Job Offer: Someone Who Can Throw

This morning the monkeys were right back in their usual place, and I had no problem finding them. I guess they were tired of Spondias fruit and had returned to eat their normal foods. Collecting the leaves proved to be more difficult than I’d imagined. I’ve got this little “chain-saw” thing that you’re supposed to be able to throw over a branch and then cut down some leaves. Sounds simple enough, but my throwing abilities are clearly lacking. Plus, you’ve got to swing the rope around quite a bit in order build up enough momentum to throw the thing up over a branch. This was simple enough when I was practicing on trees in the yard at the Hacienda, but in the forest, there is no place free of branches, brambles, thorns, etc to swing the rope. In the end, all I got was a bad blister on my hand and a sense of frustration. I cut down some Madroño leaves—by jumping up and breaking some off of a low branch—but testing these leaves is not going to tell me a whole lot. First of all, the monkeys did not eat these leaves today, and secondly, when they did eat these leaves, it was from much higher up on the tree crown. But I figure it will be good practice for using the tester and can maybe provide me with some baseline data. I guess I will really have to have someone come out with me every time I want to collect samples of what they’re eating. This is frustrating but not the end of the world. I ask myself, in this situation: What would Pablo do? Well, he’s good at throwing things, so he wouldn’t be having this trouble in the first place. But ignoring that, I’m sure that Pablo would hire someone to help with this. I guess I will have to see if Simeon or some of his friends are good at throwing things and want this type of job.