Here�s Hambone pooping on my toilet. Does that make up for two spongy entries?

In a further attempt to make up for it, let me tell you a story about the time I asked my dad to pick up some toy mice for Hambone.

At this time I hadn�t lived in Chicago long. I successfully navigated the block and a half to the grocery store, found Ace hardware to paint the stars in my bathroom, and found my way to my job interview. I had gotten lost on several rollerblading excursions, and I was more concerned with finding my way home than with what and where different store locations were.

I may have found the essentials (Ham eats grocery store-brand food and turns his nose up to the $14 bag of Science Diet), but I certainly didn�t know where to find the toy mice Hambone loves so much. Since I knew he was a little down about not having a balcony to lounge in the sun on or being able to go on walks (it was 13 degrees on a warm February day), I wanted to surprise him with his favorite toys.

I know that I got the little pink mice with the loooong tails from Wal-Mart in Texas. Surely there would be a Wal-Mart here too.

I looked up Wal-Mart in the online Yellow Pages, only to find that it was in what I was told is the hardcore ghetto. My search for Target showed that it was hardly accessible by public transportation.

(Who would have known that K-Mart was right down the street from me, completely accessible from the #70 bus? I thought they got rid of all of those stores by now...)

(Parenthetical remarks -- I embrace them as I do the semicolon.)

So I gave my dad a call and asked if he could pick Ham up some pink mice with the loooong tails and mail them to me whenever he got a chance.

�No problem. I think I have to go to Wal-Mart tonight with Boy.�

(Yes, we call my brother �Boy�. He�s the only one, and I guess it just stuck. Also, we all have completely unrelated names as nicknames that aren�t weird names, per se; they just aren�t related to our given names whatsoever. I�m called �Miss� for probably the same reason Kyle is called �Boy� -- I was the only one for a while, so it stayed around even after Jen was born.)

(Ahh -- parentheses and a semicolon. I wipe a tear from my days as an English Writing and Rhetoric major...)

(Anyway, back to the story now...)

The night I was out at dinner, so I missed my cell phone call. When I finally checked my messages, Boy was on the voicemail:

Hi Joanna. It�s Boy. Dad and I are at Wal-Mart right now, standing in front of the mice. What kind was it that Hambone likes again? We got confused when we saw how many mice there were. There are red ones with fur, glow in the dark ones, blue ones with feathers, brown ones with raw hide, green cat nip ones, multicolored hippie ones, ones that promise to smell like a pigeon�s ass...

So, uh, call us back within a few minutes or we�ll just randomly pick some out.

I opened the package (any package opening is a big deal to Ham because he thinks he�s going to get more food... Come on now! He is fifteen pounds!), and I dangled a little tan mouse by his tail.

The hunting instinct was unleashed, and Hambone about took my hand off when he leapt up to attack the little furry toy. Within the first fifteen minutes, Ham ate the rawhide tail. And then for the next several hours (and throughout the night, of course), Ham was on a safari, assaulting that mouse like he was a Hussein son angered by someone�s sneeze.

What is my baby kitty capable of? Look at that sweet face:

Well, let me show you the damage done within that first afternoon: .
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At least I know if I ever encountered actual mice in the house, he�d take care of me.

Oh yeah -- I added myself a snazzy new notify list. If you wanna get updates on when I update, add your email address and I'll let ya know!�