By Pesky the Rat (PTR) -- Well, as many of you may have discovered, we here at Pesky  the Rat have been running out of gas. Some of this has to do with a certain Janet the Snake, who has been chasing me relentlessly throughout the apartment with a rodenticidal rage, and some of it has to do with Susan the Human, whose job and life and other interests are pulling her away from her proper spot as my personal stenographer.  But these things happen. And so, after three years, I will be hanging up my hat and exploring garbage piles further afield.

This page won't be going away--Susan the Human will, in her spare time, renovate it into a collection of sordid tales entitled, "I am Not a Snack: Three Years in American Politics with Pesky the Rat". There may also be a collection of Janet the Snake's disgusting contributions, title to be determined but guaranteed to be ghastly.  We hope these spots will provide a nice place to stop when the human-dominated media strays too far from the truth. Because goodness knows, the truth is all we do around here.

And so this rat thanks you all dearly for your support and friendship and snakefights in the comments, particularly Don the Corn Snake & Co, Abdul the Asp, Ginnie the Gerbil, Janet the Human & friend. You all added so much to the site. Susan the Human still tears up thinking of the image of Don the Corn Snake, carrying his little suitcase, longing for Janet to take him on some terrible vacation.  And Abdul's observations about Don's personal collection of "toys" were at times almost too much to bear.

Many thanks to the enormous support of the Salon community, particularly Mark Hoback, who got us a gig with a famous cartoonist, Rob Salkowitz, who allowed Janet to eat the wingnuts in his comments, Dr. Omed, who is his own gnome, Rich, who we believe to be a secret agent living in a nuclear submarine just off the coast of Hawaii, and to all the others who were so supportive and offered links.  We've had tons of fun and too many close calls to count.  Please keep (or start) patronizing the Salon Blogs community, which provides some of the most interesting reading on the net, free of charge.

You can still keep up with Susan the Human on her photoblog, which is temporarily still here, but which will move to a more intuitive address in the next few weeks. She should be back posting pictures of Italy in a few days.  But Susan's main focus for the foreseeable future will be to revise and finish two juvenile fiction novels she's been working on. She's particularly grateful to the three readers who provided extensive excellent commentary on one of the books in its rough form, and she will revise it taking much of that  constructive criticism into account.

Janet the Snake is taking a job with the Bush Administration as Condoleeza Rice's replacement as National Security Advisor. Democrats everywhere are advised to send her photographs of George W. Bush dressed as a hot dog. She is particularly fond of sesame seed buns.

I will be taking over the Howard Dean suit from my old pal Muffin the Bushy-Tailed Woodrat, and hopefully running the Democratic National Comittee in short order. That's just between you and me, though. Most people out there think Howard is actually real.

Off we go...and remember, no matter what those snakes try to tell you, repeat after me: "I am not a snack!"

Want to explore Pesky the Rat? Click on the links to the left and below.

Susan the Human can now be found at her new site, http://www.mackerelstreet.com/human , where she publishes photo essays about California, Italy, and other interesting places.