Way-aye, Roscoe here.

Mam’s being doing lots of things that make me nervous, but she’s worked out that I’ve seen it before and I remember what happened. She’s promised me she’s never going to give me up or let me down, although she might go away for a few nights at a time. She says she might even take me and the others to a strange house and leave us for a couple of nights, but only so she can bring the rest of the house contents back with her.

So yesterday, when she was laying small piles of paper on the floor, and putting some of them in some things called files, I watched her, but didn’t worry. She put  other things in envelopes and put them in a box which lives underneath my run.  Who knew she kept things other than the pop-up tents underneath my run? She keeps one of our carry-boxes underneath Biggles’ run, and another box, and the spare paper and pads for under our fleeces. But I never gave any thought to anything else she keeps underneath us.

Roscoe and Neville get fresh grass

Roscoe in his new tent

Our runs

Cucumber time

Roscoe’s starving

She made a lot of noise when she was doing this (and she’s started doing it again today). Sometimes she’d rip some paper in half and throw it in the box for waste paper. Sometimes she’d rip it in lots of pieces. One time she took some over to our waste hay bag, the one that she shakes our fleeces into when she changes them, and tore several things into strips and put it in among the hay. She says that bag goes to compost, and it’s the safest place to send those pieces of paper so nobody else will ever know what they said.

It all sounds very complicated to me, but then, Mam is a complicated person.

Bertie’s quite complicated, too. He’s been having his foot soaked, rinsed and creamed twice a day for the last week. Mam and Dr Sally don’t know what’s wrong with it, although Mam wonders if he stood on a thorn and got an infection in it. Apparently it’s not something called bumblefoot, although they are treating it the same way to stop any infection spreading. Bertie seems quite happy. He says it’s no trouble standing in the brown water for a while, and Mummy tickles his chin while she’s holding him. The brown water’s a bit smelly though. Fortunately, the rinsing and the cream take the smell away.

I hoped Mam would take a photo of him standing in his brown water, but she says she hasn’t got enough hands to do that.

You can’t get the staff, can you?

Ta-ta till next time,

Roscoe

PS Did Bertie tell you Mam spent one day putting all the vet bills she’s ever had in one file? She said it brought back memories. I wonder if she’s going to add up how much each pig cost in vet bills? I hope it isn’t me.