The Case of the Missing Hamster

Monday, November 6, 2006

What a weekend!  Middle son’s hamster showed up missing on Sunday morning. He’d cleaned the cage on Saturday evening and forgot to lock it.  The little booger knows how to push the door open, which is why he has to keep it locked!

Here’s the story:

 So we searched and searched and finally went to bed, telling our son the hamster was bound to show up in the middle of the night by running across someone's feet. Not so. 

At 4 am, I was awakened by scratching noises. They'd gone on for a few moments I think, as I was between the land of gone and come back. As I drifted back to consciousness, I realized the sound was coming from the wooden TV table. About a second later, I realized it must be the hamster! I leaped up, turned on the vanity light so as to not awaken my slumbering husband....but the little critter had vanished. Bummer.

I decided to go back to bed and pray and try and get some sleep, all the while wondering how that little hamster got up all of those stairs and made it to the farthest room in the house! A bit later, I heard the scratching again. I crawled out of bed again, turned on the light, and .......don't hold your breath....nothing.

I crawled back into bed, prayed some more, tried to doze. About 5:12 am, I heard it again...this time going through plastic...and I immediately freaked. You see, we have a poster of our oldest daughter that I still had not framed, wrapped in heavy plastic beside hubby's desk in the room. I envisioned this hamster shredding away that poster; the very last poster of her competing in gymnastics....this was war! I jumped up onto the bed and pounced over hubby while yelling at him  "WAKE UP! The hamster is in our room!"....made it to the light in a flash...and caught the little booger, standing up on his hind legs on the carpet at the end of our bed as if to say, “Oh Lord...she's caught me and she doesn’t look happy!” 

Hubby quickly shoved the door close so she wouldn't escape! Then he went on one side and I on the other. He is now wide awake and yelling at me to catch the hamster....yeah right! The dern little critter was way to fast for me! As she scampered between my legs and headed off to my closet, I grabbed my cell phone and called the hamster owner who was downstairs in his bed dreaming the night away.

I heard a groggy, "Hello?" to which I screamed into the phone, "GET UP HERE NOW!!!"

1/10 of a second later he appeared in our room. (I didn't know the boy could move that fast!) I yelled at him that his hamster was in our closet and he needed to get her out of there please. She was so wound up every time he caught her she'd jump out of his hands, so I ran downstairs and grabbed her ball, ran back upstairs, handed it to him and she jumped right in. He promptly took her back downstairs, put her in her cage and locked the door. He said the poor little thing was just guzzling down that water!

I gotta tell you; I asked the boy...what were you thinking when you ran upstairs? He said, he thought something horribly awful must have happened and he'd better get up there now. Poor kid...he's probably traumatized for life. I still crack up every time I remember his look of sleep and surprise; I’ve been laughing ever since!