Proof That I'm Old

Saturday night and I'm home on the couch. The Oregon - Stanford game's on in the background. I'm searching about the Internet for random home furnishings that I cannot afford.

My searching goes like this. After a few sites that don't really hold my attention, I get here. I see that in the "category I can afford" are some shaped pillows with animal prints on them. The last pillow I see has a tapir print on it.

This little guy reminded me of capybaras, and specifically Capyboppy, the capybara in one of my favorite childhood books.

A quick google search reveals an adorable video of happy capybaras, with a long chain of comments. Scanning the comments I see that there's a capybara in Austin with a twitter account and a blog!

Instantly I'm following, and then I hop to its blog, where I see its favorite book (besides the one its owner wrote) is Capyboppy. I mean, obviously.

Some facts on these rodents of abnormal size:

FACT: An extinct, North American species of capybara was, on average, a hundred pounds heavier than the current creatures. An even larger ancient rodent once lived in Venezuela and weighed in at 1500 pounds. No word on fossil evidence of cuteness.
FACT: According to the Vatican, capybara count as fish, and are thus acceptable food for Lent. Apparently, the meat looks like beef, but contains less fat and calories. And the taste? I saw descriptions ranging from "pork-like" to "fishy". Which is quite a range. Have any of you tried it?
FACT: Capybaras live in herds—usually a handful of males, plus a lot of females and young. That sort of living arrangement is common for large mammals, but it's very rare in the world of rodents.
FACT: Capybaras are semi-aquatic and can remain underwater for as long as five minutes.

Adorable giant hamsters. This concludes my exhilarating Saturday night. Next up, a post on bingo night down at the rec center.