I thought you might like to know what I do all day.  I’m very busy, of course.

A typical day at this time of year goes something like this.

The sky gets lighter in the window above our heads and the sun comes up and we can see it’s bright at theother end of the kitchen where we live.  That’s good, that means it’s sunny.  I have a drink and a bite to eat, and tell Dougall it’s his turn in our nice snugglesac, because it’s my turn in the hammock.  If I’m lucky I get to snooze before Oscar comes biting the bars and disturbing me.

Some time later Mummy comes in our room and sats “Good morning, boys,” just like she always does.  Then she goes round us one by one asking how we are and if we slept well, and holding her hand for an early morning nose boop.  I usually boop her hand and give it a sniff to see what it’s been doing.  Then she makes noises at the other end of the kitchen, including the sound of slicing cucumber (it’s very distinctive) and we know it’s nearly Cuddle Time. I’m first, of course.  Sometimes I’m not quite ready to be picked up, and I run back and forth in my cage until I’m ready to step onto her hand.  She’s very patient.  Sometimes she goes off and does something else and comes back to me.  Anyway, I step on her hand and go into the other room for my cuddle and cucumber.  Sometimes she combs my hair which I HATE!  Most times she smooths my coat and scratches my neck and ears and it’s all rather nice.  I chat to her and snuggle against her coat and in her armspace, where it bends comfortably.  The when I’ve filled up my cuddlemeter, we go back to the kitchen.  I start at the door to the other room: Mummy puts me down and I go all the way along the hall, past the shoes and the bags and the rubbish, and jump up the step into the kitchen, and turn left to go onto the paper and explore all the space at the other end of the kitchen from our cages.

While I’m exploring (and I probably go up the back end and check under our cages and all round near the doors to the garden, and then back again) Mummy cuddles Dougall and puts him down on the floor for his exercise.  He never does any, but he’s supposed to.  Mummy cleans out our cage, then she gives Oscar his cuddle.  When he comes back for his run Mummy brings our tent along so that I can jump into it and go back to my cage.  Then Dougall does the same.  Then we inspect the cage to make sure she’s done everything properly, and sometimes we have to point out errors to her, but not often.  When all the others have had their cuddles, runs and medicines (only Colman has medicines at the moment), it’s BREAKFAST TIME!  Mummy fills up our pellet bowls, then she gets some yummy leaves, either from the fridge or from the garden.  This morning we had bean leaves and a bean to share, a carrot with tops on each, a piece of red pepper, some mint, some parsley, some other leaves from nice plants, and some melon skin.  Yummy!  We like melon skin.  Apparently Colman doesn’t and Kevin gets his after Col’s had all the melon flesh off it he wants.

Then it’s time for a snooze.  Mummy goes and changes her coat and either stays with Col and Kev working, or goes outside, sometimes for a very long time.  She usually tells us she’ll be back in the afternoon if she’s going to oplay golf or something like that.  Anyway, we have an enjoyable time snoozing, napping, eating hay, eating bits of breakfast we’ve tucked away for later, and stuff like that.

If it’s dry and Mummy comes back in time we go out in the garden later.  We have runs that move around to different patches of grass.  I get everyone to get on with their lawn-mowing duties while I supervise.  Most of them are very good at it.  Oscar and Midge took a while to get the hang of it, but they’re okay now.  I usually talk to everyone through the bars of the run, and Midge is very chatty these days, and very polite and subservient.  Oscar still thinks he’s the bees knees, but I’m in charge and everyone knows it.  When I’m ready to go in I stare at Mummy.  She’s quite good at noticing these things. m Sometimes she just brings me in, sometimes she brings everyone in.  I don’t mind going in on my own, it means I get piece and quiet and that stash of food before Dougall comes back.

Then I snooze and eat hay and snooze again until it’s cucumber-time.  That’s when Mummy gives us slices of cucumber.  It’s usually getting dark then.  Mummy goes to bed a little while later and we snooze and eat hay and drink water, and eat pellets and snooze and so on through the night, until the sun comes up again.

And that’s how my day goes.  It’s fun, and as you can tell, it’s action-packed!