The Hippo and the Cocktail Party

By Klara Woldenga, Entertainment Editor

The hippo did not know why he had come at this small cocktail party.

Maybe it was because he felt the need to finally use his expensive evening outfit. He had spent quite a bit of money on a black tie for an event just like this: Casual cocktail hour, dressed up but not overly so. Maybe he had come because he hadn’t been out in a while. His therapist had recently told him that being out and interacting with others was very important to hippo health. Regardless, he was here now, and had to make do with the side-eyes from the guests, and the occasional spilled glasses of wine caused by others being “startled” or “bumped into” by the well-dressed water-dwelling mammal.

“Is it really true?” a guest asked him. “Are hippos as hungry as the board games suggest?”

The audacity, the hippo thought.

Sure, hippos are hungry, they eat a lot of things. You could say that, on occasion, hippos do in fact become hungry hungry hippos, but a stranger shouldn’t just feel free to ask that. The hippo made his point by wandering over to the dessert table and eating brownie after brownie until the stranger backed away slowly.

The hippo could have eaten all of the brownies—all the food on the table, really—but chose instead slow down and wait, just like his therapist had suggested. Stress eating is bad, he had recently learned, especially for hippos. He decided to leave with his head held high and crumbs sitting on his snout.

After putting his hippo shoes back on and exiting the apartment, he took a few deep breaths in the elevator. He did eat a few people on his way home, of course. Hippos are a natural predator to humans, after all.