We went to the zoo and saw lots of tattoos and tank tops

Since the baby giraffe made its appearance (on Will's birthday, no less), we wanted to go to the zoo to see it for ourselves. The "seeing" is relative, though, since it's still kept in its indoor pen until it (a girl who is yet to be named, hence the "it") is a little older and more able to handle being outside more. When we arrived at the zoo to find it crowded in general and the giraffe area with a line snaking around a good bit of that side of the zoo, we quickly revised our plan and talked up the rhinos instead. (Waiting in any kind of line is excruciating for Will, especially a line that long in the blazing sun in 85 degree weather, so we decided we could go back in a few days on a weekday when it wasn't quite so busy. We're zoo members, so "going to the zoo" often means we spend an hour or so there, ride the train and/or carousel, and retreat to the comfort and non-crowdedness of our house.)

Anyway, since we decided to go after Laura's afternoon nap, we didn't get to the zoo until around one o'clock or so. And it was packed. The tank tops and tattoos were out in full force (hence the title). Seriously. Why is it that zoos, amusement parks, etc. really seem to bring out the salt of the earth? And then some. I always kind of expect to stumble upon some sort of mobile meth lab or something, as rough as some people look.

Laura had on her own tank top but was, sadly, sans tattoo. I told Jamison before we left that I wanted to dress her appropriately so she'd feel at ease there. She doesn't look all that happy in this picture but she was perfectly content to survey the zoo and all the people there from the comfort of her stroller.

Since I was on Will duty (as opposed to stroller duty), my right arm was sore the following day from trying to corral his excitement and keep him next to me and holding my hand instead of darting off into the sea of white trash people taking a gander at all the animals. (Yes, I did just write that. I don't know how else to adequately convey the type of people who seem to frequent such places.)

After an hour or so, we decided on a carousel ride and to then wrap things up with a walk to see the rhinos. We'd checked books out from the library on our weekly trip there to prepare for our zoo visit and Will had chosen one on rhinos, so he was looking forward to seeing them in person again. As the grand finale, we finally got to the area where they usually are only to find that they weren't out. Of course. (All of this discovered while standing right next to a rather loud family who was lacking in the common sense department, to put it nicely. I think I even caught Will looking at them with a mixture of pity and disgust as they vociferously discussed the animals and their various body functions. Yeah.)

Surprisingly, Will didn't have a meltdown. Instead, he said he was hungry and thirsty and we strolled ourselves right out to the parking lot and left. Once we were in the car, we compared notes on our experiences and talked about such fascinating topics as whether or not these tank top wearers looked at other tank top wearers and judged them for their questionable taste. Jamison said he felt like waving and smiling to each "normal" family he saw, maybe to start some kind of no-tattoos, no-tank-tops secret society. I said, and stand by this still, that the zoo has two major functions for me: (1) to make me feel smarter and (2) to make my husband and children seem even more attractive than they normally seem to me. (I know, that's kind of awful.)

Anyway, I know all of these musings on the cultural anthropology of zoo-goers has been fascinating but I have to stop here and get the wee one up so that she's not up even earlier than her regular 6 am wakeup time tomorrow morning.