Lyrics; euromillions; zoos

I like that Cee-Lo's Fuck You is higher in the itunes charts than his Forget You, the version which has been redacted for the sake of sales.  It's not just a catchy song, it's also pretty much exactly the plot of the Abbé Prevost's Manon Lescaut, which is a brilliant novel, and helped Lord Peter Wimsey work out who killed Cathcart in Clouds of Witnesses.  For example, there's a bit that goes

Now I know that I had to borrow
Beg and steal and lie and cheat
Tryin' to keep ya, tryin' to please ya
Cos bein' in love with yo ass ain't cheap.

The Chevalier Des Grieux could have said just the same thing, only in French, of course.  Manon Lescaut made a big impression on me as a teenager and it is the only whole novel I have ever read in French.

I went to the zoo with my brother, sister-in-law, and excellent nephew on Saturday.  On the way they told me about how last Saturday my sister-in-law had got a text message saying she'd won some money on the Euromillions.  It didn't say how much.  So they wondered whether to do something special -- but they were already on their way to the cider festival.  And what was going to top that?  Then they thought they could go to an expensive restaurant that evening, but my brother remembered that he'd got the stuff to make his special courgette and feta tartlets, and my sister-in-law really loves my brother's courgette and feta tartlets.  So they were a bit stumped.  Luckily it turned out that they had only won six pounds something.  I thought this was a cool story-- even without winning the Euromillions they already had the cider festival and delicious tartlets.  Someone should turn it into a children's story.

The zoo was very good.  They were penguins which you could watch from above or below, and a Zona Brazilia with capybaras and tapirs.  My nephew liked the rats, because he knows that rats are good things.  On the whole he's not sure about the larger mammals, which is fair enough really.  It must be disconcerting at that age to see all these animals you know from books, like the snake and mouse out of the Gruffalo, but not taking part in a narrative, just lounging around in cages.  It was Bristol zoo, or Brizzle as they say around those parts.  The gift shop had excellent t-shirts with local phrases like "Cheers drive!" and "Yer tizz".  Also "Alright my luvver?" which is more Cornwall, really.