Gary the monkey

The year was 2002. It was the winter. I got one of those strange feelings inside, you know that feeling you get once in a while that says "go buy a hamster". Yea, well I woke up with that feeling and decided I should listen to my gut instincts. Perhaps God was relaying a message to me because that hamster would somehow play an integral role in saving my life. Maybe someone would break into my house in the middle of the night, and the hamster would see this thief and begin running its little heart out on the hamster wheel in an effort to signal to me that my life was in danger. A hamster wheel burglar alarm. I could put a sign up in my front yard that says my home is protected by a hamster wheel. Do you really believe that EVERYONE who has a burglar alarm sign in their front yard really has one, or even turns it on? I don't. In the words of Gary the Monkey, "it's a scam." But my hamster wheel would not be a scam. No sir. I bought that hamster... and a cage... and a wheel... and some cedar chips... and a water bottle... and a food bowl...and some food...and some bedding. Good god, how could a $5 hamster turn into a $50 shopping adventure? But I decided it was worth $50 if this hamster was going to save my life, so I spent it. We named the hamster Christy, after our roomate Christy who slept 14 hours a day and only woke up at night, despite the fact that all of her college classes were in the day. Since the hamster seemed to display similar sleeping habits we thought it was fitting. Weeks went by and nobody ever broke into my house so Christy (the hamster not the roomate) never had a need to trigger the alarm. One night, my roomate Adam decided it would be good to treat the hamster to something special besides hamster food because she had been such a good hamster. So he gave Christy some ice cream. I don't remember what flavor but I remember that hamster eating it up like it was Thanksgiving dinner. The next day we woke up and Christy the hamster had passed away in her sleep. She was hard as a rock. Perhaps from an incredible and unshakable sugar rush. Nobody will ever know. But what I do know is that we learned a great lesson that day. Don't feed ice cream to your pet hamster.

Oh yea, and don't catch wild baby possums and put them in your empty hamster cage, they make really loud shrilling noises.