Olive goes to the Zoo! part 1

We arrive at the Zoo!

We are eager to see the Easter Bunny, as we were told he is here somewhere, along with other Easter activities for the kiddies. Judging by the traffic, the packed parking lot, and the line for tickets, we are not the only ones on this quest today.

This is Olives first time to the Zoo, and we are curious if she will react with the same enthusiasm she shows for all of her animal books.

These were pretty cool to watch. (Though Olive seemed more interested in the pull string on my sweatshirt.)

So we continued our search for rabbits, and made our way toward a large crowd up ahead.

As we got closer, it turned out it was a Meerkat exhibit, and the anxious crowd was trying to get this guy to turn for a photo..

And while all the people were getting frustrated, I raised my camera, focus, and on queue Mr. Meerkat turned and gave me this 'over the shoulder' shot.

Everyone was freaking out yelling "get your camera!! he turned around Henry! Hurry!!" and as soon as it happened, it was over. A collective grown from the crowd as I some how walked away with this shot and a smile.

(It kinda felt like one of those Mentos commercials..)

Anyways, Thank you Mr. Meerkat. Im not sure why you did that, but that was pretty cool.

As the morning went on, the crowds and the sun came out, and we tore apart our bags looking for her sunhat. (Which we left in the car). Hence the new 'Junior Zookeeper' safari hat adorning O's noggin.

She looks pretty good eh?

One of the most iconic parts of the LA Zoo, the Flamigos. (or, correctly spelled 'the Flamingos').

This is where the opening of 'Threes Company" was filmed where Janet, Jack, and Chrissy bumble their way around the Zoo. The bad news: Chrissy was no longer standing there on one leg.

The good news: Olive was really intrigued by the flapping, gawking glowing birds. She was quite entranced by them.

It was funny watching her trip out on just what the heck she was watching. I think at one point she looked at her milk bottle and asked "what was in here?"

We kept ducking into tents and pavillions trying to find the rabbit exhibits, but no dice. One had a puppet show going on. And although the crowd was well into it, we found it kinda creepy, so we split..

As a parting gift, everyone got a box of peeps. Which I wasnt too excited about. But Rebecca acted like they were giving away $100 dollar bills. Ok.. Guess my wife has a thing for peeps.

(now I know what to get her for our anniversary!).

So Im taking these photos, and its pretty crowded with onlookers trying to get their own 'National Geographic' shots. And I turn around and this lady carrying a young girl walks by and the child drops a pair of sunglasses.

I picked em up and called out for the woman, tapped her shoulder, she turned. "umm, I believe you dropped these" I said. She looked at the glasses then gave me a huge radiant smile and said "Oh thank you so much!!" She took the glasses and returned to her husband who had kept walking.

And then I realized that was Halle Berry.

I turned to Rebecca with a confused look.. She said "Yeah, that was Halle Berry. And she's with her model boyfriend and he's HOT!" Anyways, it was yet another one of those weird 'only in LA' moments. But as starstruck as we were, Olive didnt seem to care. Imagine that.

Oddly enough, Halle turned up in this photo. She has her back turned towards us, and is in a red tshirt.

(And yea, she was beautiful.)

So we walked a bit further, in search of some food and I carried the Jr. Zoo Keeper for a bit.

So we scaled the mountain paths, scattered with little burroughs of cages where three or four Monkey/Eagles/Deer/Groundhogs called home. Oddly enough, the most active of all the tenants were these turtles.

Unfortunately Olive missed all the action.

And she wasnt the only one sleeping, as we crept up on some lions.

I made some joke about leaving her in the cage and she shot me a look.

Ok Olive, you can come home with us.

Part 2 coming soon!

An Olive update..

High five to all my peeps out in Olive-land.

Just letting you know my daddy will be posting more soon as he has been taking thousands of photos of me doing every little thing, but he claims that he has been 'busy' and unable to blog. (But he has assured me he will be posting new goodies soon.)

Id type more but my diaper is full, and Im a bit distracted. That and its taken me three hours to just type this..

Have a lovely day, peace out, and send the Easter Bunny my way if you see him.

Olive K

***

Meet and greet Annabelle at the Park

So Lucy (our nanny) has been taking Olive to the local park, where she met another nanny and baby that Olive just adores.. Annabelle.

So nanny's exchanged numbers and us parents set up our first 'playdate'. So this afternoon we went down to the park to let the girls have some fun!

LA Marathon

An early morning, even for the Kuska's.. We headed downtown to Silverlake to join friends and neighbors of the Grieves, to root on Hamish who is running his first marathon.

We staked out a great spot in front of a nice coffee shop. And as we sipped hot chocolate and rubbed the sleep from our eyes, we looked up the street for any signs of movement.

Olive must have been confused why all these people gathered so early to watch an empty city street. But always the optimist, Olive went ahead with our strange custom and stared on with us.

And soon the first signs of life, as police cars and tv trucks came over the far horizon, being chased by a large graceful pack of Kenyan super atheletes. They were stunning to watch lope by in person. They were larger, more muscled and tensely efficient than I ever imagined.

In seconds they were gone only followed by a long silence. This was only mile 7 but they had already motored up a large lead.

Ive run three marathons in my life, with a personal best of 4:44:00. The Kenyans, who usually win, tend to finish around 2:08:00.

(It makes my thighs explode in pain to contemplate such a pace for 26.6 miles. I just dont see how its humanly possible..)

With that thought in mind, we went back to our coffees and small talk. The kids keeping watch for Hamish, or anyone else for that matter.

And soon the first of the rest of the 'pack' started to trickle by. Georgie (in the green) offers her support while the boy next to her has a surprise of his own.

Now this dry river bed was coming to life. Runners, clapping, shouting, pounding. Music started playing and families started waving.

Over here!!!

We find the man of the hour and he swooped by for a couple kisses and high fives. He soon hustled off into the masses and had an incredible race.

Olive still was a bit confused.. Just where were all these people going? and why?

I think this Bulldog looks more exhausted than any of the runners we saw..

Running the marathon brings out the best of LA, and its sense of humor. These burlesque girls were handing out doughnuts, cokes, and beers for any weary runners. Many stopped to get a photo, and many left guzzling cokes.

Hmmm. Maybe I was approaching these marathons the wrong way..

You would see all kinds. Children and their balloons, old men and their soggy grey tshirts, women wearing pink, running for charities, and a son running in memory of his mother. We saw the jogging Elvis 's, drag queens, barefoots, and amputees all running and smiling (most of em).

And as thousands and thousands ran by, Rebecca saw her good friend and coworker, George Leon. (Oddly enough, I sang karaoke with the guy in Tokyo once and he marveled the Japanese with his 'Hit the road Jack'). Anyways, there he was was some friends, happy, sweaty and smiling. And soon he hit the road leaving us wondering what a small world this planet really is.

You are incredible George and never cease to amaze and surprise us.

And soon the numbers thinned and we all started talking about breakfast and getting back to our fat, lazy lives.. :)

You'd think watching 25,000 Angelenos run by would be a scary moment for a little girl. Olive seemed pretty chill about the whole idea.

She still had that perplexed look on her face,

but was having fun.

We stayed for another hour and somehow found a gap in the runners to make it across the street. We made it back to our car and ventured home for breakfast.

Later that day we found out the Hamish, after all his days/weeks/months of training, finished in 3 hours, 15 minutes, 6 seconds.

Which if you've ever ran, he was doing sub 7 1/2 minute miles (26.6 of em!!).

Not only does he qualify as 'most awesome athelete ever' in my book, he qualifies for the most prestigious race of them all: The Boston Marathon.

Later that week when he had some days to recover, I asked him if he will continue to run, he sorely mumbled "never again."