Saturday at the Blank Park Zoo

Since James met Hedwig at the Iowa Cubs game on June 9th, he has been asking to go to the Blank Park Zoo. Today James and I headed out to the Zoo with his favorite Nascar magazine that I could not peel from his fingers to meet Joni Armstrong, James' long-time reading tutor. In reference to the Zoo James will often quote an old Bible story video he has on Noah's Ark, "God told them to take all of the animals, a male and its mate." Focused on an Iowa Public Television presentation toward the entrance of the Zoo, James took Joni and I on a high-speed tour of the Zoo premises that ended back at the IPTV presentation. Then James sat down and started reading his Nascar magazine. Later James posed for photos with the Cat and the Hat and Dan Wardell. Although it is often hard to tell by his actions, I know James had a blast and was glad to see his friend Joni!

On the way home James wanted to stop at QuickTrip for a drink. QuickTrip ended up being extremely eventful and not for all good reasons. First, we ran into my friend, Chris Knauf, and his girlfriend, Lauren, on their way to the Zoo. Never wanting to miss an opportunity to hug a girl, James reached out for Lauren and gave her a big sweaty hug. Inside James got his Dr Pepper fountain pop and peanut butter M&M's and headed to the counter. At stores James usually tries to make conversation with the clerk, and I encourage him to do so because that is socially appropriate behavior. However, I was hoping the floor would open up and swallow us when James very socially inappropriately asked the QuickTrip clerk, "Are you a man or a woman?" At that moment we were saved by a man that grabbed James' Chicago Cub's shirt and said, "Hey man, what time do we play the Yankees today?" I said, very loudly, "I'm sorry. He is autistic. He doesn't know."