Heather & Chopper's Wonderful World of ...

Chopper and I made a day trip to Raleigh to pick up wee Paisley, now six weeks old, and bring her home.  It made for a long day, but it was totally worth it.  Paisley is a wonderful little hedgehog: curious, bright-eyed, active, and with a good appetite.

Her mom is Winnie, who is a sweet girl, too.

We didn’t get to meet her brother, but her sister Penelope was being picked up yesterday, too, so we spent a little time with her.

Paisley even went to sleep on my hand when we were getting ready to leave.

She slept the whole way back to Charleston, as best we could tell, and thankfully, she doesn’t seem to have any problems with car travel.  (We have known hedgehogs who got carsick from time to time.)

Once we got home, we spent a little time letting her sniff and explore us on the sofa.

She was quite curious about her cage, which we’ve set up with a wheel, some toys, and a pile of blankets in the corner for her to sleep in.  She immediately took to the wheel, although she seemed to be as interested in gnawing thoughtfully on the crossbars as running on it as first.

Unquestionably, the funniest part of the evening was when she encountered the little rubber duck that my mom gave Knarla some years back — I tossed it into the cage with a couple of other toys when I put everything together.  Paisley sniffed it within an inch of its ducky life and then, for some reason known only to her, decided that it might be tasty.

Dexter hasn’t met his new little sister yet, although I’m sure they’re aware of one another as their cages are in the same room.  (They will always live separately.)  They’ve got a joint vet appointment on Monday for a well-pet checkup.

I’ve uploaded the best of the Paisley photos to Flickr for your enjoyment.  More to come, of course.

With all the political news around (which I am not touching in this particular forum, except to say that everyone needs to make sure they are duly registered and participate in the process), I was glad to see the 2008 Ig Nobel prizes awarded.  For those who aren’t familiar with them, the Ig Nobels are meant to “honor achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think.”

I laughed.  Did I think?  Maybe.

My favorites this year:

• NUTRITION PRIZE. Massimiliano Zampini of the University of Trento, Italy and Charles Spence of Oxford University, UK, for electronically modifying the sound of a potato chip to make the person chewing the chip believe it to be crisper and fresher than it really is.
• BIOLOGY PRIZE. Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert,, and  Michel Franc of Ecole Nationale Veterinaire de Toulouse, France for discovering that the fleas that live on a dog can jump higher than the fleas that live on a cat.
• PHYSICS PRIZE. Dorian Raymer of the Ocean Observatories Initiative at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, USA, and Douglas Smith of the University of California, San Diego, USA, for proving mathematically that heaps of string or hair or almost anything else will inevitably tangle themselves up in knots.

The physics prize, in particular, is very relevant, as anyone who has ever handled a pair of headphones already knows.

I think the 2007 awards had more flair, but still.

Paisley is one month old today.  She has been out exploring the cage on her own and eating some solid food (a couple of days ahead of her siblings, I might add) and even wheeling.  Meep.  We pick her up on October 11, one week from Saturday.

I am in love with her already.  LOOK AT THAT FACE.  She looks very curious and calm, which is an excellent sign.

Several news items about the baby hedgehog.

1. We’ll be picking her up on Saturday, October 11 (at least tentatively) and she’s scheduled for her first well-pet visit on Monday.
2. She’s been jaunting out from her mom and siblings on expeditions around their cage, including some wheeling (already!) and some nibbling on solid food.  She’s apparently curious.
3. We’re thinking that her name will be Paisley.

Chopper and I are going to adopt a new baby hedgehog in the next several weeks and I’m tickled to be able to share the first photo of her.  She’s about three weeks old, and her eyes have just opened.  No name yet, although I’m partial to Paisley.  We’ll need to meet her and make sure that she’s cool with that.

The red stuff on her back is nail polish, used to tell her apart from her littermates (another girl and a boy).  She can come live with us once she’s weaned and on her own, about six weeks old.

Dexter thus far has no opinion on the matter.  The two of them will live in separate cages and have minimal contact (other than being in the same room).