By Ben Smith:
Alright, you asked for it so here it is. It’s pretty much a given that weird stuff is going to happen in October. Maybe it’s the weather transitioning to cooler temps. Maybe it’s the days getting shorter. Maybe it’s the Harvest Moon, or Hunter’s Moon, if you prefer. Either way, strange things tend to occur in October. However, I surely didn’t have escaped monkeys from a crashed truck on my bingo card.
Just to bring you up to speed, let’s go over what transpired. A truck carrying twenty-one rhesus monkeys overturned close to Heidelberg and several of them escaped through a hole from the wreck. The initial reports that came out said these lab monkeys had been infected with covid, hepatitis c, and herpes! And if that’s not enough to raise your eyebrows, the truck was supposed to be transporting the monkeys from a research center at Tulane to Pensacola, at least from the early reports. Now, it’s a known fact that I have a tendency to get lost from time to time. But even I know that Heidelberg isn’t between New Orleans and Pensacola.
Shortly after the zombie monkeys, or whatever they are, escaped, Tulane tried to set the record straight that the monkeys were in fact not infectious, but they were aggressive. On the other hand, they also sent word that the monkeys should be killed in the event they couldn’t be captured, but they didn’t seem too interested in getting up to Mississippi very quickly to collect their monkeys. Well, now I’ve got more questions. Do they bite? How fast are they? Has Ole Miss already officially claimed “Monkeys” as a new mascot? Is the MDWFP going to mandate a special season? If so, what’s the daily bag limit? See how my mind goes all different directions?
Out of the twenty-one monkeys on the truck, thirteen of them immediately realized they were in Mississippi and stayed in the truck. These are the test monkeys we should be studying. As for the other eight, whatever Tulane pumped them full of-let’s make sure we don’t do that to people. Those eight monkeys were stupid. They climbed out of the truck and thought it was a good idea to roam about. I guess they didn’t know Mississippi is an open-carry state. Then, it took them watching five of their buddies get shot before the remaining three blew the joint.
The day ended with three monkeys still at large. I began taking over/under bets from friends on how long they’d make it before falling victim to Mississippi’s finest hunters. The general consensus was two to three days, which I thought was generous. It turns out that Jasper County is apparently not the home of Mississippi’s finest hunters. And, fortunately for the monkeys, it’s still archery season in Mississippi unless you are in Leflore County (see big buck poached). Had this happened in December I’d have given them 4-5 hours tops. I bet game wardens in Jasper County are having a field day with all of the tickets they are issuing to hunters that are carrying a rifle “just in case they see a monkey.” That’s going to be my new excuse for hunting with a rifle year-round.
Fast forward five days. Three monkeys were still unaccounted for. I lost the bet, and shame has been brought on my home state. I’m chalking it up to government interference. If authorities would get out of the way this would get taken care of quicker. I digress. An update pops up on my phone Sunday afternoon that one of the escapees is in MDWFP’s custody. It didn’t take much digging to find out that in custody meant that it had been shot dead by a concerned Mississippi mama. Tip of the cap to you, ma’am, for your marksmanship and for showing the rest of the world that anything in your yard that shouldn’t be is getting shot. One down, two to go.
Monday comes and goes with no new news. Mid-way through Tuesday I received a message that another monkey had entered the afterlife. The details were a little fuzzy. One article said that it was found dead, but a Facebook user suggested it had been shot by a local minister. Since true journalism is pretty much dead anyway, I’m going to go ahead and run with the minister story. What would be a better headline than “Local Pastor Protects Flock from Diseased Government Monkey” anyway? It has Mississippi written all over it and I’m here for it.
That leaves us with one more monkey still on the loose. Even being in the group of dumb monkeys, he’s obviously a little smarter than the others. He’s managed to successfully avoid gun toting women with children and the local Baptist church where he’d surely be met with stiff resistance. In the words of Kevin Bacon in the movie “Tremors” where he describes the last graboid, “This one ain’t dumb.” I know that kind of contradicts my theory of these being the dumb monkeys, but think of this one as being the last of the dumb ones. On the flip side, he could be the smartest of all of them. He could have broken out of the truck, hid in the woods for a few days, then hitched a ride to Portland with one of those PETA people that are hanging around. If rifle season comes and goes and the last monkey hasn’t been shot then we’ll know to broaden our search area to include the Pacific Northwest. Big Foot lives up there so I’m sure a monkey could blend in just as well.
Now, before any of y’all come knocking on my door telling me how horrible I am for joking about this, don’t waste your time. Because the real joke in the entire situation is the fact that the NIH is spending thirty-five million tax dollars a year to inoculate these primates for the sake of research. Then, when their truck runs off the road and these monkeys are on the loose, nobody is real quick to come forward and claim them. The whole thing is just bananas.
Great Post! 😂😂