Bigfoot and Brain Surgeons

The list of things I’ve never understood would be far too long and far too boring for me to even attempt to write out. It would include things like osmosis, Lewis-dot structures, geography, and the appeal of the new Narnia movie(s). There is something, though, that has been bothering me more than any of the other varied and wide-reaching subjects that I know less than I could about, and that is the question of whether or not people who have part of their brain removed can feel the difference. I don’t mean feel the difference like know that part of their consciousness is gone (although that would be interesting to know too), I mean know the difference by the weight of their heads. When the surgeon removed the lowest rib on the front, left hand side of my ribcage, I was able to tell as soon as I was really conscious that there was something wrong there, and that still hasn’t gone away, even though it’s been almost six years since it was removed. I would assume that it would be even worse in your head. But maybe not, I guess there aren’t any nerves inside the brain itself, so perhaps you wouldn’t even be able to tell that it was missing.

I’m sure that if I cared to, I could learn the answer to my question fairly quickly, I mean, google doesn’t fail me often, but I’m not sure I care to find out just yet. Some of the best thinking I’ve ever done has been internal debates on subjects which I could easily find out the truth with minimal effort, but chose not to. Even when I end up being wrong, I think that the exercise of wondering if is important, and I know that it helps me make connections between subjects that never would have occurred to me otherwise.

The other day, I was thinking about how gorgeous mule deer are. They have this big glassy eyes, and ears that are comically large, and that jelly-bean body up on those knobby-kneed stilts. They’re amazing; I could fawn all over them for hours. There was a little zoo in the mountains near my home which had an exhibit of mule deer, and they would come up to the chain-link fence and lick your hands (probably for the salt). There were also some bison there, and I always got the impression that those big, beautiful beasts could walk right through the fence if they wanted to. There’s something thrilling about being at eye-level with an animal who’s forehead is bigger across than your hips, and having it look at you with all of that calm curiosity. There’s something alien about the way prey animals think, and they way they look at you.

I’ve always wondered that about bigfoot. I mean, he’s supposed to be an upright ape, and is often touted as the missing link (in Oregon..? but I guess I shouldn’t be picky about geography when I’m talking about bigfoot) but would he be an omnivore or an herbivore? I suppose he could be a predator, a carnivore, but given his probable evolutionary history, I think that’s unlikely. I would put my money on omnivore, and I bet his diet is a lot like a bear’s. Not a polar bear, more like a black bear, or a grizzly; someone that eats mostly plants and fruit, but wouldn’t object to a little fresh venison once in a while, maybe even the occasional rainbow trout.