Zoo Cruelty

My old friend Mark and I have a long-standing tradition of making regular buddy trips to the L.A. Zoo. It started many years ago when I bought him a zoo membership for his birthday and continued regularly during the rest of the years that I lived in L.A. On average, we'd visit a couple of times a year to see the new exhibits, eat Kettle Corn, gossip and generally catch up. It's always a fine time; but since Madeline was born and we moved up north, I haven't been good about setting aside time for it. I wanted to remedy that, so this last weekend we set a plan for a zoo visit.

Unfortunately, the temperature in Griffith Park on Saturday topped 110 degrees. More than 98% of the animals were hiding in their enclosures -- completely invisible to the slim hardcore crowd of sweaty tourists. Those few intrepid critters who did venture out looked like this:



Frankly, it just seemed cruel. To be fair, though, I think that photo fairly summarizes how I felt about our trek that day as well. I was wilted and weary about 10 minutes into the first loop; but my not-so-subtle pleas to Mark that we consider packing it in and adjourning to a neighborhood pub were ignored. For reasons that aren't clear to me, he veritably thrived in the swelter. Hours later, he was still like a Gila Monster on holiday at the shore, he was -- well, see for yourself:



It still baffles me.