Zoo Day

When you walk in to Zoo Atlanta, you're feeling all cheery and hopeful. Zoos are good. They help preserve the species and educate the general public about conservation, the environment, geography, etc. The animals are well cared for and have ample room to live. Then you see this:

Eight thousand flamingos packed in to a space the size of a New York apartment (I'm talking third floor LES walk-up, not UWS penthouse). Half is land, half is water, brown, stagnant water. But that's not the best part; the best part is that you smell it first. It smells like shit, but with a metallic twang, sort of like the smell of blood, a little bit irony. It's so bad, Henry thinks it is in his mouth and tries to spit it out.

And you think, this is gonna suck.
So you head on around the corner. Strange bird, kind of pretty kind of creepy. What's in his mouth? A mouse? A dead mouse? Upon closer inspection, it's not just a dead mouse, but a dead mouse the poor bird has been carrying around for who knows how long. Circle of life, I guess.

There are some giraffes hanging out with a zebra and rhinoceros.

But the giraffes seem to be pretty laid back, unlike these guys:

Lazy lions sleep.

And Komodo dragons bask, with a sign for the stupid people leading them the right way.

And then you get to the gorillas! Glorious, hilarious, psychotic, playful gorillas.

And that's about it. The best part, otherwise, was this:


And don't ride the train, no matter how much your kids cry, just don't ride the train.

Wilson's Birthday(s)

Wilson, being the spoiled little 12 year old that he is, wouldn't be content with just one birthday; we had to drag it out over a couple of days. Henry, having just celebrated his birthday for a record three days, was not impressed. Maybe even a little bit angry that he had to celebrate another's birthday.

But, once we got to Inoko and he realized there would be fire, he seemed content.
Like all hibachi places, Inoko brings out soup and salad almost before you sit down, and definitely before you get beer, unlike other hibachi places, they have a surprise for kids:

Can you spot it, the surprise? That most Japanese of treats, Goldfish! Which Henry promptly dumped in his soup. He seemed to enjoy it, so...
We recently took Henry to Shoki, which I have to admit was surprisingly good, both service and food. I was curious as to how Inoko would stack up.

Now, I don't expect much more than frozen vegetable medley when I dine out at these prices, but I do sort of expect said vegetables to be defrosted before they're are put on public display. Also, make sure the strucural integrity of your rice mound is intact before you dump it on to the grill. Lastly, a bit more finesse with the serving of the rice would have gone a long way. Henry leaves less mess when he eats with chopsticks than this guy did serving rice with a spatula. He did, to his credit, make a second flaming volcano onion when Henry asked, but I don't think his heart was really in it. The singing of Wilson's happy birthday wishes also lacked heart, as did the sad, grocery store sheet cake served up. It really couldn't hold a candle to the Shoki pineapple boat.
On Wilson's actual birthday, he chose Outback. I don't blame him, for this reason:

Say what you will, but fried onion dipped in a ketchup/mayo mixture is delicious.
The rest of the meal was not really worth mentioning. The real drama was the range of emotions of a young man coming of age, realizing his own mortality, and breaking down in the face of crushing defeat.

Chickens and Tattoos

I decided to get a new tattoo. One of Henry and my favorite books to read used to be The Hungry Hen. Since we have one Henry, aka Henarenaroo(ster), four hens in back yard, and one egg waiting to hatch, I decided to get this:
I went to see Derek Vickery, aka Lil D, at 13 Roses Tattoo Parlour. He took the book and spent a few hours working up the stencil above and then proceeded to put it on my arm.The outline took about thirty to forty-five minutes. The shading at the bottom was added by Lil D. It really holds the image together.
The color starts.
From that first little bit of red to this took another forty-five minutes:
The final touch is a little bit of yellow on the bit of grass in the rooster's mouth:All done. It took about one hour and thirty minutes.
For all your tattoo needs, please go see Lil D and tell him Chuck sent you.
PS, yes, it hurts.

How To Make a Henchilada

Ingredients:
1 Henry
1 Yoga Mat

Method:
1. Unroll yoga mat on ground.
2. Persuade Henry to lie crosswise on yoga mat.
3. Roll yoga mat around Henry.
4. Enjoy.
Note: The first time we made a Henchilada, Henry became scared and demanded to be set free. Once set free, he demanded to be rolled up seven thousand more times.

Brownies

Two days after the snow fell it still had not melted, instead solidifying in to an icy mess that made driving difficult and playing outside both uncomfortable and a tad bit dangerous. With Sophia coming over and Henry already wired from days inside, I decided to do the next least healthy thing to laying around watching television: make brownies. So, with a little help from Alton Brown, we turned the oven on to 300...
Sifted out 1 1/4 cups of cocoa powder...Half a cup of flour...
One cup of sugar...
One cup of brown sugar, which is a considerable pain to sift...
Five eggs from the backyard chickens. The recipe only called for four, but the Ameraucana eggs are a tiny bit smaller than grocery store eggs, and one more egg will make anything a little better...
Those go in the mixer with half a pound of butter, two teaspoons of vanilla, half a teaspoon of salt...
Mix in the cocoa/flour mix and two types of sugars...Give this to the kids to tide them over...
Scrape it in a pan and throw it in the oven for forty-five minutes or so...
No photos were taken of the finished brownies.