Cute Penguin Story:

I have a pretty good feeling that the title of this post will push it's status straight to mega-"It's Friday" status.  And, then people will read it.  But, I've got pictures!  Also, there is actually a cute story about penguins being cute.  So . . . read on.

Have you been to the Ripley's Aquarium in Pigeon Forge, TN?  It's pretty cool.  I say this having a bit of aquarium pride because of the Atlanta Aquarium.  I don't want it to feel like I'm cheating.  But, I do feel like the penguins are given a little more room to achieve their full adorableness.

If this was a story about beluga whales or gigantic whale sharks, then hands down this would be Atlanta's fight.  But, it's not, it's an adorable penguin story.  So, let's all put on our finest tuxedo and eat some sardine's.  It's time to embrace the adorable.

Let's start with a picture.

You got any fish?

That little guy hung-out around me for about 10 minutes.  He may have been aggressive and gotten his fish early, or just realized that I'm pretty good company and wanted to spend some time with me.  Either way, while all those little dudes in the background where making fools of them begging for fish, homeboy just chilled with me.  Which sets the stage for the real story, this is all about those penguins in the background.  This is the story of one in particular, the most adorable penguin of all.

He is the one with the black back and white front.

There they were, a huddled black mass of fish hungry sea birds.  A faceless mass writhing and grunting at the women with the orange overalls.  One of those women, the one on the left in the above picture, has a bucket full of sardines.  She gives them one at a time to the penguins and calls out their name to the woman on the left.  How do they know their names?  They each have a name band, boys on the right fin, girls on the left and color coded to boot.  The woman on the left then gives a tick next to the penguins name to gauge how well they are eating.  That's the feeding process and it goes really well until one of the penguins is done eating, and needs to get his adorable on.

One of these penguins is about to steal your heart.

So there I was, big hoss standing in front of me wowing the crowd around me when I noticed a penguin climb up and stand next to one of the women.  I thought, "That's cute, I wonder if anyone else noticed that."  It seemed as if no one really did.  All I heard were people cooing over the cute penguins eating and coming up to the glass.  Not, me though, I couldn't take my eyes off the penguin next to the lady.  I wasn't even sure if she had noticed him yet.

It must have been five minutes of the penguin just chilling out beside the lady.  I was getting to wonder if this was all that was going to happen.  Maybe this penguin wasn't being cute but mounting a perch with which to watch over the sad supplicating horde.  This penguin was a mad overlord!  This penguin looked down on all the other penguin, silently judging them.  I began to look away and focus on my buddy who was hanging out by the window.

And then this happened...

All my watching paid off!  Now everyone around me had moved their attention to the adorable penguin sitting in a lady's lap.  Maybe it was still a power thing, but what a cute power thing.  That penguin sat in a ladies lap!  She still had to do her job of ticking off fish dinners with one of natures most precious creatures.  So, did he just hang out and let her do her job or did he ramp up the cuteness to levels near catastrophic?

IT LAID DOWN IN HER LAP!

Penguins don't cuddle, do they?  I mean, I got a minor nose bleed when I was hit with the wave of adorable.  That has to be the cutest thing ever, anything else and there is no way the woman could do her job.

She quit working.

I'm glad that she doesn't read this blog because this is the single most unflattering picture she's ever taken I'd imagine.  But, that penguin is nuzzling her.  I repeat . . . there is a penguin gently nuzzling the chin of the woman who takes care of him.  I'm writing the screen play right now.  He didn't stop there, he continued to steal her pin and move her hand onto his head.  It was the cute-a-geddon.  

I leave you with two videos of unrelenting preciousity (blogger says that's a new word).  Both are a nice mishmash of Lappy and Fronty.  So, enjoy and be watching for some more from my summer trip.