Yesterday was a good day: To celebrate my mother's 75th birthday, we took her out for a day around Sarasota doing things that appealed to her love of animals. After starting with a big breakfast, we went to a local attraction that we've all been meaning to see for years, the Big Cat Habitat that takes care of exotic animals that were born in captivity but abandoned by their owners. The lions and tigers and liger were the prime attraction, but they also had bears, monkeys, a chimpanzee, parrots, emu, turkeys, goats, koi, and even stranger animals like a kangaroo, kinkajou, and coati. Sarasota is a circus town, so I'm not surprised that something like this was built here. The centerpiece of the visit was an arena demonstration in which the trained animals did tricks for the audience while the habitat owner hammed it up for the kids. It's a good cause and I wish them lots of continued success. After that, we went to the local art-house theater to see a documentary about pelicans being nursed back to health by rescue organizations. It seems to be in exceedingly limited release; the trailer has less than 2000 views. We all enjoyed it, but it was so dreamy that I think we all needed a nap afterwards. After a day out looking at animals, our cat enjoyed the extra hands-on attention when we got home.


Logical Operator

The creator of Funeratic, Scott Hardie, blogs about running this site, losing weight, and other passions including his wife Kelly, his friends, movies, gaming, and Florida. Read more »

Solitaire

Right now, I don't think I could write emotionally about my feelings from last night as well as I could have in the moment, but I haven't finished considering them and this is a part of that process. Long story short, I found myself passing on friends who really wanted to spend time with me in order to sit here and write code for Celebrity Goo Game, and I came to question what the hell I was doing. As in, my whole lifestyle. Go »

Appetite for Destruction

My name is Scott, and I'm an addict. I'm not an alcoholic. I almost never drink alcoholic beverages. Go »

Day 178

People have been asking me how the diet is going. I'm still at it, although I cheat much more often than I'd like, so the daily caloric average is now 1500-1800. However, I've been stuck on one seriously cruel plateau. Go »

Everybody Loves George

As long as everyone already knows I'm years behind the rest of the culture, can I recommend That's My Bush! before Dubya actually concludes his presidency? We just finished watching the short series; it starts weak but gets pretty strong by the end. Go »

White Christmas

We're enjoying our winter vacation in central Illinois so far. Tue 12/22 - When you're hitting the road for your vacation right after work is over, every extra minute feels like an hour, which means I did 45 hours of overtime. The drive was easier than we thought, probably because we had days to prepare this time. Go »

Ten Things I Learned While Kelly's Parents Pat & Russ Spent a Week Visiting Us

• Florida reminds me of Dave Barry's quip that vacationing in Britain is great because you meet people from entirely different states. We stopped a woman to take our picture; she was visiting from New Jersey and her daughter beside her was from California. The only local we met warned us what bridge not to jump off for swimming because the water is shark-infested. Go »