you can come too!

i recently spent a week in sunny Spain, getting used to the fact that i also recently left my job and am now one of what my friend describes as the idle poor. i know - who leaves a well paid, perk-tastic, long term job in the middle of a massive world economic downturn? anyway, there i was in sunny Spain enjoying a walk around the park i used to love running around (confused? you will be) when my friend Xavi called me and left a message (i always have my shitty Nokia on vibrate, which i can never feel, and, despite the fact that i always cancel my diverts it always goes to extortionate-to-collect voicemail). the message told me that he had to work through lunch and couldn't actually meet me for lunch. so, a lovely sunny day stretched before me with 'nothing to do, nowhere to be' (as my yoga always says). what to do, i wonder? i then remembered that that very park also housed the city zoo and so in i went.
as it was early Monday morning i had the place pretty much to myself at first, which was nice. i liked the monkeys and the big cats but my favourites were definitely the dolphins. i arrived at their enclosure (called something like seaworld) just as they'd been let into the pool and they were in frisky moods. walking into seaworld i was greeted by lots of darkness illluminated by big glass windows onto the azure blue pool beyond. to say that the dolphins were pleased to see signs of life is an understatement. you know how grateful and pleased to see you a dog is when you've left it outside a shop or on its own all day? well, imagine that but without the fur and a window between you and that's what my reception by the dolphins was like. three of them kept rushing up to the window where i was staniding and rubbing their faces against it. i swear to god they had the most massive smiles! after bobbing up and down in front of me for a while they would swim off again only to repeat the procedure. all the while they were blowing bubbles and making that funny dolphin eek eek eek noise. if i could speak dolphin i'm fairly sure they were saying 'Steeeven, wee love you! weeere soooo pleeased to seeee you! come play with us!'.
After enjoying hanging with my mammal homies i then went upstairs as it was time for their 11.30 show!

By this time, of course, busloads of children had been dropped off, so walking up to the sitting area i was careful to avoid sitting among the school parties - I'm aware that as a bearded 40 year old man ON HIS OWN in a zoo i score high stranger danger points. my old art director (check him out on www.monkeysinc.co.uk (which, with a little bit of luck he might FINALLY have updated!) used to rib me about my peodo-potential whenever i would show him pictures of myself on my mobile phone. NOT THOSE KIND OF PICTURES! for a while now i've been hankering after a pair of transparent-framed glasses so used to go into opticians and try on various pairs. i would then take snaps of myself in order to get other people's opinions. I admit these photos aren't the most flattering - especially if i'm not wearing my contact lenses in the pictures and so am squinting attractively*) but Andrew (art director) used to think they belonged alongside my profile on some register somewhere.

So, i sit alone ready for my new friends to come out and show us what they're made of - slightly worried that, on spotting me, they might try and dash over, beaching themselves in the process in front of hundreds of school kids but fortunately they manage to contain their excitement at having their new bezzy mate so near - and literally seconds before the show is about to kick off a coachload of latecomes arrives. Six or seven year old late comers, and, youguessed it sit around me. not near me. oh no, like an ameoba extending its false foot to lunch they surround me. in front, behind, to the left, to the right! so there i am, a giant among future men feeling slightly uncomfortable when suddenly, one of the dolphins jumps high in the air, causing a general whoop of excitement in everyone, and a particular thrill in the young girl sitting next to me, who is so overcome with the thrill that she cheers, raises her hands in the air and then collapses happily INTO MY LAP! don't you just love kids and their utter lack of personal space issues.
anyway, how we laughed - once i'd managed to gently extricate myself from her!

* i used to be outraged that the petting zoo in barcelona had illustrations next to each animal telling us not only where they came from and what they ate but also what meat they gave us, and, in the case of the cow, what accessories we had to thank them for. Yes little one, those shoes on your feet come from this gorgeous creature's relatives, as does Mummy's hand bag. Pet it and weep! so i was only vaguely surprised when the dolphin show took a sudden turn for the serious so that the handler could point out the difference between male and female genetalia to all the kiddies. bless