We had a giant schnauzer named Zeus and he was a fun loving dog who wouldn’t harm a sole including other small creatures too including the new member of our family Harry the hamster.
One summer afternoon I came home with Harry because a friend of mine was moving out of state and couldn’t take Harry with her, so I took Harry and gave him a new home at our house. Zeus loved Harry from the first moment he saw him and wanted to play with him but Harry didn’t want anything to do with this.
Maybe because Harry was a bit smaller that Zeus?
Though there was one thing my friend never told me and that was that Harry knew how to open his cage and get out and explore the house during the day while I was at school. Because when I came home in the afternoon Zeus always had that mischievous look on his face and Harry was always in his cage looking terrified and the cage door was open.
So as you can image I always gave Zeus a little lecture about leaving Harry alone and that under no uncertain terms should he let Harry out and play with him! This went on for weeks and the more I scolded Zeus the dirtier his looks got as if to say:” I didn’t do anything you idiot!”
I really couldn’t understand the situation and nor could my parents either.
Well one day there was no school but Harry didn’t seem to notice this fact and that sneaky little Harry just opened his cage with a couple of paw movements and there he was free to roam the house and Zeus just looking at him from the corner of his eye from his dog bed.
Harry made a run for the kitchen were Zeus’s food bowl was and stole some dry dog food and took off towards the dining room where he expertly hid it behind the buffet and darted back again to the kitchen. This went on for about 20 minutes until I put a stop to it and put him back in his cage and all I can say is he wasn’t too pleased to be caught. I think I ruined his day. I wasn’t really sure how much dog food he had hidden behind the buffet because it was a large solid piece of furniture that you couldn’t move by yourself. Though I will admit I never told my parents about this little incident because if I did that would have been the end of Harry.
Anyways, a couple of weeks past and then one day Harry wasn’t in his cage, so I looked behind the buffet and he wasn’t there and I searched the whole house but no such luck. Then I thought maybe Zeus got mad at him and killed him, but there was no evidence of a battle between the two of them. But at night you could hear some activity in the house because Zeus was wandering around or running after something, but I was never able to catch Harry – he was a really fast hamster!
Then one night when everyone was asleep it happened. Harry decided he needed a cozy place to sleep because I guess it got a bit cold for him behind the buffet and thought he would search for a warmer spot to spend the night.
My parent’s bedroom door was open just a crack (you guessed right) and so Harry thought wow that bed looks warm and somehow crawled under the covers and then there came a scream from my parents bedroom and Zeus charged in and jumped on the bed barking his head off all the while my mom screaming her head off and my dad shouting something (not to be repeated here) and I came charging in to see what happened. Well that sneaky Harry decided to sleep on my mom’s foot and as you can image if you are asleep and feel something like that; it can scare the living daylights out of you and it sure did to my mom!
The dog was on the bed when I can into the room barking at my mom’s feet and my dad was trying to pull Zeus off the bed and get him to stop barking; but to no avail. After things calmed down my dad put Harry back in his cage ( Harry was frozen in fear when he got caught in the bed and couldn’t move.)And locked it up with locking wire and said that Harry had to go by the end of the day or else.
Poor Harry I thought, but I did manage to give him to one of the boys in my class and I naturally never told him that Harry knew how to open his cage. Though, after that incident I wasn’t allowed to have any more rodent type of pets in the house. I wonder why ???????
sue romeiser 