Homo Sapiens, a review. (Extract)

As a lean, mean, tree swinging machine, as was popular amongst the primates, Homo sapiens failed dismally. As he did in the large, fearsome and massively strong department so recently made all it’s own by the gorilla. With it’s very threatening presence yet quirky, gentle vegetarian “new ape” persona and easy access to it’s feminine side, along with excellent nest decorating and childcare skills, gorillas were a strange foretaste of things to come for our hero.

Back to Homo sapiens, his gait and musculature were nothing to write home about but seemed adequate. As long as walking further than the chemist, running, jumping, fighting, balance, agility, grace, endurance and strength weren't called for too often or for too long. As he was prone to offer only disappointment in these areas if pushed.

His ears tended to the large and comical end of the scale, as did various areas under the obscenely naked dermis, put aside for the storage of fats in case of a rainy day. Full colour binocular vision of medium resolution, adequate but non directional hearing and a truly bargain basement sense of smell were his too. This last one surprising seeing as it was housed in one of the largest proboscis ever seen amongst it’s closest relatives, although to be fair the flat face doesn’t help.

Opposing thumbs and with fingers both agile, sensitive and strong now freed up from locomotion and available for use even when walking or running meant keeping aforesaid proboscis clean was, unfortunately, their main occupation. This was widely thought of as a bad thing, but considering the trouble those same hands would get him into later on, it was probably a blessing.

The lack of a prehensile tail, opposing toes, warm, protective body hair and half decent teeth would be bemoaned by the creature at some length in it’s future.

Yet this bemoaning and bad feeling engendered by such omissions would be strangely offset by the inexplicable, obsessive interest, childish delight and millions of years of the same bad jokes and innuendo he found could be had with the end product of a novel addition on the female. A somewhat humorous, and as she would say often and loudly, impracticable, representation of a female primates rump constructed from fat and placed on the chest just under the nipples. (Only two nipples though, another omission this time bemoaned by the female with litters greater than two.) This novel addition to the female was due, it's been conjectured, to the odd mating habits of the creature and one supposes a change in plans at the last minute.