The Hamster's Valhalla - or Stories at dinner

I've been on a work course this week, at a place called Cranage Hall learning [more?] about the drug discovery process. Quite informative but the most uncomfortable chairs I've sat on in a while. I think it was a combination of the chair and the fact that we were working in syndicates and had to keep twisting round to see what was on the projector screen.

As we sat down to dinner on the first night we started sharing stories and anecdotes. The guy sat next to me in all innocence revealed that he wanted to get a pair of silk pajamas. This was unanimously greeted with laughter from the girls sat round the table and to be fair the blokes too. In hindsight I don't think he should then have mentioned the bunny slippers but I guess these things slip out when you are desperately looking for a new avenue of thought.

Much laughter and gentle teasing followed. The wine was flowing freely which only encouraged us further....

As the conversation meandered on, Ros mentioned that her daughters' hamster had recently passed on, and that she had put it in the box with the other one from last year ?!?. We just had to ask more. Apparently when the other one died about a year ago, she asked her daughter what she wanted to do with it, but she couldn't decide so it was put to one side in a nice box. We wondered if later in life Ros's daughter would be given the box which by then would have accumulated several more furry bodies, and what emotional consequences this would have.

However we then discovered what the original choices for funerals had been. Ros had offered burial in the flower border, under a little headstone or a full Viking Funeral Pyre with a little longboat made from lollysticks and cremated whilst floating on their pond. Now that would have been some way to go. We spent the next twenty minutes discussing little hamster-sized swords and what hamster Valhalla would be like. All the sunflower seeds you could stuff into your cheeks probably.

This was when we noticed that all the other tables of people on the course were talking about sensible things to do with work and suchlike and giving us some strange looks.

We retired to the bar to continue into the small hours.