Chimps Gone Wild/Uma Thurman Goes Undercover

A few days ago, I read a story about a guy who was horribly maimed by two chimpanzees. I say horribly maimed as opposed to just plain maimed, because these chimps weren’t messing around. They ripped off his fingers, one of his feet, his nose, his buttcheeks, and even his balls.

I never really thought of chimps as being the kind of animals to go around laying into someone like that, but this recent bit of news has got me rethinking things. Oh sure, a chimp might get a hold of a big bag of baking flour and make a powdery mess of your entire kitchen. And when a carefully arranged, free-standing tower of soup cans is mysteriously toppled over, leaving cans of delicious and healthy soup riddled with dents and scattered across a grocery store aisle, there is usually a chimp to blame. But I rarely think of chimps as really pushing the envelope in the asskicking department. Orangutans? Sure. Gorillas? Absolutely. But chimps? They’ve just always seemed so happy-go-lucky to me.

As the story goes, the man and his wife were having a birthday party for a chimp who was living at some sort of chimp sanctuary (a home for wayward chimps). Apparently the chimp used to live with them until he decided to bite off part of some lady’s finger a few years back and the couple decided it was either lose the chimp or never have a dinner party again. The chimp was 39 years old. I never think of chimps as ever being that old. It’s just that they seem so youthful all the time, what with the crazy faces they make and all the jumping up and down. File under: “You learn something new every day” I guess. Some day I want to make a poster for people to hang in their office cubicle or basement rec room that would show a bunch of chimps climbing on a jungle gym, swinging on its bars, and falling to the ground. At the bottom of the poster it would read “Let the chimps fall where they may!” This is just one more way I will get really rich some day.

Anyway, I’m getting off the topic. Back to the angry chimps. I guess what happened is a couple chimps that weren’t invited to the 39th birthday party for the finger-biting chimp mentioned in paragraph three got really mad about being snubbed or something and snuck out of their cages to wreak havoc on the guy and his wife who were throwing the party. The couple and the birthday chimp were all sitting around enjoying big slices of chimp-themed birthday cake when - as they say when such things take place- all hell broke loose. The angry chimps tore the man to shreds as the birthday chimp watched on in horror, confronted with the knowledge that next year he’d most likely be receiving a card at best. They even managed to rip off the man’s wife’s thumb while they were at it. That in itself seems pretty insane, but when you compare it to the fact that her husband lost his fingers, ass, nose, foot, and nuts, the whole thumb incident seems relatively minor. In the years to come, I imagine the couple will sometimes forget to mention the lost thumb when they retell the story at Thanksgiving and other major holiday gatherings. The lady might try to pick something up and drop it and then her husband will casually say “Oh yeah, and my wife’s thumb got ripped off too! I tell you- that was the craziest birthday party I ever went to!” Then his wife will nod in agreement while thinking back to a day when she had both thumbs. “Those were good times. Those were good times. Oh, how I long to grasp something.” she might think to herself.

I guess if there’s anything to learn from all of this, it is this: chimpanzees can be really great when it comes to roller skating or detective work, but when they don’t get invited to parties they can be seriously uncool about it.

In other news, last night I watched a movie in which Uma Thurman and Juliette Lewis pretend be to a couple of trashy girls who use a lot of hairspray and smoke and drink a lot in their free time. In one scene, Uma Thurman gives this one guy a blowjob. He acts like it’s no big deal because he’s probably thinking “A blowjob? Don’t mind if I do! Sure this girl is really drunk, reeks of cigarette smoke, and is wearing way too much makeup, but- hey- I guess I gotta take it where I can get it. Right?” I’m sure if someone would have told him it was Uma Thurman underneath all that lipstick and Final Net, he’s be singing a different tune, but-seriously- you could hardly tell it was her. Later in the movie, Uma Thurman tries to get the guy to like her for real and he’s totally not into it. It just goes to show- it really is all about presentation.

I didn’t see the end of the movie in which Uma Thurman and Juliette Lewis pretend be to a couple of trashy girls who use a lot of hairspray and smoke and drink a lot in their free time, but the last thing I remember was Uma Thurman’s mother bought a bunch of new furniture and they were both pretty psyched about it. As for Juliette, I can only hope things turned out alright for her too.

Dave Hill