Bearshorty's musings

Tanya and I have been staying at my parents' since last Wednesday, April 13th, because of Bear's work schedule. He only had half a Saturday and Sunday off last week, so it made more sense for him to just come visit it us here on those days. But in return he has a three day weekend this coming weekend so we can do our yearly Seder at Marianna's on Saturday, which I planned already and almost finished shopping for. My parents will drive us back on Saturday morning.

I had a lot of grading until this Monday, but I wasn't willing to give up the warm summery weather this weekend. So I ended up grading at the playground a lot. I got to sit in the sun, play a bit, and got a lot done. Now I'm enjoying my week of no grading until next Monday when I get the last batch of papers. The end of the semester is in sight.

On Tuesday, I went to my hairdresser for color, highlights and cut, so my hair is a bit shorter now, shoulder length, and much neater. I also went to vote. New York had its primary yesterday and since I'm a registered Democrat since forever, I could go participate. I've trying to avoid all the election coverage as much as I can, since it all just depresses me and annoys me. But obviously voting is something I wasn't going to miss. Go Hillary!

Meanwhile, since the weather has finally became warm and lovely with blue skies and t-shirts, we spent last Wednesday afternoon and today's afternoon at our local zoo. Staten Island Zoo is very small but cute and it's free on Wednesday from 2 to 5, which makes it a perfect outing. We went twice last year, but Tanya is older now and talking, so it was different.

She is still not into all the animals; monkeys and leopard bore her, apparently. But donkeys and geese and swans and ducks are her favorite. When we ask her what she'd seen in the zoo, first thing she says is "eeah" which her word for donkey, based on Russian name for Eeyore (she loves Russian Winnie the Pooh cartoons). And she loves starring at the water. Meanwhile I was enjoying the kangaroos. Last week they were mostly napping, but today they were skipping around. The Emus are pretty fun too.

The rabbit and pig where mostly napping, but the woodchuck Chuck came out today and we took a look at him a bit. Between last week and this week, alpacas and sheep were shorn, so that was a funny contrast. Today, the otter and the Arctic Fox where also out more, enjoying the sun and grooming themselves. It was warmer today so they were probably just enjoying the sun. Eagle, on the other hand, was hiding today, while last week he posed for my camera and spread his wings.

Today I brought my actual camera, not just my phone, to take some photos and in paying attention to the ducks, I think I found my favorite. It's called a smew (real name), and it is white with black stripes. When it's swimming it looks like a superhero duck with a black mask on. It was pretty cute.

Tanya also liked the reptile section, but not for the snakes themselves, more for water in the crocodile tank and the scary snake noise that starts playing if you step on a certain square. I think she would like horror movies when she grows up because she would go up to it, hear a noise, run to hide by my legs, and then would go "again!"

She is talking so much more. Distinct sentences, constant repetition and answering questions. This morning, when I got to the garage to go outside and she was there already playing with her green toy shovel, she saw me, showed me the shovel and said in Russian, "Mama, Tanya is playing with shovel. Green." She is talking more in Russian now, although she does say English sentences occasionally.

I need to make a separate TV post on Grimm, Supergirl and Flash.

I got Harry Potter stamps today! I was in the post office, mailing our lease and I saw them right in front. So, of course, I had to get that stamp book (20 stamps). I don't think I can bring myself to use them. I want to keep that Snape stamp, at least. And the stamp of 11 year old Hermione raising her hand high is pretty awesome too. They come in a pretty little booklet too. I can't believe I didn't know there were Harry Potter stamps. (I was wearing my Ravenclaw summer baseball cap that I got in Harry Potter World in Orlando too; I'm a proud nerd.)

I went to the post office in the first place today because my Mom and I made a trip to Baby R Us with Tanya napping in the stroller to get organic baby food. I do love going to Baby R Us for that because of both sales and variety. I got 20 squeezables for $15 and 20 Earth Best jars for $16. And we had $5 in reward points. She is set for a while. The store is maybe 15-20 minutes away walking and post office and bank are not too far from there to make it worth the walk.

The weather got to lovely 68F today. It was warm with a bit of wind to require a light jacket with gorgeous blue skies. My morning walk was over an hour too, so my feet are nice and tired.

Yesterday we went to the Zoo. It's free from 2 to 5 on Wednesdays and the weather was finally warm enough. It's not too far, about 30 minutes by car with a free parking lot. We took a cooler with Tanya's homemade soup with us since she eats at 3 and drove there right after her nap.

We spent an hour and a half there and it wasn't too crowded yet. Lots of kids and families. Tanya was very serious most of the time - she is an observer when it comes to new environments - and she is too young to really understand or pay attention. Still, I like showing her new stuff. She did smile a lot at the alligator, but that was probably because first we looked at the eyes sticking out of the water and then had to go lower to look at his body underwater. She liked going up and down. We came back to that alligator maybe an hour later and he didn't move at all.

We saw kangaroos and emu, children's zoo with sheep and goat and Llama like brown creature and big fat pig being led on a leash, geese, ducks, 2 black swans, etc. I liked children's zoo a lot; you can feed the animals and we read about all those animals. I can't wait until she is old enough. The famous groundhog Chuck was lying on the steps of his wooden house in a very relaxed position, just chilling. It was pretty funny.

We also saw otters, amur leopards, different monkeys, lizards and snakes and some fishes and many other small creatures and birds. At 3pm we found an area with picnic tables which was pretty empty except for various loud peacocks roaming around. Tanya had her soup and then I nursed her as we watched one peacock unfold his big magnificent tail.

As we made our way through the zoo I got to be quite social and talk to other moms or grandmothers, which I generally don't do. But with so many little kids around and Tanya looking cute too, it was pretty easy. We met a little 7 months old girl named Ophelia (which is kind of an awesome name, although I immediately thought that being named after a disturbed suicidal fictional character might be hard for the girl later).

And when we were standing by the leopard area, instead of looking at the leopard, Tanya saw and focused on the bright green Ninja Turtle hat a little 1 year old boy was wearing next to us. She loves hats. Reaches for all hats all the time. The little boy smiled at her and both babies reached out to say high. She is nine months old and it already starts!

Bear was sad a little that missed the first zoo trip (and was suspicious of the little boy's motives :) ) but we are going to aquarium in a few weeks for my birthday so he gets to do that with her.

This morning I went to visit my grandparents and to a farmer’s market nearby. They live about half an hour away, but over a toll bridge, and we go visit them every two weeks. On a way I heard one of the most fun things on the radio. They started with a classic Russian song, on the accordion, which after a verse transitioned into a modern hip-hop commentary on the song, the singer and the lyrics. It was very amusing and clever. A good combination of musical genres that did not feel tacky.

Bear came over in the afternoon and we went to a zoo. It was raining all morning, pouring really, and I was feeling very lethargic and didn’t particularly wanted to go outside but we overcame the inertia and went on a date we were planning. This is a very local zoo but one that boasts a big reptile house with pythons and all kinds of rattlesnakes and turtles. I learned more about snakes then I ever knew. They even had an example of snake heart and the how it beats. They also had a small tropical wing with spider monkeys, which looked at people just as much as people looked at them, bats, tarantulas, and lots of marmosets. I’ve never seen marmosets before and they were very cute creatures that looked like small balding old men. The zoo had Geoffrey’s marmoset. They are a type of primate, small in size and very fuzzy. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-headed_Marmoset In the small African wing there were two leopards. One was pacing back and forth waiting for its dinner; it was making me a bit nervous. The zookeeper said they eat a pound of special cat food, calibrated to their weight.

After the zoo we went to a Halloween store to look at costumes and scary props. They had really nice party goblets that were black and said “poison” on them.

Genesis WTF moment of the day: The last five chapters of the Genesis are mainly about the death of Jacob. Nothing too crazy is going on. But the “blessings” Jacob bestows on his sons are a bit frelled up since some are not exactly positive. Jacob still resented the fact that his oldest son Reuben slept with an equivalent of his step-mother, since Reuben seduced one of the servants who bore Jacob children. So Jacob told him that for all his excellence, Reuben will “no longer excel” because he “defiled” his father’s bed. Simeon and Levi who murdered all men from the tribe of a guy who raped their sister, got the “blessing” of being dispersed and scattered. (Jacob is referring to future tribes here, since the twelve sons are the founders of the tribes of Israel. Israel is a name given to Jacob by God after they fought one night in a very HoYay way) Some sons like Judah and Joseph receive blessings in the traditional sense, they are the favorites along with Benjamin. There are certainly preferences of Jacob, he favors some sons over others which can be seen in his blessings. This is it for Genesis. I will take a short break from the Bible and start on Exodus on October 1. I’m on Bible overload. But I finished Genesis!