Curious George

We have a pet monkey at our school. We'll call him Scrappy.(I will provide a picture soon). He was captured in the neighboring forest with a trap that sliced his left forearm off. I feed my disabled friend bananas through the wires of his cage. I have been talking with him for 6 months now and I've recently begun taking him out of his cage (with a leash of course) and taking him for walks. He seems to enjoy these breif glimpses of leashed freedom and he has only attacked one child. The child was frightened but only sustained a few minor cuts and bruises.

Two weeks ago, during a walk, we passed a group of children playing soccer with a ball made of wrapped up newspapers and wire. Scrappy joined in the game. At first he tried to eat the ball but soon realized that wire and paper don't taste very good. Then the little bastard started kicking the ball. Obviously he had no idea in which direction to kick it but he really enjoyed the excercise and made some new friends. Turns out he's a ladies man. He kept on slapping a little girl on her ass after she kicked the ball.

We also have a blind man at our school. We'll call him George. He lost his sight at the age of four but seems to get along just fine. He is one of the smartest men I have ever met and he has an amazing memory. I feed my disabled friend by reading to him current newspaper and magazine articles. He enjoys politics and I am currently working on creating braille scrabble tiles. He is good at forming the words but he's awful at placing them on the board. I told him he needs to work on his motor skills.

I figured one way to help his coordination was to get him doing some regular excercise. I tried playing soccer with him but it wasn't much fun because he can't see the ball and his stick always gets in the way. One of the children took the stick in the eye and went home crying. Then I tried to think of a more formidable opponent and the first name that came to my mind was Scrappy.

We set up a miniature field with a 4 foot high plywood wall around it- so Scrappy wouldn't run away and George wouldn't get lost. The match drew about 200 spectators. As a volunteer I am not allowed to act as a bookie but I employed a witty 12 year old kid to handle the bets. We gave 2-1 odds in favor of Scrappy. The match was to consist of 2 twenty minute halves. Sadly, we only made it through about the first ten minutes before we had to issue two red cards which ended the game at a 0-0 draw.

Our first problem was that we used a real ball. Immediately Scrappy bit it and popped it. Then he threw it at George and hit him in the face. He quickly ran up to the tall man and wrestled the walking stick out of his hands. George started throwing punches but wasn't even close to connecting since the monkey is only three feet tall. Then Scappy proceeded to beat George's legs with the stick until he fell to the ground. Scrappy's mistake however came at the eight minute mark when he jumped on George's face and started poking at his eyes. George grabbed Scrappy's only arm, got up onto his knees, and started beating the monkey into the ground. Then he pulled the helicopter and began swinging Scrappy in a circle above his head. He did this for about a minute then let go and we all watched the primate fly a good thirty feet. He was dizzy when he stood up so he was easy to catch and throw back in his cage.

George suffered a few bites on the forearm, a badly bruised eye and a broken walking stick. Scrappy suffered a minor concussion and a disclocated clavicle (collarbone). Our mistakes are clear. Next time we need to use a newspaper/wire ball and no walking sticks allowed. We may need to tape Scrappy's mouth shut so he doesn't bite George again. I predict the next rematch will be a success. I will update with the results. My money's on the monkey.