DRUSILLAS ZOO

My dear bloggers
The end of a weeeeeeek, a long long weeeeeek.
Culminating in four hours at Drusilla’s zoo.
On the radio I’ve talked to doctors, story consultants, an uninformed gay black-man who suggested that the two lesbians that got mugged on the bus brought it on themselves SCUSE ME!!!!
I talked to green festival makers and the green goddess talking about exercising for the over fifties – she is eighty and her exercise regime made me feel like a bloated Rubinesque life model without the old style of Italian Renaissance or Baroque aesthetics more like the before pictures from Slimming World.
But at Drusilla’s today I stroked a chinchilla, a snake and an armadillo – its’ belly felt like a rubber dingy. It clung to his keeper James, who has been at the zoo for 17 years – it made me cry, it’s little face buried into James’ right armpit.
I stared at a sloth, at snowy white owls, fed two camels and genuinely felt the weight of climate change since all the little animals were being rescued and conserved. I marvelled at the anteater who’s tail looked like a feather duster and its nose like a hoover nozzle, he was just a very charming household appliance. I crouched down with North American beavers and fed them sweet potatoes, I allowed my arms to be clung on by black limas and was transfixed by the pink flamingoes who stand on one leg until they get tired then stand on the other. I was as close to a red panda as you can get without turning into bamboo – which by the way is what Panda means, an animal that eats bamboo.
I met the keepers who hand-reared the camels. Two delicious creatures from Mongolia displaying their summer coats a velvety, smooth Farrow and Ball greyish beige, when the winter sets in they grow a pile of fur that looks like Ian McShane’s curly locks.
I cried at the monkeys who had lost their habitat, and the parrots that were sold for profit, or the animals that were poached. The animal known as man is a misguided idiot, and fracking proves it. I ate lunch with my step-daughter and grandaughter who came along and were given a fab day in Eastbourne.
It has been a wonderful experience, tomorrow I am to my cranial osteopath to be rebalanced
Today I decided to wear a bra and some knickers, trousers and a tee shirt. WHAT AN IDIOT. It was 23 degrees so now my body is indented with vicious elastic lines and a red waistband. Today of all days was dungaree weather. I got too responsible for me own good. I now have my sarong loosely slung around my pinched middle, and tomorrow I intend wearing nothing for as long as possible.
I do not like the idea of animals being locked away but at Drusilla’s they care and coax, breed and heal. The helpers are so kind and the food is right healthy too.
I’ve done a lot of things in my little old life but today hurt my heart. The fact that we need zoos in the East Sussex countryside to help Madagascan Lima’s stay alive says it all.
Daddy Attenborough says he is optimistic because the young are getting it. I think all of us should be concerned, all of us should be prepared to lay off meat, throw the fish back in the sea, cradle butterflies and throw as many bee bombs around as we can so that our little island is covered in poppies and cornflowers, caterpillars and dormice.
I have been humbled by the keepers at Drusilla’s, their kindness, generosity and sense of humour.
May the frackers fail and may the frackers fighters be supported by all and sundry.