San Fran

The SMM was just held in San Fran, which gave Marc and I a great excuse to see a cool city :) We didn't really like the hotel area much, but did have a fantastic time visiting the sea lions at Pier 39 and fisherman's wharf, as well as a trip south to Ano Nuevo to see the elephant seals. Was a great trip!

Move to Miami - Miami Seaquarium

We are now settled in from our international move from Scotland to Miami. There is lots we will miss, but also lots we are so glad to be back in the states for. And the Miami sunshine is one of them :) Marc just started his new job, and he is loving it. He has already gotten involved with some amazing work on rehabilitating manatees and turtles, just a few days in! I went to visit the seaquarium yesterday. It does some really neat things, and could improve on some things, just like most animal care facilities. It is a great start for Marc's career!

Zombie Zoo

Had a wonderful halloween this year! Annie was here visiting, so we did animal facepaints, went to the zombie zoo - Edinburgh zoo with halloween enrichment! - enjoyed dinner at Bruno's american diner, and finished off the day with board games. A great way to celebrate, and all the kids were jealous of our facepaint!

Updated kitty pics

It's been awhile since I got some nice photos of the cats, so I spent this afternoon stalking them with a camera :)

Diploma

Took over a month, but my diploma finally came in. It's officially done!

Pachelbel

It's been a rough week...on Monday morning, Pachelbel died unexpectedly in her sleep. Due to the unexpected nature of her death we had a post-mortem performed, and it appears she died of a pulmonary embolism, which we believe was quick and painless. Took us completly by surprise, there were no warning signs, and nothing that could have been done. She was a really special girl.

The Brittish Open

Sorry for the poor quality pics...my phone isn't quite up for the challenge of misty Scottish weather. Am working in St. Andrews today, and getting to drop in on a little of the Open. It is such a big deal, thousands of people are flooding in. The pics were taken first thing in the morning, before everyone arrived for the main event. Bit crazy, but it is nice to be here for it (at least for one day! no more than that!)

Rome Zoo

Marc and I made it out to the Rome Zoo, which was lovely. Note, the first photo is not real, it was an ad at the park, we did not get to see the pope play with parrots. But some cool things were the CSI exhibit highlighting wildlife crime (first thing you see at the zoo, pretty cool!), the fun enrichment for the lemurs, and we managed to catch a seal training session (really good though I personally wouldn't be using my hand or face as a target for a seal the way they did). The biggest thing we didn't like was the Japanese snow macaques, the weather is far to hot for them (according to the zoo's sign they live naturally in temps from -13 to 25 C, the day we were there it was around 37). They had a weird skin condition, not sure what from (over grooming, mites, maybe fungus from sweating? we don't know), and I can only guess that they were being kept in to hot of conditions. The exhibit was otherwise amazing, but why have an animal being kept in such hot conditions if it is not appropriate for them?

Vatican Museum

Next up was the vatican museum. It was packed (as you can see from the map room)! So Marc and I only ran through the highlights. I particularly enjoyed the embellishments on the maps, and their routes in mythology. I also loved the celestial globes.