sedativegunk

This creature either proves the Great Creator has got a wicked sense of humour or He is a cruel bastard who, in His hurry to create the world in six days, didn’t think everything through or was out to humiliate a truly lowly and pathetic critter. The oweataa is rodent sized animal that is too weak, slow and stupid to defend itself against anything. So it’s forced to live its life out in the trees shivering in fear of its own shadow, waiting until nightfall comes when, under cover of darkness and some seriously odd behaviour, it can actually foriage for food. When its hunt begins it announces itself to the world through ear splitting, comical and sexually suggestive screams to scare away every living thing in a 10km radius. The first time someone hears this one thinks one has just been dropped into the middle of an African porno set. Then you realize, no, this is just a critter of the non-human kind.

Through some determined research on our part over the next few days, we found out from the locals that this small animal utters these orgasmic screams over and over again until its throat bleeds. The blood falls to the ground, attracts ants and the oweataa then climbs down to eat them. So after all that disruption, the oweataa is only capable of mustering up…ants. Nice going. When is there natural selection when you need it?

I realize this is probably not resonating with most of you out there, but I felt I had to write about this experience on behalf of my Habitat team. Needless to say, when the locals later asked us if our team had a name for a local event we were going to participate in, our choice unanimously was Team Oweataa. The locals found our choice nutty.