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The trio...

I had a monkey. Yes, a real monkey! You forget many things from when you’re 4 years old, but I won’t forget my monkey. Its name was Skippy. That was before the TV series about the kangaroo Skippy. I think we got the name from a brand of margarine. Maybe the kangaroo did too. I also had a dog at the time. For the dog, we had a very un-African name, Trickur. It’s a very common dog name in Iceland. I also had a tricycle, and we had a real long porch in front of the house. It was so long that I could really pick up a good speed from one end to the other. Needless to say, the dog had fun tagging along. The monkey however, got bored fast by pacing back and forth. Monkeys are smarter than dogs like that. Instead the monkey jumped onto my shoulders and hitched a ride. It was quite a trio that spent hours back and forth on that porch.

The monkey was real scared that the dog would steal its food. No wonder, because the dog did steal its food! The problem was solved when the monkey discovered that it could fit the whole meal into its cheeks. Then it would climb up high and clear of the dog. The problem now was that its cheeks were so full it couldn’t chew. Problem? Nah. It punched its cheeks with a fist just hard enough for a sizable amount of food to pass from the cheeks into the mouth. When that was chewed, a new punch....

The monkey occasionally bit me. It was simply jealous. If my mother had cuddled with me, it would be waiting for revenge, and when I least expected it, it would spring on me and bite!

I don’t remember the name of this type of monkey, but I do know that in nature, this type of monkeys get a regular spanking from their mothers when they don’t behave. My mother tried to make use of this method to get the monkey house-clean. When she caught the monkey making it’s business on the floor, she would come storming (she knew how to come storming), get hold of the paralysed monkey (it would freeze when she came storming), give it a good spanking, scoop up the business, throw it out the window and throw the monkey out after it.
This happened several times up till one day. The monkey had done its usual business and she came storming. The monkey froze for a moment. Then it started spanking itself! The next minute it scooped up the business, threw it out the window and jumped out after it. That was the last time it did any business indoors.