Weekend Update: Bucket of Panda

I still need to actually talk about Gafilk and D'Zenove at some point, but I guess I can work backwards.

I took a half day off on Friday so I could go down to the Sleep Clinic for the CPAP orientation, returning home just long enough to drop things off before heading down to North Springs station to pick up aiela, who was visiting for the weekend. Traffic really wasn’t very bad, considering it was five-o-clock, and as a result I got to the station about 40 minutes before Angie did. (Insufferably slow baggage return on her end didn’t help this one bit.) We got back to the house and I made tacos for dinner while we all hung out and talked, and then watched an episode of The Daily Show together. kitanzi decided to make an early night of it, having slept poorly the night before, leaving me and Angie time to catch up with each other.

Saturday morning we got up and had a nice light breakfast of eggs and toast. kitanzi made a quick grocery run, and then, about noon, we all headed down to ZooAtlanta. I realize that it was 40F in the middle of February, but I have to say I’ve never seen the zoo look quite so deserted. The primary reason for our visit was to see the baby panda of course, and when we arrived at the Panda habitat, we found her sleeping in a bucket. Cutest. Thing. Ever. (Click on the picture to see more photos from the Zoo trip) We spent a lot of time in the reptile house, and were fortunate enough to be there when a couple of the zookeepers came around with a chinchilla and a bunny, which they were presenting and allowing folks to pet. If you’ve never petted a chinchilla before, you have no true understanding of the word “soft”. Wow, what amazing fur. I think it looks better on the animal than a coat, though.

We spent about 2.5 hours at the zoo, and while many of the animals were off exhibit due to the cold, we had a good time walking around the park. Once we’d run out of things to see and do, we headed back home I took a two hour nap before dinner, and then we headed over to bedlamhouse and ladyat‘s house for the February Gafia housefilk. Many of the usual suspects were there, including quadrivium, surrdave, thatcrazycajun and singing_phoenix, hawklady, weirdsister and her whole family. sffilk and joyeuse13 and abovenyquist. I was also delighted to see rslatkin attending, because….well, because I’m always delighted to see rslatkin. In addition to the normal crowd, the fellow from PBA30 who had been filming at Gafilk was there with his camera and setup, to get some more footage for the local interest piece he’s doing on filk. It’ll be interesting to see when he’s done.

Played a fair amount, starting off with “All For Me Swag” and “Dungeonville“. At a con, that’d have led to an hour or more of gaming filk, but tonight it went off in another direction. It was a nice, low-key circle, and I wandered in and out of it to socialize with folks in the kitchen as much as playing. (We had a short run of channelling vixyish…abovenyquist played “Mal's Song“, which gave me an excuse to pull out “Aural Vixation“. Then someone asked if anyone could play the original “Girl Who's Never Been“, and since I had it right in front of me, agreed to play it. Somewhere in the middle of the last chorus, my voice leapt from my throat and ran from the room, leaving me with a hoarse squeak. Good thing it’s a singalong. *grin*) We had a fabulous time, and eventually headed home around 11:30pm, as I had a slight headache that wouldn’t go away.

Sunday morning, we went to lunch at the Cracker Barrel down the road, It was pretty busy by the time we got there, resulting in a 20 minute wait for a table, but we had a good time browsing the kitsch in the country store and reminiscing about candy we used to get as a kid that now only seems to exist in places like the Cracker Barrel Country Store. We finally got seated, and found ourselves in the hands of a wonderful waitress. Not only was she seriously cute (ever notice how no one is ever humorously cute?), but she was right on the spot with our orders and keeping our drinks filled. I’d have taken her home with us if I could, but since that probably wasn’t an option, I made sure that in addition to leaving a good time, we asked to speak to the manager when we left and gave her glowing praise. Servers like that really make a meal more enjoyable all around, and it’s nice to make sure they get the recognition they deserve.

The rest of Sunday early afternoon was spent with me and aiela snuggling on the couch and being insufferably cute (or so kitanzi assures me). When the time came, I drove her down to the airport and we said goodbye, and she got on her plane and went home, and I came home, and that was the weekend. (I did get to have a nice long phone conversation with sweetmusic_27 that evening. She baked at me. It was brilliant fun.)

As weekends go, it’s really hard to beat faraway sweetie snuggles, music in good company, and a bucket of panda.

(Edit: serenejournal turned the photo into an icon! Glee!)