(no subject)
Aug. 9th, 2006 01:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snarklyboojumLet's just get this out of the way: OMG PENGUINS ARE AWESOME AND SO COOLER THAN THE ANTARCTIC AND SAVE ME FROM HORRIBLE PUNS BUT PENGUINS!
There.
The penguin painting was tremendously embarrassing at first, as I couldn't get the rubber boots on over my monstrous feet and calves. And almost tripped in the bigger ones twice. Still. Penguins! Or penguin, anyway. His name was Marty, and he was selected from the group because he was the only gentoo to come to Dan this morning. The kings were interested, but they're much harder to play shuffleboard with, as they are enormously tall and aloof.
The logistics were as follows: Canvas goes down. Paint is splattered on the floor around said canvas. People stand in a circle around the paint around the canvas. Penguin is placed on the edge and convinced by the people to walk all over the place. A new art sensation is born.
Marty has brown eyes. *wibbles* Seriously, penguins are pretty. There are a lot more colors on their feathers than you'd think and the gentoos have small white-tipped feathers all along their backs when they look all black through glass. And their feet are bright orange...or at least they are before they're covered in paint. At the end he had green, pink, and blue acrylic all over himself, even on his little belly. And this boy was heavy, too! He had, like, a twelve pack hidden under all those feathers. (His stomach was very hard, and I know this because I touched him there when I scooted him back onto the canvases. Hee!) He kept trying to escape back into the exhibit, but eventually calmed down enough to make some nice footprints along the paper, as well as some interesting smears where his bigass tale dragged the ground. There was a time when I was tempted to pick him up to use his feet as a stamp (which the biologist has done before, oddly enough) but settled for pushing his back and belly around so that he'd go the other direction, and Marty tried to bite at my arm so I'd let him go. If he made contact it didn't hurt in the slightest, and he was definitely biting the biologists. (Why is it the birds are the only ones that have bitten me at the aquarium and the sharks get such a bad rap?)
These "paintings" will sell for around a hundred bucks, the profit of which goes directly back into the penguin exhibit upkeep. I got a free one, as my supervisors are awesome and bought a pack of canvas for all of us to share. Mine was the third best of that group, but I can't complain since I didn't pay anything and go to play around with Marty. (Wanna see it? The scan's huge, and cut part of it off, but nice all the same. If you turn it a certain angle the blue blob looks like two penguins sitting on an ice flow. Or I may be insane.)
So yes. Generally, penguins are rock hard but their feathers are soft. Their beaks do not hurt, although Marty wasn't really trying. They have eyes reminiscent of small beady puppydogs, and are adorable when puffed up. They also will poo anytime, anywhere, so be sure to wear boots whenever you encounter one.
ETA: I uploaded this new icon to commemorate the occasion, and because we all need to look at cute baby animals upon occasion. This one is Tango from And Tango Makes Three, the story of two gay penguins raising a chick. We have a female couple at the aquarium, and the lorikeets have no sexual (or species) hangups whatsoever. When they go at it and I'm stationed there, I always say "yes, we encourage all sorts of free love here at the aquarium" which usually makes people giggle and nod knowingly.
Afterward I worked at Theater briefly and went to a hour-long presentation on sexual harassment in the workplace. Then I took my break, went to Shark Central for about an hour, then cleaned the glass on the front of the tanks and went home. All told I did about two and a half hours of real work in an eight hour shift.
Best. Workday. Ever.
eta: my brain is too british by far. "theater" looks so wrong. i keep wanting to make it "theatre".
There.
The penguin painting was tremendously embarrassing at first, as I couldn't get the rubber boots on over my monstrous feet and calves. And almost tripped in the bigger ones twice. Still. Penguins! Or penguin, anyway. His name was Marty, and he was selected from the group because he was the only gentoo to come to Dan this morning. The kings were interested, but they're much harder to play shuffleboard with, as they are enormously tall and aloof.
The logistics were as follows: Canvas goes down. Paint is splattered on the floor around said canvas. People stand in a circle around the paint around the canvas. Penguin is placed on the edge and convinced by the people to walk all over the place. A new art sensation is born.
Marty has brown eyes. *wibbles* Seriously, penguins are pretty. There are a lot more colors on their feathers than you'd think and the gentoos have small white-tipped feathers all along their backs when they look all black through glass. And their feet are bright orange...or at least they are before they're covered in paint. At the end he had green, pink, and blue acrylic all over himself, even on his little belly. And this boy was heavy, too! He had, like, a twelve pack hidden under all those feathers. (His stomach was very hard, and I know this because I touched him there when I scooted him back onto the canvases. Hee!) He kept trying to escape back into the exhibit, but eventually calmed down enough to make some nice footprints along the paper, as well as some interesting smears where his bigass tale dragged the ground. There was a time when I was tempted to pick him up to use his feet as a stamp (which the biologist has done before, oddly enough) but settled for pushing his back and belly around so that he'd go the other direction, and Marty tried to bite at my arm so I'd let him go. If he made contact it didn't hurt in the slightest, and he was definitely biting the biologists. (Why is it the birds are the only ones that have bitten me at the aquarium and the sharks get such a bad rap?)
These "paintings" will sell for around a hundred bucks, the profit of which goes directly back into the penguin exhibit upkeep. I got a free one, as my supervisors are awesome and bought a pack of canvas for all of us to share. Mine was the third best of that group, but I can't complain since I didn't pay anything and go to play around with Marty. (Wanna see it? The scan's huge, and cut part of it off, but nice all the same. If you turn it a certain angle the blue blob looks like two penguins sitting on an ice flow. Or I may be insane.)
So yes. Generally, penguins are rock hard but their feathers are soft. Their beaks do not hurt, although Marty wasn't really trying. They have eyes reminiscent of small beady puppydogs, and are adorable when puffed up. They also will poo anytime, anywhere, so be sure to wear boots whenever you encounter one.
ETA: I uploaded this new icon to commemorate the occasion, and because we all need to look at cute baby animals upon occasion. This one is Tango from And Tango Makes Three, the story of two gay penguins raising a chick. We have a female couple at the aquarium, and the lorikeets have no sexual (or species) hangups whatsoever. When they go at it and I'm stationed there, I always say "yes, we encourage all sorts of free love here at the aquarium" which usually makes people giggle and nod knowingly.
Afterward I worked at Theater briefly and went to a hour-long presentation on sexual harassment in the workplace. Then I took my break, went to Shark Central for about an hour, then cleaned the glass on the front of the tanks and went home. All told I did about two and a half hours of real work in an eight hour shift.
Best. Workday. Ever.
eta: my brain is too british by far. "theater" looks so wrong. i keep wanting to make it "theatre".
