BELOVED BUBBLES IS HANGING OUT IN FLA.

Ref : http://www.nypost.com/seven/06272009/news/nationalnews/beloved_bubbles_is_hanging_out_in_fla__176377.htm

By BOBBY MARTINEZ in Wauchula, Fla. and TODD VENEZIA in NY
GOING APE: Bubbles, planting a wet one on "daddy" Jacko during the 1987 making of the Moonwalker video, now lives (above) in a Florida animal sanctuary.
Michael Jackson PollView ResultsLast updated: 7:33 am
June 27, 2009
Posted: 3:05 am
June 27, 2009

As Michael Jackson's fans and pals the world over grieved for the pop icon, his furriest old friend likely remained clueless to his passing.

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ONGOING MICHAEL JACKSON COVERAGE

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Bubbles the chimp, who had a human-like relationship with his bizarre owner for more than a decade and became a symbol of his descent into madness, is alive and well at a Florida animal refuge called the Center for Great Apes, said a preserve spokeswoman.

She would not say if anyone had broken the bad news to Bubbles -- and the center quickly yanked his bio from its Web site.

Bubbles arrived at the facility in 2005 from a California preserve, where Jackson sent him because he was getting older and too aggressive to be kept around the house with his first child.

Jackson first got Bubbles in 1986 from a Texas research facility and the primate soon became his best pal.

"Bubbles often eats at the table with Michael," reported Utah's Deseret News in 1988. "He was in the recording studio with Michael for much of the two years it took to make [the album] 'Bad.' "

The article also described some of the luxuries afforded Bubbles, such as a private toilet and a crib in Jackson's bedroom where he slept.

"When Michael threw an elaborate dinner party at his Encino, Calif., mansion on a warm July night to begin the promotion of 'Bad' it was Bubbles, not the pop star, who worked the room," the report said.

Bubbles was even immortalized in a statue by artist Jeff Koons, which sold for about $6.5 million.

He also got to be a world traveler, going with Jackson on a tour of Japan.

The preserve says 180-pound Bubbles is "brawny" but "tender." He's 23 and could live to be 60.

todd.venezia@nypost.com