I went to the zoo at 7:30 this morning and spent 40 minutes recording elephant noises. buki, jothi and surapa are much less talkative than the whales. only one vocalization the entire time, plus a few snorts.


they've each got their own personality. jothi is chill. buki has an oral-based fascination with all things wooden and spent most of the forty minutes either eating branches or chewing on the fence. if surapa were human, she'd be on ritalin. watching her do summersaults underwater then roll around on her back in the dirt pile may have been the best part of my summer.


as fascinating as observing bathing elephants may be, however, watching someone else study them is apparently even better. just ask the two old guys that stood there watching me the whole time. was it my frantic scribbling every time an elephant flapped an ear that was so captivating? all the recording equipment? (I admit, I too could stare at that video camera for hours on end.) my ingenious balancing act of microphones and camera, attached to a thin wooden board, that sat precariously on the wet fence for forty minutes without slipping ? maybe it was my handwriting. yeah. that must have been it. definitely my handwriting.


to make a super fantabulous week even more superly fantabulous, I found out that I passed my ARCT piano exam! knowing that I will never again have to perform in front of judges is a great feeling. the m.u. was so pleased she relieved me from dishes duty for an entire week. knowing that I have seven whole days to eat on many dishes as is humanly possible without having to clean them is also a great feeling. it gives me all the more time to regale the neighbourhood with chopin's revolutionary etude and beethoven's waldstein sonata (mm. 1). maybe a chopin polonaise. some more liszt? this is going to be awesome fun.