Dinosaur Discoveries

Shalampax is not known for its scientific discoveries. Truth be told, it's not known for much of anything, but least of all scientific discoveries. Thus, there was considerable excitement in the Shalampaxian scientific community (three people who meet Wednesday afternoons to down a few steins of beer while discussing mathematics, physics, astronomy and the best places to find porn on the Net) when Mudinyoureye, a young Shalampaxian, announced that he had found a complete Bruhathkayosaurus skeleton fossil on Shalampax.

Bruhathkayosaurus is one of the largest, possibly the largest, creature to have ever graced this planet. (If you can refer to a dinosaur that probably weighed more than 90 tons as having "graced" anything.) How did Mudinyoureye find such a large dinosaur fossil on Shalampax territory? That's a boring story, but since we don't have anything that passes for exciting here, we'll tell it anyway.

Considering that he was not a paleontologist, amateur or otherwise, it should come as no surprise that Mudinyoureye's discovery was completely serendipitous. He was secretly digging underneath the subbasement of Shalampax's building because, as he solemnly declared, "I wanted to tunnel my way out of this God-forsaken place." Needless to say, Mudinyoureye is an idiot because reaching the land nearest to Shalampax at even the most ambitious of manual digging speeds would have required thousands of years. Fortunately, he had enough sense to stop when he realized that he could earn considerable fame and fortune through his amazing discovery. You see, after excavating only a few feet, he came upon a white, bone-shaped object.

Being bone-shaped was the the most natural thing in the world for this object to be because it was, in fact, a bone; a bone from a Bruhathkayosaurus to be exact.

Ignoring the normal Shalampaxian impulse to use as soup stock any spare bone that one comes across, Mudinyoureye decided to be more careful in his digging from that point on. Paleontologists would thank him for his caution, but, in reality, he did it mainly because he had been looking for an excuse to ease off on his tunnelling efforts and this seemed to be as good an excuse as any. Over the course of several months, he gradually uncovered the complete fossilized skeleton of the mighty Bruhathkayosaurus that served to make him famous.

Mudinyoureye was not, and to this day is still not, an educated man (he thinks higher education has something to do with studying altitude), but he knew that he had discovered something important.

After excavating the the complete skeleton, he shipped a photograph and a single bone sample off to the learned, esteemed Paleantological Institute for Scientific Studies Into Noteworthy Gossip (PISSING) for analysis. After careful review of the evidence, the PISSING scientists confirmed that Mudinyoureye had definitely found something, but they had a few questions, including, among others:

At the time dinosaurs roamed the earth, Shalampax, a pitiful little upthrust of land that is barely wider than a Bruhathkayosaurus, had probably not yet thrust up and, therefore, was almost certainly well below sea level. Considering this, how did a fossilized Bruhathkayosaurus skeleton come to be found on Shalampax?
Close examination of the picture that Mudinyoureye sent showed that his Bruhathkayosaurus specimen has a jaw shaped exactly like the jawbone of an ass. This is has never been seen in any of the other Bruhathkayosaurus specimens found to date. How can this be explained?
How is it possible to account for the fact that repeated attempts at various isotope-dating techniques all came up with a date of a week ago Tuesday?
What geological processes account for the chemical composition, which was identical to that of plaster of Paris, of fossil specimen sent for analysis?

Mudinyoureye responded to the PISSING scientists enquires by saying, "How the hell should I know? That's your job to figure out. I still haven't figured out how to open a twist top cap."

The mystery continues, but in the meantime, Mudinyoureye has already made hundreds of millions of dollars selling photographs of and bone samples from his find. Who knew that a Bruhathkayosaurus had 27,186 teeth (and counting)?

	Republic of Shalampax An Inane Island in an Insane World