Thursday, February 18, 2010

The Evening News

I ran into a major unexpected traffic jam on the way home from work tonight. The reason the the traffic, as it turns out, was a loose zebra on the interstate highway that runs through downtown Atlanta.

Oh, that again.

The zebra apparently escaped from a Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus rehearsal. The zebra was subsequently spotted in the parking lot near the Richard B. Russell Federal Building, near Centennial Olympic Park, at CNN, and on the Downtown Connector. He was finally captured on the interstate near the Grady curve. According to witnesses, he was galloping between lanes of traffic on the Downtown Connector before his capture.

Interestingly, this isn't the first time a zebra got loose on the interstate. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, young zebra was found stranded and injured on I-75 in Butts County in April 2008. Then a zebra who usually lives on a farm across from Oxford College's Newton County campus was zebra-napped and deposited inside the college's Seney Hall as part of a prank.

But meanwhile, back at the White House, it seems that the Dalai Lama dropped by for a visit with President Obama (I'm resisting the urge to joke about "zebras in Atlanta and llamas in Washington"). The visit was very low key so as not to antagonize the Chinese any more than necessary, but they're apparently still somewhat miffed. But importantly, both Obama and the Dalai Lama agreed that Richard Gere peaked creatively in "Pretty Woman" (okay, I admit I stole that joke).

"The president commended the Dalai Lama's Middle Way approach, his commitment to nonviolence and his pursuit of dialogue with the Chinese government," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said after the more than hour-long private meeting. Buddhists around the world will recognize from the code words in that statement that Obama did indeed understand the Dalai Lama.

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