Kung Hei Fat Choi

Happy Chinese New Year, the Year of the Rat! Turns out that "Kung Hei Fat Choi" translates to "Congratulations and be prosperous." Sounds a little like Spock's "Live long and prosper." Which I always thought should be answered with, "Be fruitful and multiply." But I think I'm mixing a couple of things up.

These are my dearly departed rats, Ralph (brown rat) and Weencha (silver rat). They were both female rats. That really wanted a boy rat, but I knew better. We just made Ralph a tranny rat instead. That way we didn't have tons of baby rats to deal with.

Rats make excellent pets. I know that seems weird but they really do. Being social animals, rats love hanging out with their people. They will lick and groom you like you're just another of the brood. They are very smart. Weencha figured out how to open their cage, and was wise enough to never do it while we were in the room. After scolding the kids for a few days for leaving the cage door open, we set up a sting to see what really was going on. While hiding in the doorway, we watched Weencha jump on the cage door and throw her body weight around while biting on the cage for leverage, and unhook the clasp. Then she'd send Ralph out to forage for an enormous amount of hamsteroids -- a treat for rodents. I had scolded the kids for that too, telling them that they were overfeeding the rats.

My favorite rat story of all time though, is when my mother first saw our rats. She was totally disgusted by them. I told her that we picked them up from the pet store a few weeks before her visit. To which she asked in disbelief, "You bought them?"

I mean, what is the alternative? We went outside, trapped a couple of rats, put them in a cage and told the kids they were pets?

Anyway, I hope you have a prosperous Year of the Rat.

R.I.P. Ralph & Weencha, you are missed.