Licked by a Giraffe in St. Louis

Visiting the zoo is one of those things I used to do all the time as a kid, but as I’ve grown up, it has moved down on my ladder of priority. In the past few years though, I’ve tried to revisit this relic of my youth and found that it’s even more rewarding now than as a child. What I used to see as only a walled fortress that held animals, is now much more.

Yesterday, I went to the Saint Louis Zoo with Hoss, Katie Nelson, and my art school buddy, Eric Wieringa. We had a good time exploring the park, gasping at the natural oddities, and laughing at monkeys. I could go on and on about how cool the experience was, but the best part was when I fed a giraffe some leaves and got licked. Definitely not something that happens to me everyday!

I think I want to get a little tamarin. Who hasn’t wanted a monkey for a pet? We saw some cotton top tamarins in the primate house and I once again thought, “That’s what I want for Christmas.” We of course tried to justify it by discussing what tasks we could train it to do for us. I think the best we came up with is that the tamarin could sit on our shoulders until we dropped a guitar pick, then it would scurry down to retrieve it and hand it back to us. This would be slightly distracting while playing a show, but well worth the countless hours necessary for training a diminutive primate.

Ireland is less than a week away and we’re making all our last minute preparations. I can’t wait to get there and see all my friends. I’m ready for some good times!