Ulterior Motives in Employment: A Recent Confession

"...to be honest, I think the first stirrings of my now rather exotic palate came from a childhood steeped in the books of Richard Scarry. Y'know, page after page of simians and reptiles and what-not driving around in cars and such...flaunting their anthropomorphism...these images would normally stir the imagination of the young, expanding their educations via whimsical cartoony drawings of animals acting like people. In my case, it made me hungry for beast flesh not readily available at the foodshelves and soup kitchens my family tended to frequent. How was I supposed to get my mouth around, say, a Papio Sphinx (a Mandrill to the uninformed) or the surprisingly delicious flanks of many of the odd-toed ungulates? I mean it's my opinion that a person has not lived a proper life until they've spent an evening ingesting Moutain Tapir with a side of Sumatran Rhinoceros nostrils. After much inner-puzzling on how I might finally realize my newly awakened gustatory desires I came upon the perfect scenario...

Get a job at the local zoo.

10 years on, gainfully employed, happy-stomached, and none of the powers-that-be at the Zoo have ever wondered what happened to the free-range peacocks, select residents of the Herpetarium, Jordan the Orangutan, et cetera..."

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