poke the bear.

After all of the feasting of Thanksgiving, and the impulsive shopping of Black Friday (who needs to buy Christmas presents? I got a dresser!) I was looking forward to a visit with Eric and Annie, who's baby bump is now impressive at 6 months. We went to the zoo, where an exhausted looking gorilla still hasn't given birth, and saw Golden-Lion Tamarins use a sleeping sloth bear as a hammock - right before they took food from the bear's mouth! Now, sloths are slow-moving creatures, but they do have some nasty looking claws, and I'd be loath to actually reach into the mouth of any creature that much bigger than me. But they did!

It was hilarious to watch. We also saw red pandas, always a hit, and Eric had to be dragged away from watching some copulating orangutans - yes, they do it all the time.

The rest of the visit was low-key, and involved a lot of discussion of baby names. Eric's favorite seems to be Limpkins Oakenstaff, which would involve a lot of beatings on the playground, but might be a character builder.

All-in-all, my holiday weekend was a raging success, and I had a great time. And of course, there's a picture of the bump:

a happy holiday weekend.

This week was crazy - we were preparing a presentation at work and I was a busy girl after hours, as well. There was trivia night, dinner with Momola and Daddo, opera night, and then Friday night Matt and Jo came into town. They're about to move to London and managed to squeeze in a holiday weekend visit down here. We had a weekend of great weekend and fantastic food - I took them to my favorite places and they loved them, too! We went to Mandu for Korean food on Friday night, followed by beers at Brickskeller (just ignore the mice as you peruse the incredible beer menu). Saturday I made omelettes before we went out separate ways - they wandered U Street while I headed off for zoo volunteering and we met up by the apes at the end of my shift. We met Kendra at Oyamel for dinner, and all of us enjoyed grasshopper tacos - oh, the tastiness of them. I tell you, some sauteed 'hoppers, in a tortilla with some guacamole and a little salsa on top. Add a couple of margaritas and you have one fabulous night! Yesterday we went to brunch at Busboys and Poets with Christopher's Jason - I love breakfast and brunch. Matt and Jo went to the Air and Space museum while I walked back through the park in the sunshine. I met them later on downtown with a cheesecake in hand and dragged them out to the suburbs for a BBQ at my client's house. It was perfect weather for a day in a backyard - the whole weekend was glorious weather, sunny and warm but we're still pre-humidity here in DC so it was only pleasant. We let the sun wear us out and spent Sunday night back at mine watching Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Do you know what the best part was? That it was Sunday night and I didn't have to go to work the next day! Today was another omelette morning, they left for the airport midday, and I've been lazing about watching tv and doing sudoku today. Oh, it was a glorious weekend! I love having visitors; it feels like you're on holiday in your own hometown. I should have gone out today, too, but it was so great to lay about like a lump. I am a happy girl, and ready to go back to the office tomorrow refreshed and reinvigorated. Hope you all had a happy Memorial Day!