Knuckles

I promised to post another true hamster story. Here it is, and it's really sad.

Once upon a time there was a little girl called Lois, who happens to be almost my step-daughter. Lois had a hamster called Nibbles. Nibbles died. Nibbles was found with her little paws locked in a rodenty little death-grip round the bars of her cage. Rigor mortis had set in, and the only way Lois's mummy could get Nibbles out of the cage was to break Nibbles's little fingers.

At the funeral, Lois suddenly realised that she'd never been photographed with Nibbles. In the days when decapitation was considered to be the punishment of choice, heads were sometimes sewn back onto bodies so that a last portrait could be painted. In a similar manner Lois, face trembling with a brave little smile, was photographed holding a stiff liitle hamster with broken knuckles.

Hey - "Knuckles" is a good name for a hamster.