Ever wonder what a chipmunk is thinking when it is running across the road and stops asymmetrically in front of your car? It is quite obvious that if the chipmunk had continued running it would have reached safety well before you arrived at that spot in the road.

We try to guess which way the chipmunk will go. We hope the chipmunk is near enough to the other side of the road that the chipmunk will suddenly continue on and safely reach the other side. Or we wonder will the chipmunk decide that with a giant automobile hurtling in his or her direction the conditions for safe passage across the thoroughfare is rather poor and turn around too run for whence it came. We then wonder, what is the chipmunk thinking?

We imagine that the chipmunk seeing the car suddenly realizes that his/her demise may imminent and trys to plot the best course of action to safety. Yet the chipmunk freezes, and then we are tasked with trying to evade the chipmunk. This is hard for us to do as the chipmunk may choose any number of actions. The chipmunk may turn around hand head back to safety, then realizing that the other side is actually nearer, turn around again. Or the chipmunk may actually realize that safety is only a few feet away, and continue on. Or despite safety being only a few feet away the chipmunk turns around to head all the way back to where it started. Then remembering that it wanted to cross the road, the chipmunk returns to compleat its original journey. We are then driven into a mental chicain, swinging the steering wheel back and forth trying to predict the chipmunk’s thoughts in what is a life and death situation for the chipmunk.

Because chipmunks have such small brains I surmised that they do not have much processing power. Those moments when the chipmunk freezes are when their little brains are overwhelmed. They need time to reboot and reprocess the information. In essence they are trying to do the time speed distance math, without knowing the math.That is why they dart back and forth. Evolution has not given them time to process the changing world around them. Evolution has not given the chipmunk a reaction to the looming automobile. Crows on the other hand are very good at this task. They may be eating a bit of roadkill when the automobile approaches, their little brain easily does the math and the crow flies away unhindered. Their advantage may be their evolutionary calculation development needed for flight. The chipmunk processor is simply unsuited for the task at hand, it freezes and then reboots. To be fair to the chipmunks of the world, they do this task faster than most of processors built by mankind.

Lately I have come up with another theory. That is the chipmunk is completely oblivious to automobiles. The chipmunk does not actually see automobiles as a threat. Most chipmunks survive automobile encounters. Never has an automobile actually stopped and ate a chipmunk. What chipmunks are doing is natural chipmunk behavior. For example, where did I leave my nuts? What will I have for dinner. Yes I did see a cat over there. Caution hawk above! Yes, where did I leave my nuts again? I must find them. They are here, or there. Check out that cute chipmunk. Yes I will share my nuts.

Of course there are those stories of spontaneous chipmunk flattening. It is said among chipmunks that some will spontaneously flatten in the middle of the road. The more intelligent chipmunks believe that it is some sort of death ray emitted by the hawks above, as the hawks will come from the sky to eat them. There are stories that crows can also do the dirty deed. That is why they like the open road. Chipmunks have learned to run and zig zag to avoid the raptor death ray.

It is tough being a chipmunk.

Where are my nuts again?

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