Rodent Death House

For Christmas "Santa" brought #1,2 & 3 just what they asked for...a Hampster. The gilrs opened their presents and saw the hampster in an old cage from the last hampster we had a year ago. Santa even brought the hampster a new carriage to ride in.
#1 has been reading Calvin and Hobbes a lot lately and since this hampster was a boy she decided to call him Calvin. The experts say that you should let a hampster adapt to it's new environment for a few days before handling it too much. CHristmas was on tuesday and we waited a few days before touching him to let him get settled in. on Thursday morning we took the lid off the cage and let the girls pet him a little but not pick him up. He didn't seem to mind too much. The girls asked if after dinner they could get him out and play with him. i agreed so as i was finishing up with dinner and helping megan clean up a bit, #1 came down stairs crying. She said that Calvin was dead. I told her he was probably just sleeping since hampsters were nocternal. she cried some more and told me she new he was really dead since she was poking him and he wouldn't move. I went up stairs and she was right, he was dead. I picked up the hampster and put him into a plastic bag and we went to Petco. Rodents have a 15 day return policy. We walked in and told the lady that the hampster "Santa" gave us died and we wanted to get another one. She took us back and showed us what they had. Only 2 in stock and one of them had an eye infection. we took the only "healthy" hampster they had and went home. this was a girl hampster so #1 named her suzy after calvin's arch-nemisis. before putting her in her cage we sterilized the cage with bleach, bought the same kind of bedding they had at the store and the same kind of food, not to mention, we stopped at the grocery store to get some cabbage. We were told all of these things were best for the $8 rodent. we put her in her cage and watched her for the next couple days get aquinted to her surroundings. On saturday morning, she was dead. #1 didn't cry as much over this 2nd hampster death. #3 keeps walking around saying "our mousy is dead!" over the years we have had a few hampsters and even though #1 sometimes forgets to close their cage and they get misplaced for a few days , they usually last from 12-24 months. i think Petco is selling inbred, disease infested rodents to poor unsuspecting consumers.