Quick question on this query: @item.entries = Entry.find_recent(@td.id, 10) || [] My development log file shows that rails makes 2 calls to database! Is rails ORM not smart enough to know to not load the lvalue of assignment thus causing another expensive db call? Below are the stubbed models and a log snip. class Entry < ActiveRecord::Base belongs_to :tracking_definition def self.find_recent(td_id, limit=10) find(:all, :conditions => ["tracking_definition_id = ?", td_id], :limit => limit) end end class Item < ActiveRecord::Base has_many :entries end ------------------- log snip from this one line --------------------------------------------------- [4;36;1mItem Load (0.000000) [0;1mSELECT * FROM items WHERE (item_id = 1) LIMIT 10 [4;35;1mEntry Load (0.000000) SELECT * FROM items WHERE (entries.item_id = 1)