Zoo--sans camera.

Okay-- we forgot the camera, which sucks, but it was a fun day anyway.

I sent Mate to the movies with the teenagers last night, and he said "Zoo-m tomorrow?" And why not? We'd paid up on our membership--and that's one of those deals where, if you take a family of six to the zoo twice in a year, it pays for itself. So away we went to the Zoo-m... and thanks to Disney, Pixar, and Dreamworks, we had a fine time.

You think I'm kidding? The first exhibit I managed to talk the short people into seeing was the "Chi'h-Fu's. For those who didn't see the movie last year, that's the Red Panda--who are almost as cute in person as Dustin Hoffman made them on the big screen. From there, it was only a hop, skip, and a trip to the Zazus (hornbills), the Joeys (Kangaroos), the Julians, Morts, and Maurice's (Lemurs), the Melmans (giraffes), the Marty's (Zebras), the Alex's (Lions), and Tigress (uhm, you know!). We managed to miss the big Torrant (Snow cat--okay, that's mine and mine alone) and the hyenas from Lion King, but otherwise, you get the point.

And the short people were, of course, great--it was Ladybug's first trip to the zoo without a stroller, and she did just fine. She was TIRED, but she made it through to the end, even the LOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNGGGG walk to the car through the wild daisies in the park. Chicken was a good big sister--we all took turns on the hand holding and making sure the short people were with us, and in the end, everyone got rewarded with an overpriced kool-aid in a cool plastic thing and a cookie split five ways. (Big T didn't come. Why? Because he got the video games to himself for four hours... I mean, did you need to ask?)

And Mom & Dad got to banter--which took a surprising turn at the Chimpanzee cage. Two of the four chimps were wrestling like siblings--until one of them sat on the other's face. And Mate burst out with the wildly inappropriate (and oddly John Stewart-esque) phrase of "Yeah, tea-bag THIS buddy!" I turned to him in outrage, and then Chicken (who apparently either didn't hear or didn't translate) started to wrestle, and I was left with an incredible brain a-synchronization. Seriously--the last time I had such a "Did he really say that?" disconnect was when watching Supernatural, and Dean was stuck in a tight space with a pretty girl and apologizing because he "shoulda cleaned out the pipes this morning." Took me a while to get that one--took me a while to get over the idea of gay-chimp-sex. Go figure.

(And for more Mate cuteness? At this very moment, he's trying to use a Spongebob Squarepants snowcone maker to ACTUALLY MAKE SNOWCONES. It's not working--but I don't care. It was a move of such abandoned optimism, I'm already charmed. (And he closed out the attempt with, "Oh well... we're gonna hafta stick with Otter Pops." Seriously--could he BE any cuter? I think not!)

And that's it--that's us. I have one more week to go and then I'm squeezing my uberfatass on a plane and hoping no one throws me on a scale or something to claim my seat. And btw--I've had a thought about hiding a yarn needle in the underwire portion of my bra--anybody think that'll work? I mean... you know...those things are metal anyway... and it would be, like, uhm, HIDDEN, and if I've got some dental floss with me to serve as a yarn snipper, I might be able to fly with a full kit!

Just sayin'.