— पांच हजार एक सौ तीन —
Here's the basic caption I put on all of the
sixty-six shots (55 photos, 11 video clips) I took at WildLanterns at Woodland Park Zoo with
Alexia last night:
Woodland Park Zoo's holiday season festival,
WildLanterns, which is only in its
second year (what they formerly did was the holiday-lights spectacle "WildLights," for eight years prior; I had only gone to the first year of that one,
in 2012), was seen by me for the first time, because I was unable to fit it into my holiday schedule last year, in 2020. My neighbor Alexia had gone, though, and was eager to see it again and so she came with me, seeing it for the second time—totally expecting it all to be the same, and thrilled to discover it was almost entirely different.
Not the greatest syntax in there, I know. You'll learn to live with it. I only pasted it here because I'm lazy and didn't want to hunt for all those links again.
I hadn't realized that the one time I ever went to the previous annual holiday show at Woodland Park Zoo, "WildLights," in 2012 was its first year. I always kind of figured I would eventually go to it again, although ZooLights at Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma has always been notably better. But! As of last year, Woodland Park Zoo is sure giving them a run for their money with this pivot, from elaborate holiday light displays (again, in 2012 anyway, it could have been a bit more elaborate than it actually was) to "large scale animal and nature scape lanterns." Now, this is notably less "Christmasy," but it is also spectacular. And, being a part of the holiday season tradition each year, it still takes its place among my
Christmas 2021 collection of photo albums, now up to a record 11! If I walk over to "Oly LightStravaganza" in Olympia Christmas Eve as I intend to, then this year will actually get up to 12. And I honestly hope I don't have that many in one year again; it's starting to get a little overwhelming.
That said, for now at least—the Christmas photo album itself may exceed it—this
WildLanterns photo album is easily the largest of all this year's holiday season albums, with its 66 shots—soon to be more. At least three shots of me that Alexia took with her phone (all of which I really liked) are yet to be added; she promised to text them to me last night but hasn't yet. I'm sure she will soon enough.
EDIT—I take it back! I had expected texts but she actually emailed them to me, quite early this morning—all of the shots and videos she took, over five emails, around 6:40 this morning. There was still really only the three that I wanted to keep; I managed to crop the best of her shots of me in front of the wings outside the exit and I've
posted that to social media. It's a really great photo, especially with the quasi-rainbow colors. I really love that shot.
— पांच हजार एक सौ तीन —
— पांच हजार एक सौ तीन —
In any case, this, the last of my "holiday excursions" this year before Christmas itself, took up the bulk of my evening last night. I went to cut down my commute time by taking the Monorail plus Light Rail, except for some reason this week as compared to last, the trains keep leaving later, resulting in my having to wait several minutes at both stops; it was 5:15 before I got home rather than 5:05 as I had previously managed. Well, dammit! Oh well; I had time to feed the cats and then go meet Alexia outside her condo.
A quick, COVID-related note on Alexia. She and I had plans to watch
Arthur Christmas together in her condo next door Sunday evening, and scrapped it when she heard from her workout trainer, on Sunday, that the trainer's husband had tested positive for COVID on Friday. But, we kept the plan for last night, after Alexia got herself tested on Monday and received a negative result yesterday. Now, knowing that false positives exist, we agreed to stay masked as we drove together there and back in her car—not only that, but we both double masked. That was just a 20-minute or so drive each way, and at the zoo itself it was outdoors, which generally is fine even without masks, but they still required masks and Alexia and I kept both of our two masks on the entire time even there—well, okay, I took mine off just long enough for her to get a picture of me in front of a pair of illuminated wings on our way out. That was like two minutes.
Also, the trainer had been tested and come back negative as well. Even in the face of Omicron, I think we were okay and were about as cautious as we possibly could be, short of canceling the outing. Alexia was even suggesting at first that I find someone else to go with me, which would have been a challenge, but then she received her negative test result and we decided to go for it and just stay double masked the entire time.
She did keep saying, "I feel fine," and I mentioned that we should never take too much stock in such statements. We've known from the start how people can be asymptomatic and spreading it everywhere; getting the test result was far more important. And, although the test was sooner after the second-degree, secondary exposure than was ideal, I felt much better about it once that was done.
We spent a solid two hours at the zoo, which was about what I had expected. I don't think there's any way to describe WildLanterns that really does it justice; I was thoroughly enchanted by it. So many different sections of the lanterns dedicated to a particular species, a single section could be
huge—a pathway lined on either side with, say, large bee and wasp lanterns among huge flower lanterns, for what must have been a hundred feet. There are places where you can stand and feel like you're just in the middle of a whole different world because you are entirely surrounded by it.
After Alexia drove us home, Shobhit had dinner made, a surprisingly simple but tasty concoction: Costco ravioli made with, not pasta sauce, but just some melted shredded cheddar on top. It worked quite well and it was delicious. I then went to finish processing and then upload my many photos.
— पांच हजार एक सौ तीन —
[posted 12:30 pm]
