Ciao Sesame

"Sesame may resemble a mouse at times, but she is the pet that I have chose and I am not going to just desert her because other people don't think she's cute and she's not some adorable little puppy. She is who she is."

Two years ago, on Dec.31, we fell in love with a little (don't call her a dwarf) hamster, teetering on her hind legs, trying to get a droplet of water from a bottle 3 times her side. Sis and I were at the Petco in Union Square trying to find our dad a birthday present (fish!) but were instantly distracted by the cutest little (don't call her a dwarf) rodent EVER. Now I know, I know. You hear "rodent", you think "subway track paraphernalia". But no, no, no. This one was different. This one had cute little buggy eyes and a twitchy little nose and a tail the size of a piece of cous-cous.

But I digress. Or rather, we tried to. We stuck to the plan and picked out the perfect fish tank (sans fish) for dad. And then, we looked each other in the eye with a glimmer only two sisters can share, and knew what we had to do. Get that hamster.

We left the starfish, passed by the gerbils, and made our way straight back to the hamsters. Now at this point, we sorta couldn't quite figure out which hamster was the one we had fallen in love with at first sight (ahhh, isn't that always how it is), but we finally decided it just HAD to be that one, with the white runner-stripe down her back, curled up in a pile of newspaper shreds in the corner.

"I don't think mom will let dad have her," Sis said.

"Well, my cat will eat her," I said. "Or use her as a badmitten prop."

We were silent. And then I said, "You."

"Me???"

"You. You have to take her," I said to Sis.

"Me??? But what will I do with her?"

"You will love her," I said, placing my hand on her shoulder. "You will care for her like she is your own. You will feed her little tiny food, and buy her little tiny toys, and fill her tiny little heart."

"But. But."

"Be the mother she longs for," I said. "Take her home to the home she always wanted for a home."

So, my speech kinda worked, and that New Year's Eve, one little (don't call her a dwarf) hamster was an orphan no longer.

As the ball dropped and the year turned into 2006, we christened her, Sesame, poetically named for her shape and color. Abstract, we know.

For two years, Sesame was cared for by my sister. When she came to visit me in Italy (my sister, not the hamster), we were very frugal about everything we spent. But one afternoon, during a historic, emotional pilgrimage to the Jewish Quarter in Venice, Sis found a pet store in the little shtetl and was uno momento away from buying a $15 wooden playground set for Sesame. "But she'd lovvvve it so much," my sister lamented, when she realized, to her chagrin, that she had spent all her euros already on "presents" for "people".

Nonetheless, Sesame was a spoiled, happy rodent. She was indulged in vegetables, exercise machines, multicolored grains and "treats". She was a camera hog, and a rabid shitter. She could maneuver her way across the hardwood floors in the Brooklyn brownstone she lived like no other (did we mention she was a hipster hamster?). She had her own blog. She had higher page stats than we had on our own websites. She was a star on youtube. She stood her ground against a dog named Lulu, found her way home again after many successful cage escapes, and was considered a world traveler. Well. Maybe not a world traveler, but she once spent a week in the Bronx.

Sesame made my sister happy. When she became a teenager and rebelled, my sister waited up for her. When she started going grey, my sister loved her just the same.

On Dec.30, I received a text message from my sister that said: Sesame died.

It's the end of an era.

And so, we bid farewell to Sesame, our teeny weeny companion. We're blessed you bit our fingers. We're grateful we never stepped on you. We're honored you always rolled the ball home again when we let you out of the cage in that big, plastic, yellow mechanism thingy.

Heaven has a new little (don't call her a dwarf) angel tonight.

New video up!

Guest Star...Dog Star

Tonight we have a special guest star - The name of the T.V. show is no longer "Sesame's House"...it is now "Sesame and Friends." Her name is Lulu and she is a puppy.

Hungry

Hungry is the word that basically sums up Sesame's whole personality. I stopped by Petco this weekend and was checking out other dwarf hamsters which really confirmed my suspicion that Sesame has grown much bigger since I purchased her, ahem, I mean, adopted her. She's a regular furry butterball now, and hungry. Very hungry. Her new favorite snack is dry Melba Toast - those hard crunchy crackers you would spread cheese on. She loves to incinerate pieces with her teeth leaving a fine mist of Melba Toast sand dust all over her cage. She also still insists on only urinating exactly next to her food bowl. I think the plastic is starting to erode. Here is a psychedelic picture of her in her hamster tower.

Scurry...Scurry....Burrow....Burrow

Sesame may not have been posting lately, that lazy hamster, but she sure has been busy. Busy cultivating her aggressive nature that is. I don't always have time to take Sesame out of her cage but I do always try to talk to her and remind her of my scent and voice so hopefully she won't go into attack mode if I do try and take her out.

Well, the other day I was chatting with my little rodent friend and she stood up on her hind legs with her nose twitching in over-drive to take in all the scents. So, I extended my index finger so Sesame could smell and without warning she clamped down on my finger with her tiny pointy incisors. I shrieked like a mad women and quickly jerked my finger back. I looked back down in the cage and Sesame was gone. Where the hell did she go, I wondered. Suddenly, my roommate started screaming, "She's on the floor, She's on the floor!" I quickly deduced what had happened.

When I jerked my finger back in surprise, Sesame, my ferocious little rodent friend, did not let go. Instead, she kept those sharp teeth of hers digging into my finger and thus was lifted up and out of the cage until she lost her grip and went sailing through the air. Now, after landing on the floor, she lay on her back with her legs sprawled in all directions trying to right herself. She was reminiscent of when a ladybug is flipped on her back and jerks and twists around in an effort to get up again. Sesame is not a bug and I would expect her to have better motor control than that but it gave me time to scoop her up and put her back in her cage. I observed her and she seemed to have no injuries at all from her flight through space. I think this is because she has no bones - either way, I haven't petted her since.

The picture is from happier times when she liked to crawl and poop all over my hand.

The Silver Sesame Screen

Press play to see SesameSeed in action in her very own hamster playground. See the carrot, see Sesame try and find the carrot, see the carrott evade Sesame.

Requested Picture

Well, Sesame Seed lovers and fans - if you've been paying attention to the comments section youwill see a request for what might be the cutest picture of Sesame ever. So , here it is, feast away oh you seekers of cute!

Her home?

I received a comment! Perhaps from another hammie owner...or are we really owners? More like caretakers. Anyway, Mr. Anonymous wants to know what Sesame's cage, or shall I say, hosue, looks like...I found a picture on Petco - Sesame's place of origin. Last night, using the tube technique, I held Sesame and let her crawl around my arms. Because she is clumsy and because I suspect she might be blind, she promptly fell off my hand onto my lap. I scooped her up again. Then I realize she had gone to the bathroom on my left hand so I walked over to the sink and washed my left hand as I held her in my right hand. But, because she is clumsy and possibly blind, Sesame tried to crawl backwards and around on the bottom of my hand - which is basically impossible so I had no choice but to grab her with my soaking wet left hand, lest she fall onto my dirty kitchen floor. I don't think Sesame likes wet hands.

Acceptance

Here is a picture of Sesame in her litterbox that she does not really use. New treats that Sesame loves: Baby carrots, stringbeans, edamame, and...pop corn. Mostly she likes to take her food and hide it in that pink tunnel you see pictured.

In other news, Sesame's playground arrived (I'll post pictures later) and my friends have finally come clean and told me they think Sesame is not only a rodent, but an uncute one at that. Sesame may resemble a mouse at times, but she is the pet that I have chose and I am not going to just desert her because other people don't think she's cute and she's not some adorable little puppy. She is who she is. Happy Valentines day.

Learning to Love me back...

What to do when the hamster you love doesn't love you back? Buy her more stuff:

SAM Tunnel O' Fun
SAM Small Animal Spiral Gym Bar
SAM Small Animal Gym-Bar Platform
Puzzle Playground - 60 Piece Kit

Roller Ball

Since I have described how much Sesame loved to play in her ball, I thought that for this post I would let pictures speak louder than words. Here is Sesame and her extra small critter ball in action, full speed ahead.

Ups and Downs

Well, this wasn't the best week with Sesame. She was reclusive and preferred to snatch her yogurt treat out of my hands and run back with it to her tube instead of eating it from my hand. Then, when I was preparing dinner I hadan idea. I was preparing corn on the cob and realized that Sesame might like some. I plucked off a few kernels and bought it up to her cage. The first one she nibbled from my fingers so I dropped the remaining kernels into her cage. Instead of eating them she began frantically digging through her bedding (for no real reason) and wound up covering up her kernels. So, I reached my finger in the cage and pointed out the corn and she bit me, hard! That's what I get for trying to give her a treat.

I was really upset but today was cage cleaning day so I didn't hold it against her and washed everything out and gave her new bedding and let her run around in her ball. Things were going really well, in fact, she let me pick her up right out of her cage which has only happened like once before.

Near Miss!

Yesterday was the day to clean out Sesame's cage. I placed her in a small white bin while I cleaned. She's played in this bin before and never was able to or even tried to escape. Just to be careful, I placed the bin up on top of my heater (it wasn't on). I went to the bathroom and was washing out her cage with hot hot water. I came back into my room just in time to see Sesame climb over the top of the bin and start creeping across the ridge of the heater. Now, I know Sesame is clumsy and I've seen her fall many times before just inside her cage and I knew that she if she slipped, as she is prone to do, she would fall all the way to the floor. I dropped her cage, screamed "Sesame, no!", and ran across the room.

Now, I've picked Sesame up several times before but have always been very careful and gentle about it. However, in my fright, I forgot and didn't have time to be as ginger as I usually am and SNATCHED Sesame up as quick as I could. I probably bruised her poor ribs when I grabbed her that hard. Not to mention the fact that my hands were still soaking wet from washing the cage and the water was probably a shock too. She immediatly began making sounds that I had no idea she could make. I didn't even know she could make a sound beside gnawing loudly on a piece of corn. It sounded like she was yelping, "Eeeeeehhhhhh, Oooohhhhh, Ahhhhhhh, Ish, Ish, eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee" I tossed her back into the bin. She was so traumatized by my brute force that she ran into her cardboard roll and hid. I was extra nice to her afterwards, gave her a yogurt treat and let her run around in her ball for a long time. I'm sure it's gone from her memory by now, but whew....., what a scare.

Solution

I've disocvered a way to keep Sesame's cage cleaner -I only fill up her bowl about half way instead of to the brim. I have to refill it more frequently but she doesnt spread it all over the cage as much. I think she was emptying the whole bowl so she could see what was at the bottom. Now I just let her see the bottom to begin with. I let her run around in her ball a little last night. She sure does like that.

Cleaning Day

I cleaned out Sesame's cage this weekend. I was really excited because my package from PetSmart had arrived and I had all sorts of new things to try out with her. Vegetable hamster waffles were a hit - the vegetable ravioli were not. They are just too big for dwarf hamsters. I had to cut it up for her. The "Chube" was also too big for her! So I cut it in half so I could actually fit it in her dwelling. She seemed to like crawling up on top of it more than crawling into it. The bedding square was a treat for her. She started clawing and scratching it up so much I thought she was having some type of epelictic fit. When I washed out the cage I put her in her too mini critter ball. At first she didn't seem to get it...but then she started rolling around and bumping into everything. It wasn't long before there was a lot of hamster waste rolling around in that ball with her.

When I put her back in her home I hoped she would learn to use her new hamster litter box but instead she had another fit when she discovered the litter and wouldn't stop until she had ferociously dug all the litter out and scattered the litter all over the cage. Since then she has dragged all her bedding inside the box and made it into a bed. Oh well. If it makes her happy. The weird thing is that she has finally discovered her wheel. Maybe it was being in the critter ball that got her used to the sensation of spinning because now she runs in it all time.

The only bad part was when she bit me. Maybe I was a little too excited to pick her up. She does seem to be really responding to my voice though and I swear her fur looks a little frazzled if I don't make it home till late. So her hamster home looked spotless and packed with her new toys. About an hour later it was trashed again.

Funny little creature

Last night I worked on my taming process with Sesame some more. She actually started crawling up and down my arm - which really tickled. But the silly hamster kept sliding off my arm and I had to keep catching her in my hand. Over and over. I just cleaned the cage and it already looks like a disaster again. Are all hamsters this messy???

I'm trying to figure out which corner of the cage she is using as her bathroom so I can train her once her hamster litterbox comes. At one point, I checked in on Sesame and I swear she was sitting on the floor as cross legged as a hamster can sit. She looked like a little old man. Then I watched as she tried to climb up to her food bowl but slid off the step and fell backwards. I've seen her fall a couple of times. I haven't seen her use her wheel but she sure does dig for seeds and burrow.

The Beginning

Today I came home and Sesame's cage was really dirty. I don't see how I could wait the recommended week to clean it. After doing research I have learned that because dwarf hamsters are a new breed, they are not domesticated, like regular animals. I essentialy have a wild hamster on my hands and research shows that if you don't touch and hold them all the time they will grow wild.

SO far, any attempts to hold her have resulted in nips. I employed one of the tips I read and fed her a treat from my hand. As she nibbled it I sang to her and petted her - and she let me! Then I got a toilet paper roll and she climbed into it and I picked it up and slid her into my hands. I held her for a littel bit then I put her in her carrying case and cleaned out her whole cage. Washed it off, put fresh wood shavings all over it.

When I put her back in, she went crazy, running all over the place and diving into the shavings. Then she ate and made a mess again. Then she went to sleep.

How To Spoil A Hamster

Small Animal Raviolos
Mini Rainbow Run-About Ball, 5" diameter
Hamster Outhouse Litter
Hamster Potty
Fluff N' Snuggle Nesting
Small Animal Crispi Waffles
Play Cube, small