Stinkin' Rats!

Okay, stinkin' Fancy Mice! Our friends had a little mishap of gender identification at the pet store. They of course discovered this after their two female mice had 12 babies. As always, we had the best of timing and visited them just as the babies were mature and ready for homes. My second daughter, the 8 year old, fell in love with them. "Oh they're so cute. I'll take care of them, you won't have to do a thing, I'll clean their cage so it doesn't stink, I won't even cry if Frank (our cat) eats them."

We were strong and mature parents explaining that we already had two pets and little Nutmeg (our chihuahua) would be sad that your attention would go to the mice. After two days of her persistant optimism about caretaking abilities we softened like cowards and thought that keeping mice would teach her some responsibility. So, little "Marshmellow" and "Popcorn" came home with us after the girls went shopping with their own money for supplies.

The fun lasted for a couple of ....hours until their smell traveled from upstairs to downstairs. Did I tell you we had to get two boys? Someone else was smart enough to get the clean, non-smelly girls. Instead they marked and marked their territory until cute little Marshmellow turned into a Mafia Boss and left poor Popcorn on the rooftop of his Mouse House alone, hungry and afraid. The sound and the ruckus of Marshmellow's "hits" were shockingly violent. When Popcorn left some blood drops on my daughter's hand things changed for our overly-optimistic caretaker. Stress set in.

She broke down...crying from the situation. I'm scared of them, they stink and I can't believe I begged for them and spent all my money. When I asked if she wanted us to take these mean boys back to get a cute little hamster, she said "no, I just want Nutmeg and Frank." Perhaps it was a lesson learned. Of course she learned it faster than we did. I think this family will stick with dogs that resemble rats as opposed to the rats that resemble mean rabid dogs.