Guinea Pig Drama

Guinea Pig Drama – December 12, 2007

I don’t know if any of you out there have a guinea pig but for the first time in my life I now have one of my very own. My host sister was afraid that I would be lonely living all my myself so one day she handed me a shoe box that was filled with vegetables and a six month old guinea pig. I promptly named the little thing Misha because it is the only Ukrainian name I can remember with any regularity besides Miroslav. And since Miroslav means “warrior for peace” it seemed a little presumptuous for a guinea pig, so Misha it was.
Guinea Pigs are interesting creatures. It is like having a really dumb dog in a cage. Misha will squeal when I come in and purrs like a cat when I pet her. I like to think its purring because the only other option would be trembling in fear. She is also as twitchy as a canary on espresso. If I move to quickly she will freak out and run full force in the opposite direction, often forgetting that she is in a cage so she just ends banging her little head against the bars. Did I mention that she is cute but stupid? When I put her on the linoleum floor in my apartment she tries to run so fast that her little clawed feet only slip and she ends up going no where. It’s like watching a dog run on hardwood floors but slightly more pathetic.
This being said, I often feel bad to keep her in her little cage so I shut the door to my bedroom and let her run around the hallway way while I study Ukrainian in the kitchen. That way I can keep an eye on her but still do something else. Well the other day, I didn’t pay enough attention and I looked up to see Misha at my feet in the kitchen. I don’t let her run around the kitchen because there are places that she can hide that I would never get her out of like under the stove or refrigerator. So guess where she goes the second I try to catch her. Behind the fridge. Now, I am not to worried about this because she will have to come out eventually so I just finish studying. She hasn’t come out and I need to leave. I know that guinea pigs like to chew on wires so I can’t very well leave here out while I am gone. I look behind the fridge…and she isn’t there. This is not good. Then I here something, I look a little closer and realize that she is not longer behind the fridge because she has crawled under the fridge and into the 1960 motor it is powered by. Now the motor for my fridge come one about ever 25 minutes and it sounds like a garbage disposal running. It is loud and makes the whole fridge shake but it works so I don’t complain. But I know that with that amount of action that means there are some rapidly moving parts in that motor that will not hesitate to turn my guinea pig into chop suey. So I do the only reasonable thing I can think of, I panic. I move the fridge away from the wall so I can see the tiny space between the motor and the back cover. I can also see Misha left rear foot. I can’t get my hand in there to grab her and am not really inclined to try out the medical system here in Ukraine by going in with a fridge mauled hand so I grab my ever trusty spatula and attempt to spatula her out of the motor. She simply squeals (probably a guinea pig laugh) and disappears from my view. The fridge has not turned on for awhile so I know it is just a matter of minutes and I have these horrible visions of the fridge starting to rock and little pieces of guinea pig being flung out of the motor. Then I would be minus a guinea pig and the fridge that it took me 5 months to get. I would not be happy. I am just about to get my leatherman to remove the back panel of the fridge when the motor turns on.
The fridge rocks, I drop to the floor to look for Misha, I hear a squeal, and she shoots out from under the fridge faster then lightening and hits me straight in the face. We both fall back surprised but since she is used to banging her head into things she recovers faster and shoots down the hall. I am grateful that Misha is still alive because now I am going to kill her. She hides in my sneaker, her little white tush still visible but to a guinea pig “If I can’t see you, you can’t see me” is the rule. I straighten my glasses, which she has actually bent with the force of our encounter and (knowing that If I touched her I will wring her little neck) I put the whole shoe in her cage and head out the door for that class that I am now late for. I should have gotten a cat.