It was a pretty awesome day, David. At MOSI, I get to spend a few minutes at most with each guest, so it was really nice to spend hours with someone willing to listen to me talk about all things butterfly. She said she wanted to be a marine biologist so I figured she was probably already interested in nature and science.
In sad news, I think the Sulphur cat is dead. He didn't look right from the start. Possibly got in a fight with one of the ants. You never know. Could have been the wasp that kept flying around. I killed the one, but there was another one that kept coming around.
In happy news, the young lady I was with is going through her own pupation process - she's being adopted! I imagine there's a process involving lots of legal stuff right now, but she's going to visit with them over the holidays.
I thought I had put this in my post, but I guess I must be thinking of where I had written it in the email I sent to the lady who is in charge of the butterfly garden. I wanted to give her an update on how well it's doing since they replanted it. After my young friend learned it was okay to hold the caterpillars - as long as they're not molting - she literally stopped everyone that walked by and asked if they wanted to see a caterpillar. Some of those people happened to be a group from Verizon. The company is a major donor for Joshua House. Technically, the property has five houses, three of which house the kids. And they're all named after a major donor. For example, Verizon House. So...lots of money, I'm guessing. Not trying to be cynical or anything, but I figured it was pretty cool that they got to see a young lady excited about learning from our butterfly garden. One of the men said he and his kids had ordered one of those butterfly kits before and raised them. The girl I was with is 15 and pretty smart so I was teasing her after we talked to the Verizon folks about squeezing more money out of them. It's for a great cause! I'm sure they were happy to see a volunteer there, too. I know corporations that donate money like to see that kind of thing. I'm happy to be there, though. It does me a lot of good, too. I might make a lepidopterist out of her, yet. University of Florida has its own center for Lepidoptera study. Just sayin'.
