Penguin: A Brief History

On a neon light filled sky a few days back, Caitlin won a dear new friend.

The night began when Alex, EB, Caits, and I decided to take a night stroll around the Boulder Creek Festival. While most of the vendors had given up on sales for the day and left abandoned half raised tents for the morrow, the newest addition to the festival had just got its second wind. This new addition, of carnival rides and games was a far cry from the festivals normal sites: the handmade hemp doggie leashes, the “do you have a minute for the environment” folk, and the 600 flavors of organic honey.

We didn’t really fit in with the crowd of scantily clad teenage ladies giggling at teenage boys attempting to sport their first mustaches and the various carnie folk who looked sincerely bored and just couldn’t wait for another smoke break. This scene would never stop Caits from finding a true friend amongst the carnies and angsty teenage folk.

As we walked from each game with their stuffed offers dangling from the walls and ceilings, like meat hanging in a butcher shop, Caits spotted a game she demanded we all had to play.

It was the horse race game, where you roll a ball into various holes, which equate to various point values. Instead of horses, this game had English Bull Terriers on various pastel colored surfboards, and instead of 15 players we had four; the four of us. I rolled the ball twice and the game was over. Either it was a lot harder when I was a kid or they increased the pace of the horses (well in our case surfing dogs) to make the games end quicker. Anyways the pace of the game is not what matters here, but what does is the prize Caits chose after her victorious win: a penguin.

For his first adventure as a free penguin, we took him to a little spot in Ireland called Connor O’Neills. We took pictures and laughed the night away.

Well, that was until a gentleman came up to the table and asked Caitlin, “Can I see your penguin?”

Being the generous, penguin sharing person she is, Caits hande over the penguin. Apparently, the gentleman was looking for a baby penguin for his niece. Since we could give him no answers regarding baby penguins, we went back to taking penguin photographs.