Today is ten years since George wrote his ‘Hello’ greeting to readers of his brand new blog. I thought we could celebrate with a recap and a giveaway, which closes on 13th June.
George
George was a modest chap, very keen on new technology, and on engineering his surroundings to make them more comfortable for Fred and himself. He was appointed Forum Mechanic of the Rodents With Attitude Forum (sadly no longer with us), and amused many people with his matter-of-fact way of solving their piggy problems. He also mentored them on using the site. Continue reading “Ten years of George’s Guinea Pig World”→
Then I was talking to Auntie Vikki the other day and the matter of IGNORANCE turned up. Auntie Vikki used to run a rescue, but she got so tired of ill-treated piggies, or people dropping off piggies they didn’t want any more because the children had lost INTEREST. How can anyone lose interest in someone like me?
Well, it’s a good question, because I have personal experience of IGNORANCE.
Neville and I were just left in the house we lived in. JUST LEFT! I have no idea whether we did something wrong, or we weren’t exciting enough for the kiddies. They seemed to enjoy playing with us when they did, and that was quite often. I was generally on my best behaviour with them.
But then we were left, all alone. Why couldn’t she take us to the local rescue? The lady there could have helped us. Was she too ashamed? I’d be more ashamed of just abandoning someone. She didn’t leave her children behind and they seemed much more trouble than we were.
In one way we were lucky, though. The landlord man came in the next day and found us. He made sure we had hay and water and he contacted the nice lady at NEGPR. We stayed in the house for a bit with the landlord popping in to say hello and top up our food, then we went to a foster home, and then we went to the rescue. And then Mam found us and came all the way to Newcastle to pick us up.
But we did better than Humphrey and Hector. They are legends. They were left in their house when their carers moved out AND TOLD NOBODY! How can anyone do that? H&H weren’t found for a MONTH. They were starving. Hector had even been eating Humphrey’s hair. He was no more than a babe then, and that’s why Mam always put up with him being such an angry pig. He eventually learned to trust her, as we all do.
Mam says everyone knows nothing to start with, but some people are ignorant and decide not to learn. She says she’s still learning.
Well, she’s learnt her lessons pretty well so far, even if she doesn’t always give me enough time to relieve myself before she picks me up for my morning cuddle. That’s why I pick at her sleeve to get away sometimes. See, that’s another bit of ignorance gone, because when she reads this, she’ll understand.
Thanks for letting me get all that off me chest.
Bertie’s got a special guest next week. I’ve got to start thinking of what to say for the letter K. It’s hard, this alphabet thing.
HELLO! Bertie here. Today we’ve got as far as letter H in our A to Z blog.
HAY is always at the top of our minds, but Mummy said everyone has blogged about hay, and shown pictures of Humphrey and George and the others hiding in it. As well as eating it of course.
Biggles’s nose in the hay
So I thought I’d tell you about HOLIDAYS.
The first holiday that George’s Guinea Pig World went on was when George, Fred, Hugo and Victor went with Mummy to the Isle of Mull. That’s a very long way, and includes a trip on a boat! They went back the next year too. You can read about their trip here.
Grass with a view
When there were five or more piggies here nobody went on holiday, because Mummy couldn’t fit everyone in the car. Mummy took a couple of holidays, but she didn’t take us with her. She went to cold places like Svalbard and Iceland.
But now we are four, Mummy’s taken us on holiday twice – to HAMPSHIRE!
We told you about the first trip here, but we went again in April, about the time we started this Blog Challenge, so we haven’t shown you the new photos.
We stayed in the same place, but it was warmer later in the week, and we went out on the grass next to the cottage. We couldn’t go on the grass immediately in front of the cottage because it had been treated with ‘Feed and Weed’ which would be poisonous to us, or at least upset our tummies. The grass we went on had dandelions and things growing in it. Mummy made sure it didn’t have daisies or buttercups in it where we were, but it was nice. The run was a bit small, though, because we were using the panels indoors as well.
Bertie on the table
Top Tug showing off
Top Tug at home
Biggles on the table
Morning social
Lawn mowing at the cottage
River Meon
Bertie considers escape
Mummy went out most days but came back to give us a cuddle later on. One day she went to a place where they train racehorses. Top Tug is one of her racing club’s. He ran on Saturday and came fifth. Mummy says that’s fine for his first race of the season. She also had lunch with Dani and her Mummy, and also with her other nieces. Mummy has a very big family. Although I’ve got more family at Auntie Sophie’s house.
Anyway, that’s our Holiday in Hampshire, complete with Hay, all for H in the A to Z challenge.
I’m glad Roscoe’s doing I next week, because I have no Idea what to talk about for that!
We’re back to our A to Z weekly blogging challenge today. I’m Roscoe, the handsome one of the party. The one with the dashing eye patch!
G is for Garden parties, Gotcha days, Gardening and something Mam does pretty often, which is Golf.
We had hoped to have a Garden party last week to celebrate the blog’s anniversary. Mam is very happy you came and visited her special anniversary post, but is a mite disappointed that people haven’t entered her Giveaway. I mean, it’s like a raffle, and friends enter raffles, don’t they? So step up and enter the Giveaway. It’s at the bottom of Tuesday’s post.
Mam says she might add everyone who’s left a comment on the blog anyway.
Biggles and Bertie have Gotcha cake
Neville helps Bertie eat his cake
Kevin’s 5th birthday party
Roscoe and his Gotcha cake
Jubilee Garden Party
Colman’s 7th birthday 2015
Midge’s 3rd birthday party
We generally have Garden parties for birthdays, and Gotcha Days, which are the dates on which some of us arrived here, rather than the date we were born. Nev and I don’t know when we were born, and neither does Mam, so we have our Gotcha Day on 18th August. Bertie and Biggles celebrate their birthday in February, and we have an indoor party for that. Garden parties are a tradition here, though. Mam says we might have one for Princelings Day, 13th June.
Gardening is something Mam does to keep the garden tidy, while we do the gras mowing for her. This weekend she was weeding the new veggies. She says the salad leaves are nearly ready to pick, and the carrots and kohl rabi are growing nicely. She took out weeds like chickweed and some mini dandelions and mini fennel, which she gave us to try. We liked them. She gave us some extra Grass she found too. Yum.
Golf is what Mam does when she goes out all day. She usually gets us cuddled, cleaned and fed then says ‘Bye Boys, see you after 3,’ or after 5, or before dark, and she goes out of the door. She comes back later, and usually she brings food or hay. So Golf is obviously related to shopping.
So that’s it for G, apart from George, of course, who was Gorgeous, and so am I. He-he 🙂
We’ve reached F, which was a very difficult letter to think of something interesting to write about.
I mean, there’s FOOD, and FRED, who is a very important guinea pig indeed. And FLEECE, which we have on the floor of our cages with pads underneath, to give us nice bedding.
But when Mummy put the calendar on the wall onto May, I saw that there were FOUR legends of our world, whose pictures occupied one day each. That means these are special days for those pigs. It can be birthdays and Gotcha days, but these are all Rainbow Bridge Days.
These are our FOUR May legends
Kevin went over the Bridge on the 9th, two years ago. We met him and ran around with him in the garden in the April. We’d only been here a month. He was very patient with us. He had just FINISHED doing the A to Z with Percy. I think this is why Mummy told us we couldn’t do the A to Z every day, because everyone that had done that went over the Rainbow Bridge soon afterwards. It’s too much hard work for us.
Then George, who went on May 13th a long time ago. He’s the FOUNDER of this blog of course. He was an engineer and a legend. He worked very hard on the FORUM that is no more. It seems like most of the things George did were part of history now.
Victor went when he was very old, and he was ill in the morning and went over the Bridge at lunchtime. Mummy knew because she had a premonition when she was playing golf. She says it was very spooky, but she wasn’t FRIGHTENED, just surprised.
And Percy, my mate, who I still miss, but I’ve got a bit used to not having him around. He was very wise. He went on the last day of May, the 31st, last year. I miss him. It was FUN playing with him.
So those are my FOUR legends of the George’s Guinea Pig World for May.
And please come back tomorrow because we’re celebrating a very SPECIAL DAY, and you can enter a competition and win prizes.
I’m a bit behind on the lettering, because EASTER was last weekend, but since Mam gave us Easter boxes, I thought I ought to say something about it.
It’s the same sort of yummy box that Mam gave us for Christmas, but this time she gave one each to Biggles and Bertie as well as one for Neville and me. Hang on, that means we share, but they get one each. That isn’t fair!
Oh, hang on, Mam’s just filled our up again with herby hay. That’s okay then. Right.
Mam had an Easter Egg in a box, but it was made from Green & Blacks Dark Chocolate. It smelled terrible. I don’t know how she can eat that stuff. Our boxes are filled with hay and made from lovely noisy grass-covered cardboard. They sound and taste AMAZING!
They help us take lots of EXERCISE as we push them around in our runs. We also got out to EAT grass last week, which was also amazing
That’s enough Es from me. I’m going to take it EASY 🙂
Bye for now. Special week next week – with TWO posts, Mam says. She’s writing the second one. Sounds EXCITING!
