Gentleman sheep

Friday night on a bank holiday weekend may not be the best time to attract an audience for this new blog post but here goes...

Today the subject of owls came up oh so briefly in conversation with a friend. Ever in search of blogging gold, it occurred to me that owls have become quite trendy little buggers; I for one have owl earrings, an owl purse and a little fluffy owl toy on my shelf. So, here for your post-pub perusal, are my top five celebrity animals.

1. Meerkat - used to be cool, now just irritating. A Russian Ricky Gervais?
2. Penguin - the Johnny Depp of the animal world, makes anything a bit better
3. Sloth - a YouTube hit who makes it big, a hairy Justin Bieber
4. Wolf - a perennial favourite in medieval circles and now an international star due to Game of Thrones, Sean Bean
5. Micro Pig - I just wanted to post this photo:

William's Wish Wellingtons anyone?

Now I don't expect that anyone reads blogs to be told what is cool - I mean, we all know that already. So here is a more useful list of the rising stars of the animal kingdom. My advice is to pick one or two, casually drop them into conversation, download their tracks on iTunes and go and see them live in zoos before even your mum knows who they are.

1. Spectacled bear – sounds like a bear wearing glasses, what more do you want
2. Narwhal – unicorns of the sea
3. Vicuna – shaggy llama type, looks like it would be pleasant to hug
4. Proboscis monkey – perfect for hayfever adverts
5. Pozizzly  - half polar bear, half grizzly. Anyone who has put up with my rambling recently will have heard just how awesome the pozizzly is even though Wikipedia informs me they are called Pizzlys

Also big shout out to my sister who, when told about a 'wholphin', asked if it was half wolf-half dolphin. If only.

Alas, some animals will just never be cool. This brings me, finally, to the Gentleman Sheep. The poor sheep is neither sexy nor cute and, at a time when we are all munching on tasty lamb, it could do with a bit of an image boost. Making use of my amazing Paint skills, I've mocked up a sheep makeover whereby the humble pedestrian sheep takes on a new, Sherlock inspired persona:

Actually, I've just realized sheep are female. Oh dear!