(no subject)

[prog]

Looked at a bunch of apartments today. The winningest one was that sunken place, I think, since its size, location, and price can't be beat. It's really big, a minute (literally) from the Davis T, and less expensive than my first apartment here. Not sure about the view, since the view out every window is dirt. cthulhia suggests the possibility of setting up action-figure dioramas in the dirt outside, but we'll see what happens.

---

Speaking of food-eating battle monkeys, I like this story about the candy-eating knife monkey.

Comments

[cortezopossum.livejournal.com]

Out of curiosity... what kind of square footage is in that sunken place? I'm not sure about other cities, but in Madison an 'inexpensive' 1 bedroom apartment is on the order of 400-500 square feet. 'Efficiency' apartments are a bit smaller than that.
----
Funny you should point to that link. Just yesterday I told someone about this candy-eating knife monkey story and I didn't get more than about 3 sentences in before he pretty much said 'bullshit' to the story and refused to listen to any more of it. He apparently knows some people at zoo facilities and says it is against federal law to have any animals -- (zoo animals or even pet animals) in any zoo food prep area. This is one of those strictly enforced 'shut the place down' laws if word got out about it. -- The only way this could even possibly be true in his opinion is if the zoo were outside the USA or if the story were at least 10 years old.

As a former zoo docent

[cthulhia]

I would agree that the story is probably apocryphal. Or dates back to at least the 1970s.

I don't know if it's a federal law against having animals in food prep areas, but it is against the rules of accreditation, required for any federal funding and most grants. So, in most cases, these events would effectively shut the place down. If a primate with a Zoo's dental plan, so to speak, still managed to have bad teeth, the zoo would already be mushing up his food for him, and taking care not to give him anything that would worsen his teeth, like processed sugar. Any privately funded place that didn't show an interest in caring for the animals' health would get picketed by even the more-rational-than-PETA ecologists. (It always depresses me when I hear about privately-owned exotic/rare animals, since their caretakers aren't being held accountable in the same ways as a Zoo, and often don't have the educational network to keep them from harming the animals. You're already suffering under the artificial environment problem. Many have no alternative now, since their natural habitats are being bulldozed.)

Since the zoo where I volunteered ( http://uticazoo.org/ ) was small, without enough funding to keep such facilities fully updated, we couldn't have large primates. Some zoos might consider arrangements with psych/cognitive learning folks who work with primates, as a way of combining funds to get better facilities. In a situation like that, if there is one, it's possible the animals would be allowed in the kitchen.

I know that our zoo almost lost it's accreditation when we weren't able to completely solve the rodent problem, and the golden lion tamarins ( http://uticazoo.org/animals/index.cfm?skip=1&start=7 ) figured out how to trap (and eat) them in their cage.

Primates, especially teeny little orange ones, are more clever than you realize until you have to find ways of keeping them entertained in a zoo.

[prog.livejournal.com]

Don't know what the quare footage is. I don't have much of an idea how these numberss map to reality, anyway; I have been been eyeballing places to see how big or small they are.

I saw some pathetically small studio apartments for $900, which is pretty much what they've been going for since at least 2000, even though larger apartments are getting cheaper. One place we looked at was a single room with some kitchen appliances glued to one wall, and a "bathroom nook" next to the single door. "Yikes," I said. "Welcome home!" said Mike the realtor, with a grin. "Let's move on, shall we?"