We should have expected it.

This morning DCist dutifully logged onto the National Zoo website minutes before the 9 a.m. hour, when tickets for Butterstick’s first full public viewing were set to be made available. We refreshed and refreshed, waiting for that magical link to appear, that final step between us and our loved little panda cub.

Suddenly, there it was. We clicked on it. We were in. We chose a date. We chose the number of tickets. We entered our name and email address. We hit “Submit.”

And then it happened. The ever-feared “Service Unavailable” message appeared. We refreshed. Same thing. Refreshed one last time. “This Page Cannot be Displayed.”

Why must the National Zoo toy with us like this?