New Employee Orientation
A ridiculously attractive girl took me on a tour of the Fish and Reptile collections, a trip that included expositions on her recent induglences in 80′s synthpop, vivid anecdotes regarding the industrial-strength smoke machine at her Halloween party, a working model of a Dunkleosteus skull, discussing why Facebook is good for two things only: stalking and sharing photos, the story behind her very unusual yet appropriate first name, and a side trip to a room full of aquaria, whose occupants included a piranha and a 30-year old African lungfish whose tank was tightly sealed lest he escape again. Normally, I wouldn’t be too terribly impressed by tall, quirkily dressed former art students-turned-zoologists — I mean really, what’s so special about that — but a woman whose idea of a good tour is showing you the piranhas, now that’s the stuff instant, huge crushes are made of.