Don’t Say I Didn’t Warn You if She Rises up and Kills Us All in Our Sleep

The Teenager and I made the trek to Petco yesterday to replace Honey the mouse. We originally planned on purchasing an identical (what? Don’t they all look the same?) mouse but plans changed when The Teen’s science fair partner received word from home during the school day; her mouse, purchased a day after The Teen’s at the same store, had just died in her cage for no apparent reason. The Teen and her partner had a quick conference with the science teacher and the decision was made to use hamsters instead of mice.

Having had some not-so-pleasant experiences with hamsters in my youth, I was less than enthusiastic about the idea but, being a weak and pathetic supportive parent, I got on board with the plan fairly quickly.

The first hamster The Teen picked was a Dwarf hamster which seemed innocuous enough a name for a hamster breed; it wasn’t until the Petco Guy stuck his hand into the cage to retrieve the hamster and it proceeded to gnaw his finger off up to the second knuckle that we decided that maybe that wasn’t the right hamster for The Teen.

The Petco Guy suggested that we choose from a cage of Roborovskii hamsters which he assured us are docile and non-biting and, I don’t know about you but I look for non-biting as a feature in all my pets so, we ended up with a Roborovskii named Audrey (I suggested Natasha or Irina or something more Russian-sounding but, The Teenager’s mind was set as is often the case with that one).

Audrey seems docile enough. She is somewhat cute and pretty quiet save for the noise she made running on her exercise wheel last night. All night.

This reminds me to have Hugh look into greasing that godamn wheel before it ruins another night’s sleep for me. And, I digress.

With any luck, Audrey will live a long (at least until the day after the science fair please, oh please, oh please) life, filled with happy moments with The Teen.

With any additional luck, she will not prove to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, intent upon escaping from her cage and killing us all in our sleep.

What? I said I’d had some bad hamster experiences in my youth.

Sure, she looks cute and cuddly but that's what they said about Ted Bundy.