8.12.2010

Narcolepsy?



Youtube description:
We had this wild gray squirrel in our back yard that I could never get on film that kept passing out. I finally left the video camera on the kitchen counter on a regular basis trying to catch it on film. Over a few months of filming I was able to get two minutes on film. The amazing thing here is that it lived in 80 foot tall trees and we saw it for a period of six months.


Actually, I don't think this is narcolepsy. It just looks like the squirrel probably has a screwed-up inner ear, which makes it have terrible balance. Narcolepsy would make the squirrel fall over because it fell asleep, but this squirrel continues to eat seeds when it falls over. So I think its sense of balance is screwed up. Like, you know when you spin around for two minutes or however long it takes you to fall over, and then you're like "Oh! Hello floor. I thought you were over there," and everything seems like it should be shifted about 130° to the right? Yeah, I think that's what the squirrel probably feels like all the time. Sitting up for a second or two would be achievable, but then everything shifts again and you fall over.

Anyway, via.

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