Sleepy Sunday: Mouster Awakening
Mood:  down
Now Playing: I honestly can't think up a
Topic: Chinese Mouse

Sleepy Sunday — Mouster Awakening

HI I AM INDEED depressed and sleeping a lot. At least Chipper got back in touch (thank you). I'd begun to think that was one Christmas card list I'd got well and truly struck off. I'm glad he is okay. He seems to do more travelling than I'd imagined. That must be a knackering life, though.

Mousey cheered me up at an undignified hour of the morning. I shoved him up my sleeve in the night where he slept. Then at 6am he decides to get up. Not just awaken & wash his ears, but go pinging up and down my arm at a manic rate of knots. I closed right hand round left sleeve to prevent escape. He pushes at this with his nose: nudge-nudge-nudging. Eventually I let him out. He will not sit still. Madly he scrambles all over my hands. Eventually I had to put him in his proper house as I was scared I'd fall into a slumber with him tearing around my bedroom like a furry Scalectrix.

This afternoon my French American friend Pascal came round. He said I want to take Mouster to the vets because his balls are too big. I said no that's what they're supposed to look like. They are the size of hazelnuts, which, let's face it, on a Chinese mouse is not that small. I'm not wasting money for a vet to tell me that.

I did have some gear today so I'm not depressed because of that situation. Methadone Sundays are always miserable days. Mother Hubbard didn't want me round her house, as I said earlier. I found out this was because she had family round (about 4 grandkids + adult kids) so there wasn't enough Sunday lunch to go round (fair enough). I had dry old chicken shop Tenesee thighs instead. Boo-hoo! No I'm joking I love surthern fraahd chiihken. Me and Pascal called round quickly on our mutual friend Lucky then I saw Valium Marilyn briefly so it's been a busy day in that sense. I still feel down in the dumps though. I'm glad I have the mouse to amuse me. He is more entertaining than a giant cactus and Homebase were doing them on special offer at the time. If you're thinking £10 is expensive for a mouse it's because he's a special desert Chinese one with pouches (ie a hamster) who's supposed to eat live locusts (did you see that answer below?!?) and garlanded vegetables. I don't know about the live insects but I'm going to get him a giant stack-&-store box or something of that ilk to reside in. That should be big enough to kit out with branches &c for climbing because "Chinese hamsters love to climb" as Jennifer the expert reminded me.

The smallest pet I've ever had, by the way was a £2 aquatic frog. (I have to mention the price as he was such an entertaining bargain.) He lived in a tank full of tropical fish and was just big enough to be able to span a 5p piece (about the size of a 1¢, our littlest coin) with his undignified widespread legs (like a gold-toothed gypsy woman I once saw on the bus, they go wide open). He was about 1½cm long fully grown. Dark green—nearly black. He hid at the bottom for half an hour letting air bubbles out of his mouth at 5minute intervals. Then he'd frog to the top, gulp an air refill and plunge straight down again. Like a mini diver (not to be confused with the actress: Mini Driver) in the tank. He loved attacking dried tubifex worms. Yeah, he was cool my frog. And we had a colour-change fish that looked like a stealth bomber. Flew around the tank like a ribbon. Used to stick to the glass like a snail. (A Borneo sucker.) She was called Nubia: the only fish I've seen who could swim vertically down the bubbles stream.

I'd love to get tropical fish again. Everyone said the tank was beautiful, like the pictures in the books. All banked up properly with an underwater forest. An aquatic Garden of Eden. (I also get told my dinner looks like a serving suggestion; I'm a bit of a perfectionist that way.) 

Just realized how many things I have not posted you. Like my monumentally bad 4-at-once 1st time acid trip. My cold turkey detox at my Dad's house. The one I wouldn't even confess to what was wrong until day three... My massive OD. And so on & so on... Many things I do not wish (to be honest) even to recall right now... But I will post them all up in good time, my friends. I promise you. Okay then, I'm knackered; I gotta go so good morning/afternoon/evening/night/bye—Gledsx

AllExperts.com Replies!!
Mood:  bright
Topic: Chinese Mouse

Subject	Sleepy Chinese Hammy
Question	I have a Chinese hamster (male). I got him when he was a baby. He is now definitely fully grown, coming up to 3 months old. He is really tame and good natured. There is nothing physically wrong with him as far as I can discern. The problem is, he seems to spend 24 hours in bed! He doesn't like running the wheel, though I've given him the choice of 2. He lives in an aquarium 10"x10"x18" obviously alone. I've given him a huge range of empty tea-boxes, toilet tubes etc to play with. He just seems only to want to exercise when I take him out and let him run around on me. But even when I let him up my sleeves-- he falls asleep there! Please help me! Is there something wrong with him? Can I change his behaviour? Do I need to? Is he just naturally "laid back"?
Answer	Hi, thank you for your question. It imght be that he's active very late at night, some hamsters don't get up until 11 pm or even later. He might be bored with the cage, change one toy every week to give him new impressions, smells ect. (the house should always stay the same, though). Add branches, twigs and leaves (hazel, aplle, pear, willow, oak, beech, birch, as long as not treated with pesticides), Chinese hamsters love to climb. Scatter his food in the cage, he doesn't need a food bowl - they are used to foraging for food and a bowl is boring for them. Hide food and treats in the boxes or thread his vegetables on a piece of string so that he has to climb to get to it. Live insects are also great entertainment, when the hamster will eat them live (I recommend small locusts because they cannot breed in the house when they escape). If you can get a bigger tank, then definitely do so. In my opinion, the minimum size for Chinese and dwarf hamsters is 24" long and 12" wide and high, this give you room to add second level, a high layer of bedding and the hamster will still have enough room to climb. I hope I was of some help to you Jennifer
AllExperts is a FREE service, but if we've helped, you can pay it forward ... by rating this answer! This way, you help future questioners by guiding them to the best volunteers on this site. BTW, once you rate this answer, you can send it to yourself in an email.

Chinese Mousiness
Mood:  cheeky
Now Playing: with the Beijing Opera
Topic: Chinese Mouse

Okay, skip this posting if you're not into hamsters... 

Chinese Hammy Photo Gallery Links.

So you can understand why I call my pet "Mousey" when he's a hammy...

And to see what he looks like—

Click the following links herebelow...

http://goto.glocalnet.net/natal/ham/chinese.htm — I'm putting this one at top because Benji looks just like my Mousey.  Note the platypus-tail. That's his gonads under there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Hamster — the original and best Wikipedia description. The hammy illustrated, though is a "white spotted," whereas mine comes in normal natural colour. To see a rather unflattering snap of what he actually looks like (when stressed) click below. My hammy's on the left.

http://www.petwebsite.com/hamsters/chinese_hamsters.htm — my Mousey's pictured on the left.

http://uk.ask.com/web?q=pictures+of+chinese+hamsters&qsrc=1&o=322&l=dir&dm=all — a gallery of gleddymousey pixx, including one newborn...

http://www.aub.dk/~zannie/hamster/dwarf.htm — a whole gaggle of dwarf hammies, Chinese included...

http://www.hamsterhideout.com/breedschinese.html — another comparison; a gledwood one and a white...

http://www.hamsterific.com/ChineseHamster.cfm — "a Chinese hamster is sometimes called a Mouster"...

http://www.midlandhamsterclub.co.uk/hamster/chinese.html — the (UK) Midlands Hamster Club has some really good online info for glorified-rat-with-pouches-o-files...

http://members.shaw.ca/petitepaws/chdwf.html — a photo of a Mummy with really cute babies. The accompanying text is particularly perceptive for anyone thinking of buying a pet or wanting tips on handling. These animals are very easy to keep but you need to know e.g. they're extremely shortsighted, they orient themselves by sound, whisker-impressions and smell, etc etc just some things that seem very obvious when you know the animals but may take some getting acquainted with... 

OK this is my last hammy link but one:—

                                                                            *******

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Gerbils-Hamsters-2005/Wobbly-Chinese-Hamster.htm — this Q&As page for all rodent-lovers is pretty much here for my own reference...

Of the hamster types available as pets I've had loads of Syrians (mostly as a kid) though about ten years ago I had my famous golden hamster Hammy (named after his hamsterness). He was much loved. My Aussie friends (who come from a country where hamsters are banned to prevent the influx of nonindigenous vermin) said he looked like a cartoon character! Hammy lived to the glorious (for a hamster) age of 3½. Four people came to his funeral (let's face it, that's more than many humans get) and sang All Things Bright and Beautiful. The hymn wasn't my idea (I love my pets but I'm not THAT soppy) but it was a beautiful song. A couple of years ago I had a Campbells and a Siberian winter white living together. Unfortunately the winter white died (of old age, I suspect; I bought them from a dodgy shop) and the Campbells, who was a tiny baby when I got him, was still grooming his dead housemate's fur, which was heartbreaking... Anyway my Campbells Condensed eventually ran to the wheel in the sky and now I have the Chinese Mouse who is the tamest pet rodent I've ever had bar none. If I pick him out of his nest (he has FIVE nests, lazy swine!) sleeping, cup my hand round him so just his head's poking out, he v often continues to doze, he likes to be stroked on his furry forehead... then eventually he wakes with a start, realizes he's not in bed and decides to go for a ramble. When he's determined to move there's no stopping this animal, but most of the time, I have to say (just as Wikipedia put it ) he does display an endearing gentleness of character. Remember I mentioned a disappointing attempted photo session because I just could not capture his true likeness... well the picture of Benji (click http://goto.glocalnet.net/natal/ham/chinese.htm) does sum up some of the Chinese hammy warmth of personality.

The only hammies I've never owned are Roborovski dwarves. Have a click on this: http://goto.glocalnet.net/natal/ham/raborov.htm they are tiny! And you can keep hoardes of 'em together! Which is so entertaining. Especially when you have one running the wheel one way and then another gets on, determined to go for a spin in the opposite direction...!

Good Morning
Mood:  chillin'
Now Playing: Barely Consciously...
Topic: Chinese Mouse
Good morning everyone. I am sat here rather tired out and nicotine-deprived. Mousey's in his nest. The proper one with cotton wool and sawdust, not the one called my elbow. -ey by the way is not to be confused with Mousie, my French friend who you will see leaving messages in here. I think French Mousie has always known about the Chinese Mousey. I wish I could introduce them. But my scanning abilities are rather dire and my last attempted rodent photo session was a disaster. I got loads of close-ups of a hammy with a dead worried face. (Yes, even hamsters can look worried. I have the proof on Mother Hubbard's mobile phone.) Perhaps one day I will manage to get a nice picture of the Chinese Mouse and I'll email it to the magickal village of Plumpiemousie where the midnight colours are inverted and all is funky, yet never druggie. Such an amazing place...

Mood:  lyrical
Now Playing: Soppy Mood
Topic: Chinese Mouse

LITTLE MOUSEY

(Even wino crackhead heroin junkies love their pets.)

"LITTLE MOUSEY"

Best performed by children's choir to the tune of "Little Donkey" with triangle, castanets and swanee whistle accompaniment. 

LITTLE MOUSEY

Little Mousey... Little Mousey are you

keeping warm?

Little Mousey... Little Mousey shelters

from the storm.

Outside it is cold and wet.

Raining... Raining...

Haven't you got out of bed yet?

Lazy... Mousey!

Little Mousey... Little Mousey, I will

keep you safe.

Little Mousey... Little Mousey;

tiny but so brave!

Rambling and pinging time.

Naughty... Mousey...

He's escaped the Little Swine.

Naughty... Mousey...

Little Mousey... Little Mousey...

In your nest of fur.

Little Mouse, escape the kitten;

in her dream she'll purr.

Dream of catching Little Mousey.

So I'll reprimand her!

You are my entertainer.
...;-)

Little... Mousey!

Pinging, velvet, covered in fur.

Little... Mousey.

Little Mousey... Little Mousey,

it is now the time...

To say goodnight and sleepy warmie...

Dreaming of my rhyme...

                                      "Aaah!"

Mood:  lyrical
Now Playing: Responsible Adult
Topic: Chinese Mouse

HARVEY THE CHINESE HAMMY'S GROWING UP FAST. In hammy years he's already hit his teens. He has an adult coat all sand-coloured and the same bristly "mane" across the shoulderblades that tomcats and other male mammals get.

I've taught him a couple of tricks. He grabs my finger by the back legs and swings down like a bat. If nothing's worth dropping for he reverses back to sitting position without ever putting a foot wrong.

He climbs the flex of my mobile phone charger housemouse-style. I'm saving up to get him a proper mouse-cage with bars for climbing because I think that stuck in an old  fishtank — and not being into wheels — he must be bored.

He will still relax in the folds of my clothing, or even sleep there. He gets a good hour of supervised exercise each night. It is very closely monitored, though. Since last week's jailbreak I'm on full alert for all his escapological antics.

I love my Mousey — but when he tries to escape he is a bloody swine.

HIGH SECURITY PRISONER ESCAPES!
Mood:  incredulous
Now Playing: Jailer
Topic: Chinese Mouse

HARVEY, THE CHINESE SWINE, made a jailbreak last night. The hour was 5am GMT — his nightly ramble time — when the swine made his jailbreak — rushing my sleeve to freedom. & gaah! — no sign of the rodent.

    Ten minutes passes. I have not to be frantic because this will frighten him off.

    Then his vole-like face emerges by a can of lighter gas under my bed. On first glimpse, believing he is tame,  I lunge at him and he pings away. He's so depressingly quick and agile I am despairing.

    Now I know what that dark "dorsal stripe" is for. It is a chipmunk-style go-faster stripe. And it works.

    And now I've frightened him, he's vanished well and truly. No sign of the escapee at all. I go out and get a cyder to calm my nerves.

    Off goes the normal light, on with fireglow bulbs. His fishtank is sideways on the floor, tempting him with food and water and his own bed.

    And suddenly, poppy-eyed and chipmunk-nimble, the swine reappears.

    The smell of his own bed is too much to resist & bang — I caught him.

    Ears down and pentinent He ckulks back to his nest, cussing to himself , "Drat — back to a life-sentance of four glass walls and a diet of glorified muesli."

Harvey Hamster
Mood:  energetic
Now Playing: Chinese Whispers
Topic: Chinese Mouse

"Hi, my name is Harvey the Naughty Chinese Harvest Hamster. If my owner was bright enough to scan + add my mugshot, it would be right here↓→."

Okay I've let the mouse speak. I've always been one for pets of the rodent variety from syrian hamsters (the big tubby ones) to "fancy" mice, Campbell's Condensed Russians to Winter White Dwarves (the last two are practically the same).

Harvey is still a baby. He was sold to me as a girl and I'm glad I double-checked their facts just for my own information. Girl hammies have 2 holes close together; boy hammies have 2 pink dots further apart. Eventually as they mature they develop unfeasably large testicles à la Buster Gonad from Viz magazine. (A hamster's testes are as big or bigger than his head!!)

Being a baby he still sleeps a lot of the time. I have to say that from the minute I bought him he is the tamest pet I've ever had. While his cagemate pinged violently from corner to corner, Harvey just at still on my hand, peering goodnaturedly at the action. (Hamsters, mice & rats are extremely shortsighted, hence the old expression mouse sight, meaning "myopic".

Because they dislike direct light (even lamplight), I put fireglow bulbs in mine. Little rodents can't see by this so to him it's near pitch darkness when the room is lit a peaceful red. His ears prick up to the max and he pings to & fro up my arms to shoulders and down again — 5am being peak time for him. By daylight he is tucked up in bed and practically unrouseable.

As I say, a Chinese hamster is nothing like a tubby Syrian hammy. For one thing, he's about a quarter of the size and a tenth of the weight (if that). He does look to all intents and purposes like a mouse with a 2cm twiddly tail & black stripe down his back. His fur is "ticked" all over (ie. black-grey-brown) and a far richer colour than the ordinary house mouse's dull coat. His tummy is white with black undercoat. With his big poppy eyes he looks more like a European woodmouse than anything else. And as the websites say, he does hug my finger with all fours, just like an English harvest mouse. (hence the nickname).

Harvey is called a hammy not a mouse because he does occasionally use cheek pouches. But they're never enormously packed to overflowing like the golden hamsters' of my childhood. Plus (another oddness) — he will not run the wheel. Even when I hooked it over the side of a chair three feet up so he's nowhere to go but round the wheel, he spent most of the 20 mins peering down at the fallbreaking pillows I'd arranged below, wondering if a grand leap to freedom was worth the risk. When I did persuade him to tread the wheel, with coaxing: "come on, come on!" he did it so gingerly and unenthusiastically I eventually let him down. Never in my life have I met another hamster who hated wheels!

Well that's enough about Harvey. He's currently drinking from a Coke bottle lid because his waterbottle's broken, so I'm going out to get a new one now.

L8Rs,

        G.

---

---

---