Here’s one more picture from the zoo — a lovely shot (taken by the lovely Becky) showing me, standing in front of a large group of flamingos, wearing my USC Class of 2003 shirt.

Less than three weeks till graduation!

Becky and I went to the San Diego Zoo on Saturday, and I took a bunch of pictures with my new camera. Check out the monkeys!!

There was also an incredibly cute group of koala bears lying all over each other:

And here’s Hua Mei, the giant panda who was supposed to be sent back to China several months ago. Apparently the delay has something to do with SARS. Dunno if pandas can get it, or what, but yeah.

The verdict is still out on the camera, by the way. It performed great at the zoo, but still seem to be having a bit of trouble in less-than-ideal lighting situations. I’m continuing to test it out… I can return it up until next Tuesday, if I want.

Click here for a full gallery of zoo photos!

UPDATE: My dad comments that the SARS delay is due to concern for the panda’s human handlers. He’s right, according to this article, which also reports that this is only the latest in a series of delays: “The panda, born at the zoo Aug. 21, 1999, was scheduled to leave San Diego last September, shortly after her 3rd birthday. Her departure has been pushed back several times. … Paperwork problems in Washington delayed her departure, and then officials in China decided it was too cold there to move her during the winter. A planned May departure was pushed back to June so officials could properly plan a celebration for the arrival of the first giant panda born outside of China to come to the land of her origin.” Now, “neither Chinese nor zoo officials wanted to put at risk [of SARS] the humans who would need to travel with her. Now it’s anyone’s guess when she will leave. Hua Mei’s health is not the issue, said Donald F. Lindburg, head of the zoo’s giant panda team, because it is very unlikely a panda would be susceptible to the SARS virus.”

If this is true… wow.

Today is the 16th birthday of my “honorary sister,” Kimberly Stone!

Kim (or as I generally call her, “Kimber”) is a Newington High School sophomore and the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Stone, the Newington school system’s dynamic computer duo. (The pictures above and below were taken on Kim’s middle-school graduation day in June 2001, when she was 14.)

When I was at the high school, Mrs. Stone was the faculty advisor to the school newspaper, Scribe, and Mr. Stone was our technical advisor. Because I was Scribe’s editor-in-chief from the midpoint of my sophomore year until the end of my senior year, I spent a lot of time (and ate many a Subway tuna-fish sandwich) with the Stones.

During that time, I watched Kimber grow up from a fourth-grader into a sixth-grader, and by the time I graduated, we considered each other “honorary siblings.” (Each of us is, biologically, an only child.) Now she’s a high-school sophomore… which makes me feel very old!

Anyway, yeah, my little sister is turning Sweet Sixteen today. Sniff, sniff. Happy Birthday, Kim!