Lions and tickets and bears, oh my!

A day after President Bush urged Americans to drive less, I took a six-hour drive to South Carolina to visit Southern Belle and Daisy. I got my first speeding ticket not long into the drive. (By that, I mean it was my first speeding ticket ever, not the first of many speeding tickets for the trip.) I was in the midst of a bunch of small towns notorious for making most of their money off of ticketing motorists on their way to the major southbound interstate. Dumb move on my part.

I was very pleasant with the officer, but apparently I took it unusually well because after he gave me the ticket he said, "Uhh ... can I ask you something? Are you always this happy?"
Me: "Umm..."
Officer: "Because you are, by far, the happiest person I've pulled over today. Are you just sort of a happy-go-lucky kind of person?"
Me: "I don't know. I guess. I figured the ticket was sort of inevitable after you pulled me over, so no sense getting mad about it."
Officer: "Huh. All right..."
Then he told me where there would be more cops ahead, I asked him how long till the junction with the interstate and we both went on our ways. I have to say the overall experience was far more pleasant than I thought it would be. Even though niceness is apparently not nearly as effective at getting you out of a ticket as crying or cleavage.

Anyhow, the trip was good -- the right balance between low-key and activity that makes you feel like you were actually on a short vacation rather than a whirlwind of activity that leaves wishing you could have a vacation after your vacation. I discovered several things:
1) Daisy is still a good pool hustler, even though if she wants to hit that cue ball into the pocket, then by golly, she'll do it with authority.
2) Columbia is apparently quite proud of chickens (there are a lot of sports mascots named after poultry), the Confederate flag and its library, which is absolutely huge and supernice.
3) Random children on a class field trip will go up to two complete strangers throwing a Frisbee in the park and join in. And they will never get tired, no matter how ragged the adults are run. (OK, how ragged the other adult is run. I mostly watched and laughed.)
4) You may be able to drink all night and into the morning at a bar in Columbia, but trying to find a place to get an ice cream cone at 10:30 p.m. is dang near impossible.

I also had lunch at a place where apparently President Bush once ate a hamburger and mixed it up with the regular folk. I think they've since had that table bronzed.

And I went to the local zoo, which is suprisingly good for a city of Columbia's size. There are lots of interactive exhibits and opportunities to feed the animals, including the giraffes, which is pretty cool. And they have a glass wall next to the gorilla exhibit so that you can sit next to the great apes, even the ones with anger management issues. And if you're a small child, you can sit and point at the gorilla and say, "Monkey, monkey, monkey, monkey ..." repeatedly for, like, 15 minutes. As Southern Belle pointed out, if you know the word "monkey," how often do you actually get to use it correctly? It's apparently quite exciting.

You can also watch one Galapagos giant tortoise try to hump another tortoise from the totally wrong direction (the side, in case you were wondering); leading me to question how Darwin came up with his theory. You can watch the zoo keepers feed a variety of animals, including sea lions, which do tricks, and penguins, which are just funny to watch. They also have koalas -- and those cuddly guys never get old.

All in all, pretty cool.