It’s spring! We have proof!

On March 25, 2019March 24, 2019 By bertie bootsIn garden2 Comments

Bertie here, full of the joys of spring!

We went out in the garden for the first time this year at the weekend.

I thought it was a bit scary, all that sky above my head, so I hid under my tent. I still ate the grass I found there. I thought it was a bit cold on my feet, but nice under the shelter of the tent.

Biggles ran around with Roscoe and Neville! I know he’s been spending time with them on the floor, and more time than I have. I usually say hi and good-bye to Roscoe at floor time. Sometimes we get to bump noses, but usually if Mummy’s got my tent out I’ll go into that to avoid any confrontation. If there’s something we don’t argue about we can spend a while longer together these days. But I didn’t realise that Biggles had actually made friends with them. Turncoat. I knew there was a good reason I didn’t like him.

Bertie still hides behind the tent

View of the runs and the garden with Nev, Rosc and Bigs out in the open

Roscoe intent on the grass edges

Neville and Biggles eat from tents while Roscoe turns his back

Bertie hides under the tent

Biggles emerges onto the greass

Here are some pictures of us out on the grass. The white thing is the netting over the new seeds. Mummy’s sown carrots, salad leaves and something else for us in there. On the left is the bed with the veg that’s been growing all winter; swiss chard which we get for breakfast some days, curly endive (the same) and broad beans which will pod in a couple of months, Mummy says. And on the far right, behind the lavender, there are baby pea plants growing. That’s baby plants, not baby peas.

Next week we start the A to Z thing. I’m very excited about it.

See you in a couple of weeks,

Bertie

PS Did you see my interview with Joshua?

PPS. Mummy says we can come off our special low fat diet pellets because it’s made no difference to our weights. This is the latest chart.

Neville and I had a bath

On March 18, 2019March 18, 2019 By geordieroscoeIn Hygiene2 Comments

Way-aye, it’s me, Roscoe.

Mam’s been saying she’d give us a bath and the other day she did it. It’s not fair, really, since it’s only a few months since our last one. I don’t think Bertie and Biggles have had one since we’ve been here! (Mam just said they’d be having their’s this week, probably today.)

I don’t really mind having a bath, once it’s inevitable, like. I was running, or rather, splashing, around the big white bath until Mam caught me and made me all wet, and then I waited for Nev to get wet, then we got all soapy, and having it all rubbed into our coats, all over. It’s a really good feeling. I like it anyway. I’m not sure I like the funny spray thing that washes the soap out after, but it’s soon done.

Mam wrapped us each in towels and we went and sat on her lap to get dry. Then after a while, when we were nearly dry, she put this very noisy warm wind on us, and made us drier. Then we came upstairs to our nice clean run. Even the cagewear had been washed.

Bertie’s been talking about doing the alphabet each week. I like the idea. Mam said something about finding when we’d first done it on here. It was 2012, and Victor did it. That was three years after the A to Z started. Then Mam discovered it was three years after George’s Guinea Pig World started. So it’s our tenth anniversary this year, too.

So as well as doing the alphabet, we’re going to have something special around 7th May, which is the anniversary of George starting this website up. He did this post to welcome everybody, and it all went from there.

We’ve only filled nine letters, so far. We’ve thought of two things for A, six for B, one for C, three for G, one for K, for each for M and N, two for P and one for R. We’ve got a lot more thinking to do. Oh, Mam’s just suggested ‘degu’ for D…

And that’s a reminder that Bertie is being interviewed by Joshua the Degu on Friday, on Auntie Tori’s website. You’ll be able to find the interview here, but it isn’t alive until Friday (22nd March).

See you next time!

Roscoe

There’s something called A to Z

On March 11, 2019March 9, 2019 By bertie bootsIn a to z challenge3 Comments

Hello everybody, Bertie here!

There’s something called A to Z where you go through the alphabet during April, posting every day about something beginning with the right letter. Percy was doing it when Biggles and I came to live with him. Well, he was still doing it when we got too big to be in the same cage and he went to live with Midge, but that’s another story.

Anyway, next month is April, and I asked Mummy if we could do it.

Mummy: you know it’s a lot of work, Bertie?

Me: Well, maybe.

Mummy: and you have to find time to visit everyone who visits you.

Me: I can do that.

Mummy: and you have to think of a topic for each letter of the alphabet, and find pictures of it, and make a nice post.

Me: I can do that.

Mummy: Every day. Probably instead of grass time.

Me: Er….

Mummy: I tell you what. Get together with Roscoe and the others and see if you can make a list of things to post about. Roscoe can post the list here next week. Maybe aunties can give you ideas for any gaps.

Me: er… okay. And then can we do the A to Z in April?

Mummy: Maybe. Why not just post once a week from A to Z? That would take you through to the autumn. It wouldn’t be so much work for you and you’d still have grass time.

Me: That sounds great! Do we still have to make the list?

Mummy: That’s up to you.

So, I told Roscoe all about it, and we’re going to put a list together. He might put it up next week, or I’ll do it the week after. But it isn’t going to be all done in April. It’s going to be a Long-term Project.

Don’t you think that’s a good idea?

See you next time

love

Bertie xxx

What do you do with a notebook?

On March 4, 2019March 3, 2019 By geordieroscoeIn Happenings3 Comments

Hi all, Roscoe here.

I have a question for you this week. What do you do with a notebook?

Mam’s been asking us whether she should do a notebook for George’s Guinea Pig World, with pictures and wise words to go with them, and plenty of space for you to use.

I don’t really understand her myself, but then I don’t write. I don’t see Mam write much either, although she does sometimes scribble something on the back of one of the envelopes she keeps by this keyboard. The one next to me right now has questions scribbled on it from quiz programmes. That’s because she sets a quiz once a month, and that’s the night she’s always very late home.

Oh, I do see her write in a very small notebook she keeps by the weighing scales. She puts our weights in that (no change, by the way), and any other notes on trimming toes, having baths, etc.

She wants to know if readers would like a notebook. Would you like it with lines or blank? Would you like sections for weights, or perhaps for medicines (dose per weight and how often, that sort of thing)? It would have lovely colour photos of George and Fred (and maybe others) in it, and probably be around 80 pages, and cost between £12 and £15. It would be a lovely gift for a fan or a guinea pig friend.

Roscoe looking smart

Roscoe shows both sides at once

Roscoe on the floor

Roscoe with Santa hat

Roscoe making a hay nest

Roscoe in the garden

What’s over there?

Me on Mam’s lap after the bath

Well, pictures of me would be a lovely gift. Maybe she’ll get around to doing that if this one of George and Fred (and maybe others) is popular.

George’s Guinea Pig World Notebook: Roscoe edition. I like the sound of that.

What do you think?

love

Roscoe

PS the cover pic is just a mock-up, Mummy says. She’s got to get the old computer out for full-sized pictures. Or something.

Sunny weather, funny smells

On February 25, 2019February 24, 2019 By bertie bootsIn garden3 Comments

Hello, Bertie here.

It’s been very nice weather this week. Mummy had to go out for golf and other things, so we didn’t get to go out in the garden. On Saturday and Sunday she spent a lot of time out of doors, wearing her short sleeve shirt, but still her winter trousers. She says the ground’s too cold for us to run around on yet, and there’s not much grass anyway. These flowers are out, that Percy had his photo taken with. She’s also got some of them in a jar thing on her desk.

She found a little grass for us in the wildflower patch, we we loved. Then the next day she brought us in the stem from the kale plant, because she’d taken it out, and also some carrots that had been growing all winter, and some grass that had been growing where the kale was. I loved chewing on the kale stalk, but I think Roscoe and Neville were overwhelmed by it, as they left most of their kale top, even though it had leaves on it. If they’ve left any over from yesterday I hope I have it for breakfast. Mummy does that sometimes, if someone leaves something, she gives it to one of the rest of us.

Roscoe was chewing at the paper under his fleece yesterday, and she told him to stop. Then she got another piece of paper and tore it up and made it all crunchy, and gave us one each. It’s great fun. I like playing with that.

I expect you’re wondering about the smells. I don’t know what they were, but Mummy had the doors and some of the windows open, and she went outside then came in again, and it was smelly when she came in. At once stage I saw her taking a pot of something into her bedroom, and she had a stick of some sort in her other hand. And when she came out again she had a patch of dark colour on her jacket thing, and was looking cross with herself. The smell was even smellier when she came out, so I know she’s got something to do with it.

But she says the house is looking smarter, and whatever she’s been doing, she’s pretty pleased with herself. Except for the jacket thing.

The smells going away a bit, and Mummy says it’s going to be warm and sunny until Wednesday, which she’s pleased about because Wednesday’s golf.

Oh, and she told us she’s planted seeds in the centre bed. That’s the one without the white cover in the picture. She’s planted carrots (yummy), lettuce (yummy!), and kohl rabi, which I’ve never heard of. She says Fred and George and Victor and Hugo used to love it. Well, they would, wouldn’t they?

Did you see Roscoe’s interview last week? If you missed it, it’s here.

See you next time

love

Bertie xxx

Slimmers World part 2 and my bid for stardom

On February 18, 2019February 17, 2019 By geordieroscoeIn Health4 Comments

Way-aye there, Roscoe here again.

Hope you’re all doing well. We’ve had nice sunshine the last couple of days, and Mam hasn’t been wearing lots of clothes (plenty but not lots of woolly ones). She says it’s only February so don’t expect to go out on the grass yet. But I know there’s photos of past piggies on the grass in February, so I’m getting me hopes up.

Mam is very disappointed with our diets. I think she’s disappointed with her own, to be honest, since she tries hard during the week and then she says it all goes wrong at weekends. I told her we should dole out her food, but she doesn’t listen.

Mind you, this starving us hasn’t had much effect so far. It’s hard to tell though, because if you’ve just had a wee it could make you weigh a lot less. Mam’s done something clever with her pictures to give you this chart of our weight loss over the four weeks.

Neville’s line is at the top. You can see that after the black line that shows when we started these slimming things he’s dipped below the 1700 gms line. So maybe it’s helping him. He certainly comes and stretches up for his cucumber and things from Mam, so maybe that’s helping.

The next line is Biggles. I don’t know what he’s eating, but he’s not been losing any, and Mam’s very disappointed with him. She says he’s a bit more active though. Bertie’s the next one down. If I was feeling kind I’d say he’s lost a bit in the last couple of weeks, but since he put it on to start with, he’s only a tiny bit less.

And then there’s me. I’m the lightest of us anyway. Mam says that’s no excuse, I’m heavier than ‘huge Hugo’ ever was. I suppose that bursts my bubble a bit, but not much. I was doing well till that birthday party, so I reckon we can blame it all on your cake, Mam.

Mam says we’re continuing with the diet till we’ve got through all the special food. Well, it’s fairly tasty when you get used to it, so that’s okay. I miss the occasional carrot though.

I’m a star!

It’s an exciting week coming up, ‘cos I’m on Furkid Friday this coming Friday. Don’t miss it. This is the link, but don’t click it till Friday as it won’t work till then. You get to meet Joshua, and he interviews me, and there are pictures, too. You’ve probably seen the pictures before, mind.

And here’s Joshua in his cage!

…and we’re still thinking about Auntie Tori, who says she’s had her operation and is home recovering. Get well soon, Auntie Tori ❤