I have an improvement for you.
Sell the elephant dung!
N.B. Don’t rush round offering it to all and sundry. Start by hinting you might be able to lay your hands on some of this **exotic fertiliser **. Once one person buys some, swear them to secrecy. (That will spread the word better than paid advertising!)
P.S. I want four elephants. I want to play a living chess game and they are the rooks. (The word ‘rook’ in chess is believed to be a corruption of ‘rukh’ - the Persian for ‘chariot’, so elephants do make sense.)
Y’know, it occurs to me that a tapir is pretty close to a tiny elephant. Maybe we should concentrate on making a longer trunked tapir instead of a teeny elephant. (But we’d also have to do something about those 5 foot erections!)
In the book version of Jurassic Park (or possibly one of the sequels – it’s been awhile), Ingen Corp spent quite a bit developing puppy-sized elephants. Most were genetic failures, but ever since reading that I’ve wanted one of those little guys quite badly.
You mean like this? (Daisy apparently sells a historically-incorrect version of the Red Ryder air rifle with a compass in the stock and a thing which tells time, as inspired by A Christmas Story, but I can’t find it on their website.)
Finally, the truth comes out! (Well, someone had to make a joke sooner or later.)
And the one that did live was quite ill-tempered and bit a lot, and also caught colds frequently - which it eventually died of, if memory serves. (Hmm…I guess from Crichton that counts as subtle foreshadowing that genetic manipulation of large vertebrates might have unintended and uncontrollable consequences, eh?)
But think about the poor elephant. I mean, can you imagine having a cold if you’re an elephant, even a cute little mean biting elephant? Blowing your trunk has got to be one of the most disgusting and difficult endeavors ever.
and they are the rooks. (The word ‘rook’ in chess is believed to be a corruption of ‘rukh’ - the Persian for ‘chariot’, so elephants do make sense.)