I don't know about you, but I've been thinking a lot about giraffes lately. In fact, I'd venture that I've thought more about giraffes in the past few weeks than I have in the previous decade.

"Why?" you ask? Well, there's a long answer and a short answer.

The long answer is that a few weeks ago, during my turn to helm Discourse's "What Now?" newsletter for subscribers, a reader emailed in asking me which animals I considered "dumb." Not stupid, or of low intelligence, but existentially dumb. And, as an example, this reader offered the humble giraffe. I didn't give it much thought at the time, but over the course of the following weeks, I arrived at a stunning conclusion — one that happens to be the short answer: Giraffes are awesome.

Here are some things I've learned about giraffes recently:

Did you know that giraffes can decapitate a lion? A lion!! Just ~ POW! ~ kick its head right off. And lions are big! Like, ten-feet-long-quarter-of-a-ton big. Does that matter to a giraffe? No. Giraffes are deadly, and will simply kick a lion's giant noggin clean off the rest of its body. Imagine what it could do to you (also kick your head off).

This brings me to the second thing I learned about giraffes recently:

Giraffes can kick in every direction. Every. Single. One. All of them. Name a direction —  a giraffe can kick in it. Now, imagine an animal strong enough to kick the skull off a lion, but doing it everywhere. Giraffes are like a horrifying panopticon of being kicked to death. There is no escape. Just a whirlwind of hooves coming at you from all over. Sophie may look innocent, but in reality she is an omnidirectional murder machine.

Oh, and when they're done kicking the shit out of you until you are quite simply dead?...

Giraffes will feast on your bones. Or anyone's bones, really. Because that is something giraffes do: they chew on bones. Officially it's a nutrient absorption thing, but I think deep down it's really about looking extremely cool and mean. See?

One more thing:

Male giraffes taste female giraffes' urine to before mating to determine fertility.

I have nothing more to add. These are just some things I've learned about giraffes recently. Now you've learned them too. Blog over.