days in the life

Last night I went to a Class of 1970-1990 Cy-Fair high school reunion at Tin Hall in Cypress. My actual 20-year reunion was just a couple of weeks ago, but I didn't go... But my friend Nikki came down from Dallas and had wanted me to go for months, and I wanted to see her so she roped me into going. Tin Hall is NOT the type of place I ever hung out in high school. I was more of a Numbers kind of girl. I only saw a couple people I knew, including my high school boyfriend's sister, and her husband (they were high school sweethearts). My good friend Suzanne came out also. Here are a couple photos of myself, Suz and Nikki.

Me, Suz and Nikki. I should have some more pics soon when Nikki sends me the ones from her camera!
Julie, Nikki and I.

Here is a photo of Sam feeding a dolphin at Seaworld.

The dolphins come right up and take the food out of your hand and you can even touch them. Sam didn't think it was as cool as at Tangalooma on Moreton Island, Australia where we got in the ocean and got to feed the wild dolphins that come up to the shore every day.
Savie ALWAYS makes faces whenever I try to take pictures and so I told her I'd put it on the web anyway! :)

Shamu! I just thought these are the most incredibly beautiful animals. There was one female animal trainer who seemed to have a particularly close relationship with one of the orcas. It was just a cool thing to see how we can have such close bonds with these wild animals.

I'm doing an article on some of the conservation work being done by Seaworld. They actually have breeding programs for some endangered species, similar to some zoos, including Attwater's prairie chickens which are almost extinct. Seaworld breeds them and releases them back into the wild at a couple of locations around Houston. They live in coastal prairie, which is now mostly gone. They also took on some sea lions that were causing repeated problems in the Pacific Northwest where they were eating endangered salmon and despite attempts at relocation they were "repeat offenders." Washington State officials were going to euthanize them, but Seaworld apparently said they'd take them in. So they got them in April and they are in a pool together and will be transitioned back into where the other sea lions are. One of them was so incredibly overweight because of all the salmon it was gorging on. It weighed like 800 pounds or something! It had lost 200 already being in Seaworld on a low-fat fish diet. Ha! Isn't that a hoot.