Captain Hamsterpants Is In The House!

With the loss of Cutie Moody, the purchase of a new hamster was imminent.  We've had lots of critters around here.

See?  

Jacob had decided he wanted to buy a mouse this time.  The Doc said mice freak him out and said he had to get a hamster. I was rooting for the mouse purchase, myself, because they are a lot easier to tame.  If you have read this blog in the past, you might remember what a pain in the tushie Cutie Moody was when we first got her!  That story is here and here.  In her defense, she turned out to be a great pet!  She just took a month to really get used to us.

When we got to the pet store, we didn't even look at the cute little mice.  We checked out the djungarian hamsters since that's the type of dwarf hamster we have had in the past.  They are cute little boogers but not too cuddly.  The teddy bear hamster cage was full of fluffy things.  It looked like that episode from Star Trek with the Tribbles.  See?

Photo from Photobucket

I'm serious.
The gal at the pet store told us one of the teddy bear hamsters was already very tame.  After our experience taming Miss Moody, that sounded very appealing!  So, she boxed up the hamster and we drove him home.

On the way home we named him Captain Hamsterpants.

The first half of the ride, the little guy made all sorts of racket.  At some point, the inside of the box went dead silent.  Jacob looks at me and says, "I think he's dead."

We get home and prep the old hamster cage for him and he still makes no noise.
Weird.

We open the box, and he looks like he has broken his neck.
He doesn't budge.
Jacob starts freaking out.
Internally, I'm in full panic.
I look at Doc.  He shrugs.

I nudge the Captain.
Nothing.
Not a single movement.
Again and again I nudge his lifeless body.
Not a thing.

Dawn sent me this pic!

As I reach in the box and lift him up, he puts his little paws by his face and does this.

From Photobucket

I swear I'm not even exaggerating.  I have never in all my rodent experience seen one play possum.
I yell a word that starts with S and drop the sucker back into the box.
The Doc and the boys just laugh and laugh and laugh.
Once I got over my initial shock, I grabbed that fat bastard and put him in the cage.
Then I changed my pants.

At this point,  we realize that he is significantly bigger than our previous rodents and his cage is too dang small.

He's a little big for the house, too.

The Doc keeps saying, "Why did we buy a rat?"

We already own 4 cages for small critters, but it was back to the pet store for another cage purchase for us!   And just so you know, I couldn't find a single large cage for under $50.  This was helpful information when I was able to tell the Doc that I scored a $15 clearance cage that wasn't yet marked.

I told them I wasn't sure about a tall wire cage because our previous hamster climbed up the sides and fell all of the time.  The salesman assured me that teddy bear hamsters are not the acrobats that djungarians are.

Um... okay.

So much for that theory!
But the good news is that The Captain no longer plays possum and is really quite tame.
No one has been bitten.
And this boy is in love.

And that is all that really matters.