Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Monkeys!

Well, I'd originally posted something else, but I've changed my mind because I dont want Toe Treading...

So instead, let's talk MONKEYS!

Monkeys are cool. I saw some in the wild in Cambodia. They ran across the road on the way back from Angkor Wat. I like monkeys.

Over here, they're just in the zoo. Or, more specifically, in Orana Park and Willow Bank (wildlife parks/zoo).

So yeah. I like monkeys.

How about you?

~Anna.

I've been bitten by monkeys twice, when I was nine and eleven - the first time it was a pet belonging to someone who was temporarily keeping it in our greenhouse, the second a pet kept on board a sailing ship at a Majorca holiday resort. I've also been bitten by rats, gerbils, cats, dogs, axolotls, xenopus toads, a grass snake, two or three different corn snakes, and a stuffed shark (dropped it on my hand and it landed mouth first and bit me hard enough to draw blood). Despite this I like animals...

Axolotls? I'd love to see them once for real! I think they're fascinating.

And xenopus toads... You're not working in genetics, are you?

I like monkeys. They're not my favorite critters, and the type of monkey that played Marcel (or was it Maurice?) on Friends kinda scares me. Actually, they all kind of scare me, but I still like them. Does that make sense? Hmm...

O.o I've never heard of an Axolotls. What kind of critter is that? (And no, it was my mom, not I, who was in Tennessee) Wow, you were bit by perhaps more different types of animals that I've seen. I've been bit by cats, dogs, and bugs. (In basic training, I was bit by this green bug, and for the next couple days I had this fear that my hand would swell up and fall off. There was also sleep deprivation, but that had nothing to do with the bug.)

I don't work in genetics, but I'm an educational lab technician and until about twelve years ago my school kept several types of animal for use in lessons etc. (not for dissection - we wanted to give the kids hands-on experience of handling and looking after them). Unfortunately it got increasingly difficult to keep them - safety regulations limited what we could keep, and what we could ask the kids to do, the syllabus changed away from hands-on work, and a vast increase in the department's work load meant that the technicians had no time to spare to look after them, so we had to find homes for everything elsewhere.

Axolotls are basically salamanders that keep their external gills throughout their lives. They're interesting biologically, and we had some success breeding them, but I personally found them a bit boring and didn't want them at home, so we ended up giving them to London Zoo since they needed more for their breeding programme. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axolotl for more on these animals.

These days I have some corn snakes at home, and occasionally give school lectures on snake biology etc., but I miss having the big range of animals in the school.

I saw this really cute video of a chimp scratching its rear end, sniffing its hand, and fainting off a branch.

My mom was on a business trip in rural India when she walked under a tree. A monkey happened to be in the branches above her, and it peed on her head!

At IMAO, Frank J has been having problems with monkeys. The third edition of his State of the Frank Report details his harrowing adventures.

It's funny...no really, it is.

Growing up, we wanted a monkey. My brother very much wanted a monkey. One day, we happened to stumble upon a pet shop that had a monkey for sale.

Yep, you guessed it.

We got a puppy.

Who then chewed up all of Mom's shoes, so we had to get rid of the puppy. See what happens when you don't get the monkey?

So instead my brother got a stuffed monkey puppet type thing. He loved his monkey very much. So much that he wanted to share his name.

Jim and Jimmy shared many adventures, but alas, one day, Jimmy went the way of Puff, and eventually languished in the Closet of Forgotten Toys.

Maybe it's a good thing we didn't get a monkey.

I've always wondered about the plural of monkeys. Why isn't it monkies? Because you've got pony and ponies, not ponys.

Maybe I'll ask my linguistics professor that one. :p

Sara (who, speaking of linguistics, needs to get to her homework)

Re monkeys as pets - something to remember is that monkeys are VERY communal animals, they typically live in large troops, not as individuals or pairs. So any pet monkey you encounter is almost certainly in a weird psychological state, if not outright insane, through being deprived of the company of other monkeys. That's one of the reasons they tend to be aggressive and destructive if they get the chance.

I once watched a docco where they removed the fear glands from monkeys to study the effects. These monkeys were so awesome, you could put snakes in their cage and they'd start playing with them!

Monkeys rock! I wish we had them in Australia, I'd totally get one as a pet.

Why not get a bathroom monkey ? If you're lucky, you might be able to get a good deal on shipping.

I can help you with that one - it's one of those linguistic tidbits that a Swede may know, when she has no idea about so many other necessary things (like, what preposition should you use with this particular noun in this particular expression? Or what on earth is an axolotl anyway? Thanks for the link, Marcus - what a fascinating little critter! Lucky you who have been bitten by one!!!)

Anyway, the plural of monkeys is spelled the way it is because there is a vowel before the last 'y'. Therefore, the correct spelling is monkeys, keys, days, boys etcetera. But you spell ponies the way you do because there is a consonant before the last 'y'. Therefore, the correct spelling is ponies, families, factories, flies etcetera.

Ann