BABY GIRAFFE!

Wow, I hadn't realized what a long time it's been since my last post! School has been pretty busy this past week, which has kept me off-line most of the time. (School has also kept me away from my knitting, too--there have been days this past week where I haven't knit a single stitch. Sad, I know.) I have a paper due on Monday, so I spent most of last week working diligently on that. I also have two more papers due in the next two weeks or so, so I expect posting to be pretty sparse in the near future, too. But I did manage to get my Monday paper in good shape, so I took a break to come down and visit GPG for the weekend. You have to take a break from work every now and then to recharge, right?

Anyway, GPG and I had a great time yesterday visiting the NEW BABY GIRAFFE at the Houston zoo. He was born on March 15, 2006, and he is very, very cute. Here is a picture of the baby giraffe with his mom so you can see just how teeny tiny he is:



Isn't that pretty little? The funny thing is that, even though he's so small compared to a grown giraffe, he's probably about as tall as GPG. And he is definitely taller than I am.

The giraffe seemed pretty independent for a baby who's only 10 days old. He didn't seem to have any qualms wandering away from his mom in the enclosure and looking at all the spectators:


Here is a close-up. He was a little unsteady on his feet. Pretty wobbly. I think he looks a little knock-kneed here:


And here he is getting some attention from his mom:


GPG really likes this picture because of the way the mom's body and neck frame the baby. I think it's a good photo, too:


And, if you look closely, you can see the mom's tongue in the picture below as she goes in to lick her baby. She gave him a once-over to clean him up a bit:


As a bonus, the zoo also let out the baby orangutangs!


I guess they aren't really so "baby" anymore; one is about 5 years old and the other is maybe . . . 2? I'm not sure, but they aren't newborns. Still, they are small enough to be very cute. One was playing with a flannel blanket and a big empty water bottle:


The baby giraffe and the orangutangs were the best part of the trip.

But, while we were there, we also did catch a sight of a Giant Rabbit:


And that rabbit was seriously giant. It was bigger than some dogs! And it was really soft, too; some zoo personnel had it out on a leash so that zoo visitors could pet it. It reminded me of the Were-Rabbit from the Wallace and Gromit movie that came out last year.

Anyway, that was our trip to the zoo. We had a really good time.

And, just for fun, I wanted to include a picture of the dinner we made yesterday. We grilled hamburgers, but because the store only had one real-size hamburger bun, GPG picked out a parmesan dinner roll for his hamburger. We always make GPG's hamburger patty a little larger than mine, so the patties looked pretty funny on our disproportionate buns:


Can you tell which one is mine and which one is his?

Anyway, that was our Saturday. Today GPG is off autocrossing and I am supposed to be cleaning up my Monday paper and preparing for the next paper, which is due next Tuesday. So I'll sign off here. But hopefully I'll be able to post again a little later this week.