Recovery

In Which Dr Witmol Starts With A Champagne, Argues About Nachos, Eats At Krispy Kreme, Shoots a Jager Bomb And Wakes Up In A Pool Of Giraffe Saliva.

Said goodbye to my editor who moves on to greener pastures with no hard feelings. Drank lots. Ate food that I shouldn't have. Ripped open my hand on the zipper of my boot (this was quite surprising to me at the time - all I could do was watch the blood drip onto the footpath with a strange sense of amazement).

Went to Gla's birthday/end of exams gathering at The Royal George (the downmarket version of The Ivy) and met a bunch of accounting types. Between bars we stopped at Krispy Kreme, the fount of all that's evil in the world, and vaguely remember losing my bag of cinnamon fun bun (their sugary version of an Easter bun) between the counter and the ice cream fridge. Rescued by Gla's friend, who I later repaid by destroying his cigarettes. I like to think of it as saving his life.

Bar 333 was loud so instead of yelling at each other we just had Jager bombs and started dancing. At some point, Bun Rescuer's friend took a photo of me and later asked me for my number, of which I gave him, and he asked me out yesterday so I mustn't have looked as trashed as I felt. Then five of us went to karaoke at Echo Point and then I used my last $20 to get a taxi home.

Not long after I fell asleep I had to wake up again because I'd been invited to a behind-the-scenes of the zoo (one of Skippy's friends works there) and had to walk to Neutral Bay to catch a bus. It was awesome!

Keeper does tours in the Australian mammals section so we started at the education centre patting snakes and lizards, then moved into the nocturnal section where we saw the zoo kitchen; the funniest part was seeing Keeper take out a plastic container full of frozen baby mice and then waving around a frozen rat. We fed the bilbies and the potoroos and then headed out to take a look at a koala, pat an echidna and a quokka. The quokka was especially adorable (right).

Then Keeper managed to get us into the Giraffe Encounters later in the afternoon but then had to start her shift. We had some time to wander around so saw the bird show (finally managed to see my condor in action) and then I split from the group to go and see the condor habitat and wander around on my own. Due to lack of sleep I kept finding all these areas devoid of animals and seriously slowed down quite a bit as the afternoon became drowsier.

By the time I arrived at the giraffe enclosure for my Encounter I was practically crawling up the hill. But after I handed over my ticket and fed the four of them carrots, I perked up significantly. There's nothing quite like having your hands covered in giraffe saliva to make you more alert. One of the giraffes, who I think went by the name of Safara (below), kept lolling her tongue around and slobbering everywhere. It was quite endearing.



Nothing else quite as interesting happened for the rest of the weekend (I turned off all the electricity in my apartment during Earth Hour, then promptly fell asleep in the couch) so that's where I'll leave you.