2001-02-22 - 23:59:38

Breakfast Hamster

Well, I got an unhappy surprise this morning.

I sat down at the kitchen table to eat my breakfast, and I noticed Cleo, the hamster that lives in the kitchen lying face down in the middle of her cage. She was dead. She was the oldest hamster in the house, but she was only 19 months old.

She's looked fine when I saw her the night before, but it can happen that way sometimes: frisky one minute, dead the next. Poor little thing.

Throughout the day, when I'd walk through the kitchen I'd look into the cage and find it empty, then I'd go: "Oh yeah, nobody lives there any more."

Cleo was the ideal hamster to live in the kitchen because she was so willing to wake up and cutely beg for treats when she sensed that someone was in the room. In fact when more than one person was sitting at the table she'd go BANANAS until someone dropped some food on her. The trouble was that often when we were eating dinner, it would be something we couldn't feed her. No, Cleo, Pork Fried Rice is not for little hamsters.

In spite of how friendly she seemed, she didn’t like being picked up that much, at least not by strangers. She actually bit Peter, Lilac's husband when he was visiting here a couple months ago. And with him being such a deft hand with animals and everything. I think she was pissed that he hadn’t offered her anything to eat.

So right now there are no hamsters in the kitchen, and it definitely feels kind of lonely there now. I'm thinking of moving one of the other hamsters in there. The prime candidate is Small Fry, because he is such a cheerful, lively fellow. However, I hate to deprive Lily of his presence in the Library where she has her computer.

So, for now, the space on the kitchen table is empty, and I have no company in the morning when I eat my breakfast cereal.

Goodbye, Cleo.