Emergency Room Tapir

Astoria, Oregon ~ March 3, 2011

(With more octopus and less jaguar.)

You never know where you're going to find a tapir! Fortunately, I had my cell phone with me and it had a camera.

I had the worst flu or cold of my life - or whatever kind of bug it was - in late February and early March of this year, and on March 3rd I took myself to the Emergency Room to figure out why I felt so bad. As it turned out, I had a freaky reaction to Tylenol PM and I was having something just short of panic attacks. Since I wasn't seriously ill or damaged, it took them over three hours to get around to processing my tests. Meanwhile, look who was there to keep me company! Under the circumstances, I was especially glad to have the little tapir's company.

I don't know who got the idea to paint a mural with a TAPIR of all things in the temperate lands of northwestern Oregon, but we are, after all, in a rainforest, albeit different from the one where this little Asian tapir lives in real life. 

This blog is sponsored by Tapir and Friends Animal Store.

March 24: Very special tapir pictures

Some very special tapir pictures showed up in my e-mail box today from just about 40 years ago. I hardly have words to describe how it feels to see them - I actually got teary; I loved that tapir. I've posted them with descriptions on my TPF Tapir blog.

Tapir art and craft in my Picasa albums

I've spent a lot of time this weekend digging out photo files from folders, rearranging them and putting them in web albums. It's only the beginning, and it's fun - finally, after all this time I'm making some progress! Here's a picture of Elvis, the cat I had in Colorado, with two balsa wood tapirs from Peru. It was taken in 2001. You can see these tapirs and more in my lowland tapir art web albums. Check out the other tapir art albums, too. That's what I worked on today. Also, I have to share this. Sara Tegan sent a link to a tapir web cam in England. What fun :)

Lion Country Safari, Florida: Tapirs, rain, and golden light

After having had no luck with the beach and high-rises, we decided to look at animals. It would be a drive-through and we wouldn't be bothered by heat. As it turns out, it stormed like crazy during the hour or so that it took to get there. The rain was coming down so hard and fast that we sat it out in a parking-lot-cum-swamp. The skies were still black when we got there, but the rain was letting up for the most part.

The giraffe on the concessions cart near the front gate was cool. It reminded us of the giraffe eyeglass holder in our online gift shop.

The real animals were nice, too. It turned into a pleasant afternoon watching animals at close range. There were some dark long-legged birds and black buffalo with horns flattened backwards that caught my attention. Maybe someday I'll put their pix in a web album, although if I'd had a really good one, I would have posted it. The windows were a big problem.

We had started late and were driving slowly, taking a lot of photos, most of which were pretty lousy. We weren't allowed to roll down the windows, and they were watching me. The zebra-colored vehicles seemed wary of anyone looking that carefully at the animals and pointing a camera. To be honest, it was very tempting. The lion was, I'm not sure why, particularly majestic and compelling. Both Sue and I felt it, and since he was behind chain link, I really, really wanted to get out and take his picture. But the staff were vigilant, so it didn't happen. By evening, the light had turned gold as we drove toward the sun on our way out of the park.

Sun, rain, green, and animals. It had been a relaxing few hours, for sure. We were almost the only ones there, so we didn't have to deal with crowds, either.

In the first exhibit, a huge area with few fences, we found the tapir, here resting under some trees out of the rain along with a few avian friends. I should say a lot of avian friends, although they didn't all turn up for the photo shoot. The white chunk out of the photo is another stork. Click on the photo to see the dark birds he's cuddling up with.

Having eggs for dinner at iHop was also a sane choice. The food wasn't overbearing, and if anything, the air conditioning was too cold.

Fixing a stuffed tapir's ears. Honest.

No, this is not some nefarious form of tapir torture. Kate and I are fixing the ends of the ears. When they arrive from the importer, the fur is regrettably flattened in some areas and you have to fluff it up to look nice. This is not true of all of the stuffed animals I get for the gift shop, but tapirs are such slow sellers, they sit in the boxes at the importers for a long, long time. We're trying to help make them more known, popular, and in demand. It's quite a job. Meanwhile, for those who know and love tapirs, or are just getting acquainted with them, we want the ears to look nice!

Tapir/Art room, Palisade

All of the rooms had incarnations. This was near the end of my time in Palisade, and I'd started trying to paint again, to find myself with the medium. On the canvas with the tapirs, I'd painted everything except for the tapirs, and as of this writing (2008), I haven't finished it. The painting on the filing cabinets is from the 1980s. It's a detail - a big blow-up of some weeds alongside a road taken from a 19th Century line engraving and painted with a brush in pastel shading. I always liked it, and never painted anything else remotely similar. Taped on the wall is a xeroxed enlargement of a photo Stefan Seitz took of a baby Malayan tapir. I thought I might paint it someday or design it into a t-shirt. Two real tapir skulls sit on the filing cabinet along with the turpentine can (with Mona Lisa's picture on it), and the green blanket is a color I like. I still have it. Also on the filing cabinet is a black figure. I hope I have another photo somewhere. It's a fertility goddess or something like that; a big woman riding on a real deer skull. Marco bought it in the Philippines. It stayed with him in Colorado. The folded paper behind the turp can is a simple collage I made by gluing some picture on top of another; I don't remember the image exactly, but it almost came to mind. I had it around for quite awhile. The easel is a beautiful artwork in itself that Marco gave me and I still have. It folds up and you can carry it with your paint things inside. It's very clever and very heavy, too. The basket under the easel is one I still use as a trash can (for clean trash). I got it in Los Angeles for not much money at a basket store. It's tall and fits nicely in corners and other unexpected places where no other trash can will fit. And, it looks artistic and classy. I've stitched the bottom into it again. I hope it never wears out. The small red wooden thing is a book rack. I think I got that with Robin, and I think we got two of them. It was inexpensive, under two dollars, I think. And I always loved it, especially the color. The canvas(es) propped against the filing cabinet seem to be three that I hinged together to form a triptych, but then never used. There are a lot of memories in this little corner, but I also like the arrangement for what it is and how it looks. It was a simpler time, too. The file cabinets had tapir info and personal files. I've brought them to Oregon with me also. And, they've expanded. I thought this was going to be a quick and simple post!