those three days I really felt like I couldn't trust my own memories and I was pretty eaten with shame and guilt. At other points I was incredible nervous, to the point of nauseau. It felt like I had a large sticky earthworm writhing in my stomach. But I got some sort of resolution on Wednesday, and it's been pretty much better from there.

4. I got some good writing done. I'm also finally liking the style or sound of the prose I'm writing, which has been so rare lately.

5. At work, we have a whole bunch of new summer students. I now have people to meet. That is always exciting. There may be more coming, too.

6. I'm supposedly supposed to be (read that out loud! such fun) writing another post about hope because I had the folly to mention that Kay and Jon have both recently written posts of that topic. I'd be lying, though, if I said I had any good ideas at the moment. I'm trying, though.

7. Somehow the people at work figured out that it's my birthday this weekend. Facebook likely told them. Anyway, there was cake, which I accidentally left at the Park. I hadn't thought they'd know, but, well, I suppose I was wrong on that one. I was out of the Admin building all day, so they did have lots of chances to scheme and plan and get cake.

I encourage you to visit Jen, host of this meme.