Hamsters - This one is for Rebecca

FOR SALE: LOTS of hamster paraphernalia.
Cheap.

Thinking of purchasing your child a small pet for a present? Is this ALL they’ll want for Christmas? Do they PROMISE to be eternally good and never cause a single gray hair on your head if ONLY you will allow them this one small, tiny gift? Can they produce crocodile tears at the drop of a hat?

Do you think a hamster will be easier to clean up after than other pets? Are you suffering from the misconception that size will make a hamster easier to care for than a cat or dog or pet python? Before caving, consider the following:

1) Hamsters can be born pregnant. If they tell you they can’t “sex” them (tell a girl from a boy) at the store, it won’t matter to the hamster. THEY know the difference.

2) A boy hamster has more hormones raging in one leg than my son’s entire high school football team combined. Any reproductive specialist studying male infertility should examine a male hamster. THEY are the real experts.

3) Hamsters can reproduce almost bi-weekly. If the books tell you otherwise, they LIE. Remember your high school science classes? The farther down the food chain they are, the more they reproduce. I’m talking amounts AND frequencies. Just about anything will eat a pet hamster.

4) Hamster mothers can, do, and WILL eat their young. Child psychologists are now getting around $60 for a half hour session. Forget about the excuses you will be given by the 18-year-old pet store “expert” who will tell you this is all YOUR fault. Your child will have already explained to you that it was all YOUR fault.

5) Hamsters have long front teeth. Long SHARP front teeth. Sharp teeth that continue to grow for the entire life of the hamster. Hamsters are NOT vegetarians. They eat their own young, for corn sake, what makes you think they’ll respect yours any better?

6) Hamsters are NOCTURNAL. You may think you comprehend the meaning of that word. Let me help you:
a) It’s two a.m. You have been sitting, staring at your computer screen for at least four hours.
b) You have the worst case of epidemic swine flu ever recorded in the history of mankind. Medical science cannot help you because “it’s just a virus.”
c) You also have a month’s worth of lesson plans, reports, whatever, that needed to be turned in yesterday by 5.
d) You have been given a one-day reprieve only because your doctor wanted to hospitalize you, but you heroically managed to drag yourself to your place of employment, with his signature on a note.
e) NO ONE, I don’t care what they told you at the pet supply store, NO ONE has invented a noiseless hamster wheel. Plastic wheels, metal wheels, or the little balls that roll around on the floor; it doesn’t matter - they are NOT silent.
f) Endlessly repetitive, small grinding, squeaking noises have been medically proven to cause extreme mental instability when being forced to listen to for prolonged periods of time – like ALL night long!
NOW you comprehend the meaning of the word Nocturnal.

7) While the hamster itself may be a great pet bargain at $6, any piece of hamster paraphernalia that has “Habitat” on the box is going to COST you, BIG time. These will be the “habitats” that your child will NEED. Trust me, just like kids at Christmas time, hamsters like empty cereal boxes and old toilet paper tubes, WAY better. Habitats come in all sorts of designer shapes and colors. Your child will want his hamster to either be a “jungle” rat, a “space” cadet, or maybe even a “road”ster. These habitats are the exact same things you can buy at any Wal-Mart for about one-tenth the cost, but the “habitats” are what you will bring home. May I suggest you try holding your breath and closing your eyes when they give you the total. Remember, pet supply stores take credit cards for a reason.

8) The cutest accessories are the costliest and will best enable your hamster a means of escape. The “apartment” lid can be popped off in a matter of seconds. Most hamsters are EXTREMELY intelligent and wait until you aren’t looking to practice their feats of amazing canine (as in teeth) dexterity.

9) Hamsters LOVE to chew. Let me make this VERY clear. Hamsters can and WILL chew through whatever habitat you chose to purchase for them. Credit card companies will expect you to continue to make the monthly installments on habitats, even after the hamster is long gone. Have you ever had a mouse in your wall that you could hear crawling around at night while you tried to sleep? Hamsters, after they chew through expensive habitats, LOVE the inside of walls.

10) Purchasing a used habitat is NOT an option. Hamster “pee” smells like ammonia. Industrial strength, eat-a-hole-through-your-tennis-shoes strength, ammonia. Litter box odor is a joke compared to this smell. Your neighbors will be able to tell you have a new pet. Hamsters will pee in the same place all the time. They are NOT re-trainable in this matter. They should build dams with old hamster pee. Sand blasting will not remove excess pee from the sides of used habitats.

11) It has been my experience that hamsters have a life expectancy of about three weeks. Just long enough for your child to become good and attached. They will either expire or escape. Hamsters can think of hundreds of ways to become kamikaze hamsters. If you have a cat in your home, just forget about it. You will be expected to spend every waking moment watching your child’s dearly beloved. Humans require sleep. The hamster will choose one of these moments to carry out what they must consider to be their patriotic duty. Again, this will all be YOUR fault.

12) When younger brothers or sisters get excited, they jump up and down. Hamsters do NOT like to be jumped up and down. When they are bitten, little siblings will DROP whatever bit them. However, the sibling will continue jumping up and down. Hamsters, who normally live only weeks, can live LONG years crippled with broken backs. They will mournfully haul themselves around the cage by their two front legs while dragging the back two behind them, causing you EXTEME guilt and mental anguish, every time you look into the habitat. Hamsters CAN make facial expressions. I don’t care what your husband or friends suggest; you may not be capable of just “flushing it down the toilet”.

13) If you EVER plan on going anywhere again - they don’t make Hamster-sitters. Do NOT allow your child to hamster sit another friends pet hamsters. If your LUCKY this will ONLY be a death sentence for said hamster. There are MANY things worse than death.

14) Do NOT allow your child to hamster sit, especially if you have a bird. Even a small bird. Birds apparently can’t tell the difference between a hamster’s tail and a worm. Even a small bird’s beak is strong enough to pinch off a fat finger. Hamster tails are a lot skinnier than a fat finger. Hamster tails do NOT grow back!

15) Hamsters are omnivorous. Let me give you MY definition of that word. They will eat anything, and I mean ANYTHING! Houseplants are NOT the same thing as grass. The best looking houseplants also seem to be the ones that are filled with deadly toxins. While your child may think it’s adorable to allow his pet to have a “special treat”, you will be the one expected to help SAVE HIM as he convulses to death in your hands.

16) The $10-an-ounce specialty gourmet dinner food you were talked into purchasing by the “expert” at the pet store WILL be used as lining for the hamster habitat. I have never actually SEEN a hamster consume this feast. Just because their cheeks become swollen to twice their body mass, does not mean they are eating. If you think the empty food bowl means they are hungry, just clean their cage. You will find ALL $10 worth.

17) Hamsters can store HUGE amounts of food in their “cheeks”. Enough that it can become stuck in there. Trying to push it out will only cause further damage. Vets charge a LOT of money to help a hamster remove stuck food from its cheeks, even more to fix the damage YOU caused by pushing. You cannot reason with a hamster. “I told you this would happen,” doesn’t work on children or hamsters.

18) Hamsters (smart enough not to get their food stuck) apparently regurgitate their food into their bedding, hiding it from you. As previously stated, you will find it when you clean the cage. Take special note of the previous sentence. The words YOU should both be capitalized. Ammonia is a solvent. It can be used to clean acids. Strong willed children can hold out a lot longer than your burning eyes ever will.

19) The people who name hamsters have a bizarre sense of humor. The “Teddy Bear” variety can have a wicked temperament. The cuter the name, the meaner the temperament. Hamsters, unlike teddy bears are not cuddly. They really prefer NOT to be held, especially while they are trying to SLEEP. That’s why they hide all day and scurry under any available object in their habitat to get away from your child.

20) I don’t suggest you purchase the “So, you bought a hamster, Now what do you do?” book for another $15. If you really feel you need a book, go to the library. Either way, it won’t matter. I secretly believe hamsters can read, and those books are their idea of a GREAT joke.

21) Be warned. Grandparents are very good at “pay-backs”. They even have a word for it. They call them gifts.

I understand, believe me, I know how cute, furry, adorable, cuddly, and SMALL they look in the pet shop window. They will tug on those long forgotten memories of your own cute, adorable, cuddly babies. Why do you think God made babies so adorable? Would any parent procreate if we were all born looking and acting like a 16-year-old? You may be fooled, as I was, into thinking, “well, I guess they’re better than a rat.” Apparently God has a sense of humor.