Uprising

I was watching the Nature show in HD on PBS the other night, as I am apt to do when I feel like vegging out. It 's beautifully filmed and very calming.  I don't know who narrates that shit, but they deserve a medal.

So there are these capuchin moneys, right?  Similar to the one that started that big virus outbreak in, um, Outbreak.  Well, these fuckers are pretty smart.  They find a bunch of palm nuts and proceed to tap on them to see which ones are ripe.  Looks like the dude at the grocery store tapping on cantaloupes to find the perfect one.  When they find the perfect nut, they take it up into a tree and strip the outer layer.  Then they drop them on the forest floor to dry out.  A process that takes several days.

When the palm nuts are nice and dry, they then take them to another part of the forest.  A place with large stone slabs that at the base of a set of cliffs.  They place these nuts in hollows that they have carved out in the stone slabs with some other, harder stones.  Then they take these stone "hammers" that sometimes weigh as much as they do and they bust a nut, to borrow a phrase.  It takes a lot of experience and just the right touch to bust those nuts, and the elder monkeys are quite adept at it.

But they know that all this banging will attract predators like the jaguar.  That's why they do it at the base of these cliffs.  As soon as they sense the big cat approaching, they hustle to the top of the cliff and start pushing over big stones causing mini-avalanches of rock.  Just to scare away the jaguar.

These are extremely bright monkeys.

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I've heard this tune by Muse a bunch of times on the radio, but I came across the video for the first time over the weekend on some site or other. That's the only way to see new music videos, right? I mean since MTV doesn't show them anymore.

I like how this one follows the band as it follows a burning fuse rigged to blow up one of RW's miniature towns, and then a big, bad teddy bear shows up and starts rampaging and shit. Hehe. Imagine when they pitched that to the people who still make music videos in day and age.

The teddy bear, by the way, doesn't make it. Sorry for the spoilers.

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So what does a bunch of monkeys busting nuts in the jungle have to do with the above video?  Nothing.  Nothing at all. 

Except that maybe we should all start preparing ourselves for the inevitable monkey uprising.  Will you be ready?

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Note: Remember to play the Bug-Eyed Trivia Challenge every day. All the crazy smart monkeys are doing it.