# PIKA PIKA (The Alpine Potato) [Intro: Spoken, deadpan. Sparse bass, single cowbell, dry drums] High in the Grand Tetons... there lives a potato. Not technically a potato. Ochotona princeps. A lagomorph. Which is a rabbit with a better publicist. [Two sharp guitar stabs] Pika. Pika. [Verse 1: Dry rhythmic spoken delivery, funky bass groove] Little round body on a big gray rock Furry baked potato with a biological clock No visible tail, got a serious face Running a hay operation in a very cold place Cuts the grass, lays it out to dry Stacks it in the talus for a winter supply Doesn't hibernate, doesn't migrate, no time to play Somebody touches his hay? Somebody's gonna pay [Chorus: Shouted group vocals, driving dance-punk groove] PIKA PIKA! Potato on a rock! PIKA PIKA! Running out the clock! PIKA PIKA! Making hay all day! Put it in a pile, put it all away! Hay! Hay! Hay! Hay! [Verse 2: Spoken, educational] Now. Coprophagia. From the Greek. [Band stops] He eats his poop. [One cowbell hit] Not regular poop. A cecotrope. Fermented in the hindgut. Loaded with B vitamins. Second pass through the system. Every calorie counts. [Band returns, tight and funky] It's perfectly natural. Please stop looking at him like that. [Chorus] PIKA PIKA! Don't you judge his food! PIKA PIKA! That's incredibly rude! PIKA PIKA! Making hay all day! Eat it twice in a scientific way! Hay! Hay! Hay! Hay! [Bridge: The pika's perspective, first person, same deadpan male voice. Surf guitar, wah, tongue-click percussion] Three p.m. I'm checking my hay. Something is standing on my rock. Reptiles are rare above nine thousand feet. This one is wearing a dress. Her tongue is six inches long. It is pointing at my haypile. [Band stops] Eek. That's my alarm call. It means "lizard woman." It also means "weasel." I have a small vocabulary. [Band returns] She's licking my sedge. That sedge is my winter. Ma'am. I eat my own droppings to survive. Do not test me. [Build: Staccato guitar, ascending organ] Tiny ears! Tiny feet! Built for snow! Not for heat! Seventy-eight degrees and he's done Furry little furnace hiding from the sun! [Final Chorus: Full band, gang shouts] PIKA PIKA! Potato on a rock! PIKA PIKA! Lizard on the block! PIKA PIKA! Making hay all day! Put your tongue away! Put your tongue away! Hay! Hay! Hay! Hay! [Outro: Instruments drop out one at a time. Spoken, deadpan] In conclusion. The pika is not a potato. It makes hay. It eats its own feces. It has repelled a lizard woman. Nature is beautiful. [Single cowbell hit] [End]
