And Then I Bought A Five Gallon Drum of Purell

Earlier this week, I helped to chaperone a preschool field trip to the Las Vegas "Zoo."

Guys? I'm using the word zoo, very, very, very loosely, here. It has animals, but it is not affiliated with the city, and not accredited, and it is also just – NOT RIGHT.

I would describe the condition of the place, but when I googled “Las Vegas Zoo -SAD” it zipped me right over to a very funny post on this blog, which describes it perfectly:

Two words come to mind when trying to describe the Las Vegas Zoo
accurately:

1. Ghetto
2. Sad (so very, very sad.)

Yeah. What she said.

What I'm really concerned about though, is the little sanitation issue they seem to be having. If bird flu ever gets off the ground, this is where it will start, because the place is COVERED with pigeon poop.

Now I’m not a germophobe. If my kid drops a piece of his sandwich on the ground, I’ll sometimes pick it up, blow it off and hand it back to him. Good for the immune system and all that.

But when we walked toward the entrance and I saw hundreds of pigeons milling about, I started to get a bit nervous. We paid our admission and once we were inside the gates, I could see that 90% of the structures were made entirely out of pigeon crap.

I was a bit disconcerted.

“Oh look,” I cried, “There’s poo EVERYWHERE.” I laughed nervously, aware that my voice was just a little too loud. I looked at one of the other moms. “Look! Poo! All this poo! It’s on everything! Oh. Wow!”

I spent the next hour trying to make sure that my children didn’t touch anything and obsessive compulsively wiping Abby and Carter's hands off. "Did you get poo on yourself?" "How about now?" "How about now?"

At one point in time the pre-school teacher tried to get the kids to sit at one of the picnic tables to have a snack and I loudly objected.

“But look! There’s poo on it.”

“They can just not touch the top of the table,” she said calmly.

I laughed loudly. “Ha ha ha ha. Um.”

“They’ll be fine.”

I laughed again. “Ha ha ha ha. It’s on the benches." I pointed at one of the kids. "Look – he’s sitting on poo! That’s – that’s – really bothering me a lot.”

After snacktime, we walked around the zoo, all three acres of it, checking out the lion, the alligator, and the chimpanzee (who delighted my children my picking his nose and eating his boogers – they GOT that, it was their kind of comedy).

Did I mention that there was a lot of poo? Everywhere?

So basically? I do not think we will be coming back.

Here are some other fun comments about the zoo, also brought to you courtesy of Mr. Google:

• This is by far the worst "zoo" I've ever been to. I have no idea why they have so many chickens running around, except maybe to eat all the mice I saw.
• This zoo is a city haven...for the pigeons.
• This zoo is a real DUMP, and the folks that run it are to blame along with the city of Las Vegas. The poor, poor animals. May God forgive you all for this sick place!!!!
• I strongly suggest just not going.

Yeah, me too, buddy. ME TOO.

And now I must be going. So little time, so many things to bleach.