We went to the zoo today, and it was a proverbial zoo.  The weather was freakishly warm and apparently most of the county also felt that this would be a good day to go.  We arrived just as they opened and fortunately only had to wait a few minutes to get it.  By the time we left, the parking lot was almost full and the line of cars to get in went from Blue Mound Rd up 97th St, across Wisconsin Ave, up the exit ramp from Route 45 and off into the horizon.  For those who don’t know this area you can trust us that this is a long line of zoo-goers.

One current news item for the zoo is Happy the Hippo.  The Milwaukee Zoo recently adopted him from the National Zoo in Washington DC, where he has been a bachelor for the last 28 years.  At the Milwaukee Zoo he will be moving in with two female hippos, Patty and Puddles.

This has led to a lot of jokes about how Happy is going to be happier.  But those of you who are married know that keeping one spouse happy can be challenging at times, and keeping two happy might be overwhelming.  I’m sure we will be keeping an eye on them because Everett is usually happy to see the hippos.  Actually, he is usually just happy.

Another news item for the zoo is the arrival of two Siberia tiger cubs Tula and Nuri:


On a somewhat related subject, Little Tiger is one of Chris’ nicknames for Everett.  Another nickname is the Little Dipper which came about because he loves to dip his food – chips in hummus, bread in yogurt, meat in ketchup – and while doing so he says “dip, dip, dip”.  Getting back to the zoo, this was probably Everett’s last train ride until spring.


Later in the day we visited Weston’s Antique Apples in New Berlin.  When you drive out of Milwaukee, even for a short distance, it reinforces how much of an agricultural state this is.  Weston’s is just a few minutes away yet is in some pretty quiet countryside.  While we were there we met a man who showed us a couple dozen varieties of apples along with an explanation about each one, and it is safe to say that you won’t find any of these in a supermarket.  We also went for a walk through the orchard and Everett ate whatever variety of apple they kept at his eye level.

The next day was equally warm so we went to the Shlitz Audubon Nature Center (as I have mentioned, beer is popular here) north of Milwaukee for one last walk on the beach before it freezes.


In all it was a full weekend.  Next weekend Melissa will be traveling to the NSGC meeting in Atlanta and Chris will be watching Everett solo for three days.  Woah!