arien

We ARE Zoo Brew!!!

Yes, I had an adventure this past weekend. And not only did I capture pictures of this adventure, I also found my memory card reader so I can FINALLY SHARE MY PICTURES WITH YOU AGAIN! Sorry, I'm a bit excited. If you haven't noticed that I haven't posted anything from my own camera recently, then I'm sorry you don't care. But I hope some of you are as excited as I am.

On to adventure description:



Brookfield Zoo is just a short drive from my house. It is considered one of the top zoos in the country, especially when it comes to entertaining kids. Well, for this event, they were entertaining adults. 21+ to be exact. They call it Zoo Brew. It's beer tasting at the zoo. By tasting, I mean drinking. Each taste test was a double shot glass. Each person had twenty glasses full in four hours... Aside from me, of course. I was one of the designated drivers (I used my twenty tickets to get my friends more drunk), although I did take a couple pictures that may look a little deceptive!!



I went with a group of my college friends that I haven't seen for a while. Patrick (on the far right) is in town on vacation from where he is currently living in Mexico (I think he got that backwards somehow). So he was sort of the guest of honor.



Let me tell you, it ends up being an interesting night when you're hanging out with a group entirely made up of artists!! Oh, did I mention it was pouring down rain the whole day? I guess the entire summer's worth of rain decided to wait until this past Sunday. And so everyone was wet, and happy about it. Warm rain on a warm summer day (until the temp dropped after the sun went down, of course).



Okay, so not everyone was soaked to the bone. Some smart people (me) decided to take an umbrella so they only got half soaked. By the way, the other umbrella was mine as well.



Actually, I think the rain is what made the night perfect. And trust me, we were embracing it as much as we could. "Fucking RAIN ANGELS, bitch!"



We spent the four hours of Zoo Brew running back and fourth between the beer and the zoo exhibits. Aside from the hilarity of the rain, it also cleared out just about every other customer from the zoo. We OWNED the zoo that night. I've never enjoyed the exhibits so much!! Plus, there is a new Sting Ray pool where you can pet them that I've never gone to before...



So the night went on... more beer, and more fun to be had with every passing hour.









Eventually we were dancing around the zoo (or maybe that was supposed to be some type of martial arts pose).



Only the best pictures were taken. Captured by CalebKing, of course.





And we learned very important facts, like the ocean is a part of the rainforest.



But the last place we stopped in the zoo before we headed back to the beer was the dolphins. To quote Bobby, it was "magical." Yes, we had a magical time, and you're going to like it. We were just messing around with almost the whole place to ourselves as we had been all night.



For some reason I don't remember, Patrick decided to whistle. Only his whistle is one of those really loud, high pitched ones that is hard to listen to. We kept telling him to do it again, because the dolphins sure did enjoy it.



The were interacting with us like crazy. They came when he called and they moved with our hands. They would just stare straight at Patrick, waiting for the command of what trick they should do. I'm sure we were screwing up years of training, and we couldn't even give them any fish!!



But it really was magical. I wanted to just push through the glass and feel the dolphins. I've gone swimming with dolphins before and it wasn't this cool. At that point, they were paying attention to their trainer, and I was just along for the ride. This time it was personal. The came to us because they were enjoying it as much as we were.



We eventually had to leave because the exhibits were closing. Although the dolphins did start crying back at us when Patrick was walking away. You can see a video my friend posted on Facebook of the event (with drunk commentary like Caleb saying: I don't want to step down. If I land, I'll fall.). You also get to hear my voice. I'm the one who says at the beginning "Oh, I just realized that's what their whistles sounds like!" Duh.

And so we entered back into the rain... which was stronger by that time. About the same time I started getting flood warnings on my phone.



It's fun having a waterproof camera, so you can take pictures in the pouring rain, but I guess that doesn't mean the camera can take a picture when I want it to. That one was supposed to be them jumping in the air... I think laying on the ground is much easier to capture!



Although I did capture a tackle to the ground.



By that time the night was ending. We had the rest of our beer and were some of the last people to go home. No one had really eaten all night, so we were on a mission to get food into drunk bellies. It was also getting cold, so we were afraid of being wet in an air conditioned restaurant. So I invited people over to my house for fast food and a warm fire. A normally 15 minute drive ended up taking 1.5 hours. I guess I should start listening when I get flood warnings sent to my phone... One of the cars broke down after going through a puddle that was aspiring to be a lake down First Ave. And 47th Street was blocked off by the cops for similar reasons. So I led a line of cars through my most interesting drive home. But we all got there (including all the cars) and felt much better with some food and warmth. I took my last pictures of the night:









So a silly night, with nothing too special, in a place I've been a hundred times, and weather that should ruin any event, turned into one of the best times I've ever had.