It was 2nd or 3rd grade , we just had to pick an animal and write a report about it. I was a voracious reader even then and had read a number of Lewis Carroll's books. Most of the other kids's chose animals like lions, tigers and bears (oh my). I wanted something more unusual. I was intrigued by the 'door mouse' as I had some idea it was really called.

I had to look all over the library in various encyclopedias and other books for little tidbits of information. Most of the pictures were hand drawings or blurry black and white photos, so I never really got much good information besides they slept (hibernated) a lot and had a furry tail rather than a regular mouses scaley one.

I was somewhat disappointed that they had nothing to do with 'doors'.