I'm Feeling: a little drained
Background Noise: Still Voices by PW Gopal
On April 13, 1796; the first elephant arrived in the United States, from Bengal India. It's kinda funny to think of elephants being shipped across the world. What a process! And where was this elephant going? Some kind of preserve/zoo (it's funny to think of 18th Century people getting ready for a day at the zoo... ) or did some rich guy just want the biggest and baddest pet he could have? Check this out (from the Elephant Joy website.):
"Elephants often express what can only be described as joy in many different facets of their lives. Due to our lack of knowledge of their expressions only the most blatant responses can be partially understood.
Some cases in which Elephants show explicit joy are:
In the greeting of a friend or family member (even a human friend)
After the birth of a baby elephant
Playing games
Typically this expression of joy takes place in the form of a greeting ceremony. Obviously, there are may other aspects to this ceremony that goes without recognition, but joy is one of the most predominant factors. When family members or friends meet, they can be seen to become collectively involved in a joyous meeting. This is usually observed when a friend or family member is absent for a long time. When he/she returns, an incredible welcoming takes place. During this greeting the elephants involved will spin around, defecate, and urinate. With their heads held high, and ears flapping they fill the air with a symphony of trumpets, rumbles, screams, and roars. " What if we greeted each other that way? A little awkward, I'd think.
Thought for the day: The average person's hair grows 590 inches in a lifetime. That's almost 50 feet of hair. Yuck.
2 thoughts:
It is also National "Day of Silence" today to support the LBGT community and those who are silent out of fear/discrimination/harassment. The website (http://www.dayofsilence.org/) says that this year 450,000 students from nearly 4,000 schools in all 50 states and Puerto Rico are expected to participate. I know I have seen quite a few of the shirts and had a few students in class that are participating. Unfortunatly, we do have the monitor the halls/classrooms a bit more to keep the students that need to be elightened from harassing the participates. But I think there are less of those people than there were when I was in high school. All together it is an awesome thing to witness.
I want an elephant! Can we get one as a pet?
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