Alas poor Figgy ...

'Link up your funniest post' she said - 'Make me laugh' ...

God Robo - don't you know I'm a self depreciating English girl and I'm not allowed to admit that I might be funny sometimes??

So, well, yeah, I was going to link up 'F*ck, I've killed the cat' but I thought you might find a story a bout a dead hamster more amusing .....

Linking up with Robomum for The Lounge this week.

There's nothing worse than thinking the hamster's dead and then discovering that the hamster is indeed dead ...

Now I've been here once or twice before so when Miss Mac made the sad pronouncement I was ever so slightly sceptical.

I went upstairs and together we contemplated that fat little hamster for a while.

"Poke him Mum, see if he moves"

"No, YOU poke him, he's your hamster".

"You poke him"

"I'm not poking him!"

"Well, I'M not poking him"

"I'm a kid, you can't make a kid poke a dead hamster ..."

Bugger it, she had a point.

I poked him ...  He didn't move ...

I still wasn't convinced.  If I'd buried that bloody hamster EVERY time he was dead ...

"Let's just leave him for a bit and see what happens".

"Mum, Figgy is dead, all that's going to happen is he is going to carry on lying there being deader!"

In exasperation she picked him up and turned him over.

"See!".

Poor Figgy remained curled up in a stiff little ball of fluff, his little hamster teeth grinning at me as though to say, "I told you I was dead". This time it seemed he wasn't messin' with me.

It was time for another hamster funeral ...

Unfortunately I'd broken my spade whilst ...  well, you don't really need to know how I broke it. Anyway, I had a quiet word with SD who promised to bring one round later and even offered dig the hole for me (although that may have been nore in the interests of keeping his spade intact).

We chose a spot in the garden under a bush and SD being careful not to dig up road kill (dead bird - another story ...) set to work whilst Miss Mac and I pondered on the best material for a hamster coffin.

I like to be a little inventive with such things so Rascal, (Miss Macs first dead hamster who was a ginger colour) is buried in an orange mobile phone box (geddit?? ).  Sir Frederick Fluff Balls was buried in an (empty) coco pops box (coco pops look a lot like hamster shit).

We rifled the recycling to see what we could use.  SD having finished digging the hole came to 'help'.  What about this he asked pulling out the cardboard inner from an empty kitchen roll.

"SD, I am not burying the fucking hamster in that, it'll look like a bloody Christmas cracker!!!"  Added to which Figgy was slightly larger than the cardboard tube and Im buggered if Im going to try to shove a stiff hamster up a hole that's too small (say NOTHING ok, this is a VERY serious matter!!).

Eventually we fashioned a box from part of a cardboard box with lots of sellotape, filled it with sawdust, laid poor Figgy in it and taped it up.  We sat for a moment, each thinking out different thoughts when that fucker Bear (our cat of little brain) jumped onto the table, skidded and sent poor Figgys coffin flying!  Lots of shouting scared the crap out of that bloody cat and he shot outside whilst I reverently picked Figgy up and put him gently back on the table.

"Mum. have you got him the right way up???"

Ummm, well actually I didn't have a clue, we may well have buried Figgy upside down but I assured Miss Mac that I did indeed have him the right way up and off we went to the garden to finally lay Figgy to rest.

You know what I said about the shouting scaring the crap out of Bear ...?

Well it seems hadn't. Well, not quite ALL of it anyway.

That bastard cat was busy excavating his bowels very loudly and very pungently in poor Figgys newly dug grave!

I will never forgive SD for not appreciating the solemnity of the occasion and laughing until he cried.

Miss Mac will never forgive either of us for not appreciating the solemnity of the occasion and laughing until we cried.

Figgy hopefully doest give a stuff that the three of us did not appreciate the solemnity of the occasion and laughed until we cried.

And Bear, well, I have decided that I shall have him creamated when his time comes and (in an act previously only reserved for ex lax) scatter his ashes in a cat litter tray so that he may be crapped on by a multitude of cats!