Over the weekend, the zoo had a cooking event, with a guest from a cooking show on TV. His name is Bob Blumer. I got to watch part of it. It was fun, but I had to leave before it was over. I wonder if anyone got to try the veggie burgers they made.
(Edit-our chef won! )
~*~
Monday, April 30, 2018
Sunday, April 29, 2018
A Hoard of Shinies Appears
Okay, all of these shiny Pokémon are from that crazy ultra wormhole. Mostly from when I was trying to find that stupid Guzzlord.
I'll just blow through them, though the number of new shiny Pokemon I found this month is just ridiculous.
Most of them I gave up on finding names relevant to the day. It got kind of pointless after a while. And I think I may have forgotten the reasons behind a few of them.
(evolved Piper into a Ludicolo)
Pond: Lombre
Cecilian: Stunfisk (named for for a strange amphibian creature that we have a statue of at the zoo).
Avita: Grumpig (named for an animal at the zoo).
Barb: Drapion
Apis: Sigilyph
Selkes: Sigilyph
Tank: Crustle
Adri: Audino
Tad: Lombre (I'll probably evolve her too. I'll have a Miror B team of dancing shiny Ludicolo).
Fisk: Stunfisk
Nemma: Barbacle
Aquila: Altaria
Anemone: Stunfisk (three of them? really?)
Taffy: Quagsire
Boone: Hippowdon (named for one of our rhinos at the zoo, even though Hippowdon is a hippo).
Koen: Yanmega
I'll just blow through them, though the number of new shiny Pokemon I found this month is just ridiculous.
Most of them I gave up on finding names relevant to the day. It got kind of pointless after a while. And I think I may have forgotten the reasons behind a few of them.
(evolved Piper into a Ludicolo)
Pond: Lombre
Cecilian: Stunfisk (named for for a strange amphibian creature that we have a statue of at the zoo).
Avita: Grumpig (named for an animal at the zoo).
Barb: Drapion
Apis: Sigilyph
Selkes: Sigilyph
Tank: Crustle
Adri: Audino
Tad: Lombre (I'll probably evolve her too. I'll have a Miror B team of dancing shiny Ludicolo).
Fisk: Stunfisk
Nemma: Barbacle
Aquila: Altaria
Anemone: Stunfisk (three of them? really?)
Taffy: Quagsire
Boone: Hippowdon (named for one of our rhinos at the zoo, even though Hippowdon is a hippo).
Koen: Yanmega
Wednesday, April 25, 2018
Framing Climate Change
Last week there was a cool class at the zoo: How to talk to people about climate change.
Right up my alley.
I've seen people get freaked out when environmental problems, such as climate change, are addressed in a depressing way. One girl told me she quite being an environmental studies major because it was too depressing for her. It's understandable. Some of these problems are massive, and it can seem hopeless.
But now there are actual studies of the best ways to talk to people about climate change. Ways that make people want to do something about it. Here's a link to the organization that researches this stuff.
When I don't have any good images to add regarding the topic, I'll share zoo photos XD
Black and White Ruffed Lemur.
Right up my alley.
I've seen people get freaked out when environmental problems, such as climate change, are addressed in a depressing way. One girl told me she quite being an environmental studies major because it was too depressing for her. It's understandable. Some of these problems are massive, and it can seem hopeless.
But now there are actual studies of the best ways to talk to people about climate change. Ways that make people want to do something about it. Here's a link to the organization that researches this stuff.
When I don't have any good images to add regarding the topic, I'll share zoo photos XD
Black and White Ruffed Lemur.
Tuesday, April 24, 2018
Stuck in One Mind
Sometimes I like to share these videos when they relate to learning or storytelling or something like that.
I've known for a while that people tend to get stuck in their ideas, and won't change them even when they're shown evidence to the contrary. That's a major problem when it comes to misinformation about environmental problems. But it goes far beyond that. It's everywhere, whether you believe that coffee will make you live forever or if someone thinks someone insulted them, and refuse to believe that they were wrong.
I'm always trying to find out whether something is true before I stick to it (sometimes going way out of my way to figure stuff out). And I always try to adjust myself when I find out that something I believed was wrong.
It rather drives me crazy when other people don't XD
I've known for a while that people tend to get stuck in their ideas, and won't change them even when they're shown evidence to the contrary. That's a major problem when it comes to misinformation about environmental problems. But it goes far beyond that. It's everywhere, whether you believe that coffee will make you live forever or if someone thinks someone insulted them, and refuse to believe that they were wrong.
I'm always trying to find out whether something is true before I stick to it (sometimes going way out of my way to figure stuff out). And I always try to adjust myself when I find out that something I believed was wrong.
It rather drives me crazy when other people don't XD
Sunday, April 22, 2018
Jumping to Conclusions
We get a lot of the same questions at the zoo. Some of them are wildly off track for the way we operate. I guess people have experienced other bad zoos, and they expect us to operate the same way. But we're one of the good ones XD
(I have seen a terrible zoo, and a few others that weren't bad, but weren't great).
There's a small area where keepers can bring the lions or tigers inside for a brief checkup. But the cats aren't kept in there. They have big outdoor areas to roam around. But some people step into the lion house and think that the cats are kept in these tiny areas all the time.
And someone came to me after seeing the gorillas. I guess the male was sitting inside after the females had gone inside for the evening. And they just saw the male sitting there by himself, guarding the door (protecting his females like they always do, whether or not they're in a zoo).
So after seeing the gorilla, they said to me, "why don't you go catch more gorillas so he's not so sad and lonely?"
Well, that makes a couple wrong assumptions. First, he's not alone and lonely. And second, we do not catch animals from the wild. That's what people used to do before they knew better. But that can be extremely destructive. For example, catching a baby chimpanzee can kill ten other chimpanzees in the process, because they try to protect the baby.
No, good accredited zoos don't do that. Almost all of our animals were born at other zoos. Although we do have a few animals that were rescues because they can no longer care for themselves in the wild. Like birds that have been hit by cars, or orphaned bears.
Although to be fair, I jump to plenty of conclusions myself. I've always been a huge animal nerd. So I've "always" known how marsupials are different than placental mammals.
And I was surprised to find how few adults know anything about that. People are amazed to hear that koalas and kangaroos are born like a tiny jelly bean with stubby arms and legs.
(Okay, I got to pet a koala this weekend, and I'm so freaking excited about it? @_@ Is it weird that I was a lot more excited than the kids in the class? )
(I have seen a terrible zoo, and a few others that weren't bad, but weren't great).
There's a small area where keepers can bring the lions or tigers inside for a brief checkup. But the cats aren't kept in there. They have big outdoor areas to roam around. But some people step into the lion house and think that the cats are kept in these tiny areas all the time.
And someone came to me after seeing the gorillas. I guess the male was sitting inside after the females had gone inside for the evening. And they just saw the male sitting there by himself, guarding the door (protecting his females like they always do, whether or not they're in a zoo).
So after seeing the gorilla, they said to me, "why don't you go catch more gorillas so he's not so sad and lonely?"
Well, that makes a couple wrong assumptions. First, he's not alone and lonely. And second, we do not catch animals from the wild. That's what people used to do before they knew better. But that can be extremely destructive. For example, catching a baby chimpanzee can kill ten other chimpanzees in the process, because they try to protect the baby.
No, good accredited zoos don't do that. Almost all of our animals were born at other zoos. Although we do have a few animals that were rescues because they can no longer care for themselves in the wild. Like birds that have been hit by cars, or orphaned bears.
Although to be fair, I jump to plenty of conclusions myself. I've always been a huge animal nerd. So I've "always" known how marsupials are different than placental mammals.
And I was surprised to find how few adults know anything about that. People are amazed to hear that koalas and kangaroos are born like a tiny jelly bean with stubby arms and legs.
(Okay, I got to pet a koala this weekend, and I'm so freaking excited about it? @_@ Is it weird that I was a lot more excited than the kids in the class? )
Friday, April 20, 2018
Environmental Plots: Thought
This Environmental Plots post is a bit different than the others.
I'll be talking a bit about a couple of the reasons humans have so much trouble making progress on environmental problems.
Considering this is a very complex and wide-reaching topic, I'm just going to brush a bit of the surface. (And since I've had a long day, I'm mostly gonna throw out a few ideas without trying to tie them together XP )
I won't go into huge detail about this here, but anthropocentrism is one of the main problems. Humans believe that we're the most important things on the planet, and that everything else exists to serve our species. But this gives us the excuse to treat everything else as dispensable tools, instead of living shifting systems full of life. Systems that we need to survive.
Another main problem is that humans are creatures of habit. We're used to doing things certain ways. It's hard for us to change those ingrained ways to make way for more sustainable habits. For example, cars. Most people around here would never consider giving up their car and relying on public transportation. We're used to driving everywhere in our private vehicles (though our public transportation also sucks, which makes it hard to let go of cars. We really need to improve our public transportation).
Some people will do everything in their power to hold onto their old habits. Especially when they're making a lot of money from old ways. For example, the huge fossil fuels companies purposefully sew disagreement about climate change. They try to convince people that scientists are debating about the existence of climate change. Scientists are not debating about it. They know it's happening, despite what media wants you to think.
Big businesses will destroy and pollute, and then just pay any fines that they get slapped with. They find that easier than actually fixing their problems, and trying to be more sustainable. But once a piece of habitat is destroyed, it can take a very long time for it to come back. If ever.
Of course plenty of people fight tirelessly to pass laws to protect our planet. Then some weird new guy becomes president, and they destroy much of the progress that had been made up until then. Undoing laws, cutting budgets, putting big business leaders in charge of environmental programs. The list goes on and on.
In big cities, it can be hard to notice how much forests and nature in general are falling apart. And how much people who live in other parts of the world are affected by the degrading habitats. Plus, it's harder to care about people living on the other side of the planet than it is to care about problems nearer to home.
Also, humans are often pretty bad at planning for long-term things. We're a lot more interested in short-term problems. Which makes it easy to degrade habitats as long as we're getting short-tern gain.
And sort of unrelated (but I don't know where else to put this) are the people who grew up in beautiful, pristine nature. And as they grew up, they watched it slowly degrading until there was nothing left.
How can you use these ideas?
Well, there could be some good character ideas in here. Plenty of villains have been based on some of these points, though you can go much farther than that. Human minds (and societies) are complicated and fascinating, and there are countless ways you can link that to the environment.
Stories that have used this:
Well, most environmental stories include this in some way. I'll mention a few.
The Lorax is the iconic story about short-term gain, long-term loss.
Avatar shows how we view other peoples and distant lands.
The movie Erin Brockovich is based on a true story of the lengths big businesses go to, even if it means huge environmental and health problems.
One film called Salt and Fire is about a man trying to make amends for the damage he caused (not unlike The Lorax).
Pocahontas urges us to see ourselves as part of nature, instead of owners of nature.
And Princess Mononoke is still the most beautiful and realistic portrayal of fantasy environmental problems and the people involved in them.
In Star Trek: The Voyage Home, Spock points out how illogical humans are in their destruction of nature. Well, yeah, it is illogical. But humans do plenty of illogical stuff XP
Tomorrowland shows us how important it is to give people hope. There are studies that show that people are far more likely to act on problems if they have hope of fixing them. If they think we're all gonna die no matter what, they wouldn't have any reason to try to fix things.
I'll be talking a bit about a couple of the reasons humans have so much trouble making progress on environmental problems.
Considering this is a very complex and wide-reaching topic, I'm just going to brush a bit of the surface. (And since I've had a long day, I'm mostly gonna throw out a few ideas without trying to tie them together XP )
I won't go into huge detail about this here, but anthropocentrism is one of the main problems. Humans believe that we're the most important things on the planet, and that everything else exists to serve our species. But this gives us the excuse to treat everything else as dispensable tools, instead of living shifting systems full of life. Systems that we need to survive.
Another main problem is that humans are creatures of habit. We're used to doing things certain ways. It's hard for us to change those ingrained ways to make way for more sustainable habits. For example, cars. Most people around here would never consider giving up their car and relying on public transportation. We're used to driving everywhere in our private vehicles (though our public transportation also sucks, which makes it hard to let go of cars. We really need to improve our public transportation).
Some people will do everything in their power to hold onto their old habits. Especially when they're making a lot of money from old ways. For example, the huge fossil fuels companies purposefully sew disagreement about climate change. They try to convince people that scientists are debating about the existence of climate change. Scientists are not debating about it. They know it's happening, despite what media wants you to think.
Big businesses will destroy and pollute, and then just pay any fines that they get slapped with. They find that easier than actually fixing their problems, and trying to be more sustainable. But once a piece of habitat is destroyed, it can take a very long time for it to come back. If ever.
Of course plenty of people fight tirelessly to pass laws to protect our planet. Then some weird new guy becomes president, and they destroy much of the progress that had been made up until then. Undoing laws, cutting budgets, putting big business leaders in charge of environmental programs. The list goes on and on.
In big cities, it can be hard to notice how much forests and nature in general are falling apart. And how much people who live in other parts of the world are affected by the degrading habitats. Plus, it's harder to care about people living on the other side of the planet than it is to care about problems nearer to home.
Also, humans are often pretty bad at planning for long-term things. We're a lot more interested in short-term problems. Which makes it easy to degrade habitats as long as we're getting short-tern gain.
And sort of unrelated (but I don't know where else to put this) are the people who grew up in beautiful, pristine nature. And as they grew up, they watched it slowly degrading until there was nothing left.
How can you use these ideas?
Well, there could be some good character ideas in here. Plenty of villains have been based on some of these points, though you can go much farther than that. Human minds (and societies) are complicated and fascinating, and there are countless ways you can link that to the environment.
Stories that have used this:
Well, most environmental stories include this in some way. I'll mention a few.
The Lorax is the iconic story about short-term gain, long-term loss.
Avatar shows how we view other peoples and distant lands.
The movie Erin Brockovich is based on a true story of the lengths big businesses go to, even if it means huge environmental and health problems.
One film called Salt and Fire is about a man trying to make amends for the damage he caused (not unlike The Lorax).
Pocahontas urges us to see ourselves as part of nature, instead of owners of nature.
And Princess Mononoke is still the most beautiful and realistic portrayal of fantasy environmental problems and the people involved in them.
In Star Trek: The Voyage Home, Spock points out how illogical humans are in their destruction of nature. Well, yeah, it is illogical. But humans do plenty of illogical stuff XP
Tomorrowland shows us how important it is to give people hope. There are studies that show that people are far more likely to act on problems if they have hope of fixing them. If they think we're all gonna die no matter what, they wouldn't have any reason to try to fix things.
Wednesday, April 18, 2018
This IS my Job
So, today I was talking to a family about our tigers. We were laughing and having a fun conversation, and I thought for a moment, "Oh, I'd better get back to work. Wait a minute. This IS my work. I'm supposed to be talking to people about animals."
I'd say that's a pretty good way to feel.
Well, have some tigers~
(Sumatran tiger, with her chin smooshed against her paws)
I'd say that's a pretty good way to feel.
Well, have some tigers~
(Sumatran tiger, with her chin smooshed against her paws)
Sunday, April 15, 2018
Making Tools
I was recently reading about Jane Goodall (actually before I knew I'd be working at the zoo where we have 3 chimpanzees).
She was the first person to discover that animals can make their own tools. Chimpanzees will strip a twig and use it to fish food/bugs/ex out of crevices.
And today I witnessed it first-hand. One of the chimpanzees broke off an acacia branch, snapped off the side twigs, and in one fluid motion stripped off all the leaves. Then she started poking it down into holes in the rocks and licking off what she found.
I was amazed at how easily and quickly she did it. And I was amazed that I got to see it. Though it's probably far more common than I think it is? XD
While many animals can use tools, very few can make their own tools. It was very cool.
She was the first person to discover that animals can make their own tools. Chimpanzees will strip a twig and use it to fish food/bugs/ex out of crevices.
And today I witnessed it first-hand. One of the chimpanzees broke off an acacia branch, snapped off the side twigs, and in one fluid motion stripped off all the leaves. Then she started poking it down into holes in the rocks and licking off what she found.
I was amazed at how easily and quickly she did it. And I was amazed that I got to see it. Though it's probably far more common than I think it is? XD
While many animals can use tools, very few can make their own tools. It was very cool.
Saturday, April 14, 2018
Intent Behind the Words
I read something a couple days ago.
Swami Sri Yukteswar:
"What a person imagines he hears, and what the speaker has really implied, may be poles apart. Try to feel the thoughts behind the confusion of men's verbiage."
This is a problem both with speaking and writing. Well, really with any communication. The speaker may say one thing, and maybe it doesn't come out quite right, or the listener is on a different track and doesn't grasp the full meaning of the communication.
It's inevitable. It will always happen, because people aren't perfect at communicating, or receiving communication. After all, we all have our own thoughts and experiences.
And usually it's harmless. Or you get a chance to say, "oh, not I didn't mean that. I was trying to say this."
Although sometimes people continue to insist that you mean something else, even when you're trying to tell them otherwise. Once a couple people kept insisting that I was acting passive aggressive when in reality I was super nervous. They wouldn't believe me. Of course I wasn't acting normal if I'm freaking out. But that does not mean I'm being passive aggressive. I've been passive aggressive before. I know what it feels like.
Maybe that's what they would have done if they were in my shoes. But I am not them.
It takes a hell of a lot to make me mad (mad enough that it sticks, anyway). But when I get there, I really get there.
Swami Sri Yukteswar:
"What a person imagines he hears, and what the speaker has really implied, may be poles apart. Try to feel the thoughts behind the confusion of men's verbiage."
This is a problem both with speaking and writing. Well, really with any communication. The speaker may say one thing, and maybe it doesn't come out quite right, or the listener is on a different track and doesn't grasp the full meaning of the communication.
It's inevitable. It will always happen, because people aren't perfect at communicating, or receiving communication. After all, we all have our own thoughts and experiences.
And usually it's harmless. Or you get a chance to say, "oh, not I didn't mean that. I was trying to say this."
Although sometimes people continue to insist that you mean something else, even when you're trying to tell them otherwise. Once a couple people kept insisting that I was acting passive aggressive when in reality I was super nervous. They wouldn't believe me. Of course I wasn't acting normal if I'm freaking out. But that does not mean I'm being passive aggressive. I've been passive aggressive before. I know what it feels like.
Maybe that's what they would have done if they were in my shoes. But I am not them.
It takes a hell of a lot to make me mad (mad enough that it sticks, anyway). But when I get there, I really get there.
Friday, April 6, 2018
My Favorite Character is a Dead Guy
So, for the first time since middle school, I have fully committed to a favorite movie (In middle school it was X-Men 2). I've kind of toyed around with a couple. Howl's Moving Castle was my default answer for a long time.
Then I wondered if Big Hero 6 might have the spot.
Now for the first time in over a decade, I have a favorite movie.
Coco.
And this favorite movie also has my new favorite character.
So what's the problem?
Every time I watch my favorite movie, I have to watch my favorite character die.
Literally, collapse on the ground and die.
Freaking hell.
And my favorite character is a dead guy.
Soon after I watched Coco, I posted a picture of Hector to my DA. I said in my comments that I loved this guy. At that point, I hadn't really gotten to talk to anyone else about the movie. And one of the comments that was left on my picture was "everyone loves Hector."
And I thought, "Oh. I guess I'm not really original, if this is the kind of character that everyone else loves too." That doesn't stop him from being my favorite though~
But when I told my friend Nick that Hector was my favorite in the movie, he said he wasn't sure if I was joking.
Half of me wanted to laugh, and the other half wanted to hide behind a table.
Hector is pretty strange. Either you love him, or you think he's weird. Well, he is weird. I love weird people. Most of my favorite people are weird people. I am also a weird people.
Though at first even I didn't know why I liked Hector so much. Because I started out with such low expectations of him and the movie, it kind of slowly crept up on me how much I loved both (you can kind of see that process through my blog posts, like when I was surprised that I couldn't focus on my stories because I couldn't get my mind off Coco - that was when I knew I liked it but didn't yet realize that I loved it).
So it took a bit to pin down why I really love Hector.
There are several reasons:
1. His animation. That was what first struck me. His animation is brilliant. His bones rattling around. His expressions. His crazy stunts (plus the voice actor does such an awesome job of making him both weird and endearing. And he does both the English and Spanish versions? That's so freaking cool! I watched the Spanish version because I had to see Hector in Spanish. It was good~).
2. He makes me laugh. A lot.
3. He never gives up. He's always got something new he's trying, no matter how many times he's failed in the past. Which is a lot. Despite everything, he is not a broken man (though you can see how how much the pain has built up).
4. Despite the hell he's been through, he still cares about people. It doesn't seem like it at first (not at all) but he is compassionate, and puts himself at significant risk to help Miguel. Hector encourages him and praises him, and later he comforts him when it seems like both of them are doomed. All of this is before he knows Miguel is his great great grandson.
5. I'd want him for an amigo. He seems like he'd be fun to hang out with. Probably more so when he's back with his family and not a desperate falling-apart guy. But he'd probably really need a friend the most when he was falling apart (although you may not want to lend him anything important).
Then I wondered if Big Hero 6 might have the spot.
Now for the first time in over a decade, I have a favorite movie.
Coco.
And this favorite movie also has my new favorite character.
So what's the problem?
Every time I watch my favorite movie, I have to watch my favorite character die.
Literally, collapse on the ground and die.
Freaking hell.
And my favorite character is a dead guy.
Soon after I watched Coco, I posted a picture of Hector to my DA. I said in my comments that I loved this guy. At that point, I hadn't really gotten to talk to anyone else about the movie. And one of the comments that was left on my picture was "everyone loves Hector."
And I thought, "Oh. I guess I'm not really original, if this is the kind of character that everyone else loves too." That doesn't stop him from being my favorite though~
But when I told my friend Nick that Hector was my favorite in the movie, he said he wasn't sure if I was joking.
Half of me wanted to laugh, and the other half wanted to hide behind a table.
Hector is pretty strange. Either you love him, or you think he's weird. Well, he is weird. I love weird people. Most of my favorite people are weird people. I am also a weird people.
Though at first even I didn't know why I liked Hector so much. Because I started out with such low expectations of him and the movie, it kind of slowly crept up on me how much I loved both (you can kind of see that process through my blog posts, like when I was surprised that I couldn't focus on my stories because I couldn't get my mind off Coco - that was when I knew I liked it but didn't yet realize that I loved it).
So it took a bit to pin down why I really love Hector.
There are several reasons:
1. His animation. That was what first struck me. His animation is brilliant. His bones rattling around. His expressions. His crazy stunts (plus the voice actor does such an awesome job of making him both weird and endearing. And he does both the English and Spanish versions? That's so freaking cool! I watched the Spanish version because I had to see Hector in Spanish. It was good~).
2. He makes me laugh. A lot.
3. He never gives up. He's always got something new he's trying, no matter how many times he's failed in the past. Which is a lot. Despite everything, he is not a broken man (though you can see how how much the pain has built up).
4. Despite the hell he's been through, he still cares about people. It doesn't seem like it at first (not at all) but he is compassionate, and puts himself at significant risk to help Miguel. Hector encourages him and praises him, and later he comforts him when it seems like both of them are doomed. All of this is before he knows Miguel is his great great grandson.
5. I'd want him for an amigo. He seems like he'd be fun to hang out with. Probably more so when he's back with his family and not a desperate falling-apart guy. But he'd probably really need a friend the most when he was falling apart (although you may not want to lend him anything important).
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