Birthday Boy Ollie's day in the sun

If you've never been fortunate enough to meet or cohabitate with a pet Norwegian fancy rat, you might be under the mistaken impression that they're gross, smelly, or otherwise unpleasant little creatures, and that would be a real shame. Rats make exceptionally sweet, docile pets and in our experience raising quite a few of them they have blown us away with their unique, lovable personalities and awesomely patient and gentle temperaments. While they might eagerly grab your finger assuming it's a snack, they rarely ever bite hard enough to hurt, and the only time we've ever had a bite break the skin was when they were in a pure flight or fight panic. As of today, our sweet little boy Ollie is three whole years old, which is pretty outstanding for a rodent! We've had him, quite literally, from the very day he was born, and have showered him with love, cuddles, and snacks ever since. He's managed to outlive all of his brothers and sisters, and to celebrate his third birthday I'm sharing these photos we took while enjoying a particularly warm and sunny day, which seems like eons ago now that we're deep into #Snowageddon here in Seattle currently. We already celebrated with the old man proper, then tucked him in for a nap (he gets tuckered out more easily these days). You can reminisce on how cute (or creepy) he and his kin were when they were just wee little newborns, or fast-forward a smidgeon to when they started to open their eyes, a stage in their development when they start to really look like little baby squeakers. It's been a lot of fun getting to know each of them along the way, and I'm very proud of my little old man for braving the trek up north and hanging strong into his third revolution around the sun. If you've found yourself here out of a curiosity about pet rat parentage, I encourage you to do your research and consider adopting some of your own! While Ollie is now by his lonesome, he's adapted to it and gets lots of attention, but for any young rats you look to adopt it's almost always better to adopt them in pairs so that they have a friend to keep them company. Most people aren't going to be able to spend four hours a day, every day, with their furry buddy, so having another rat living with them (of the same sex, or spayed/neutered) is very important to their overall happiness and well-being. No one likes to be alone all the time, right?

Korea: Blind Alley Raccoon Cafe

Is there any animal that you feel a particular kinship with? Like, do you see an eagle soaring high above it all majestically silhouetted against the bright blue sky and feel like there's a special significance, a certain similarity shared between your personal essence and the animal? I used to think that I had that sort of quasi-spiritual-groove with dolphins, who seem to appear near me when in bodies of water they frequent, but these days I find I chalk that up more to the mind seeking to connect the dots and form a meaningful pattern to make it special rather than actually being something special. Dolphins, in all their majestic flippering and gratitude for all the fish, are also a bit rapey and scary, too. Did you know that Flipper and his friends will isolate a female from the pod and then take turns on her, gang-raping her for weeks on end and using aggressive posturing and behaviors to intimidate her into acquiescence? Like, DAMN, dolphin-dudes, chill! Any moderately attractive woman of post-pubescent age has probably, at some time or another, had to deal with the unfortunate human equivalent of those gang-rapist-creeps of dolphins, though hopefully in less full-out-forceful and trauma-inducing situations. I know I hate me some over-the-top jabronies, so my love for dolphins is dampened knowing they're those guys at the party. As if that wasn't bad enough, dolphins also have a habit of killing babies, whether it's another bottlenosed nosed dolphin or another species, and they're riddled with STDs! Yuck. Over it. 

But you know what animal is totally cute, has a super-fluffy tail, toe-beans, fancy-facial-attire, and a vaguely triangular-faced-monkey-like appearance? Raccoons, AKA trash-pandas! These little guys are vastly underappreciated! Look how adorable that sleepy little baby is up there on that railing! Don't you just want to rub his little feeties and boop that snoot?! Trash-Pandas, much like myself, are almost always up for a good snack and a nap, which I think are two traits almost any decent human can get behind. So when my friend Carmen informed me that there was actually this magical place tucked away in Seoul where you could grab some warm beverages with caffeine AND cozy up to some raccoons, you know I was on-board! 

Unfortunately, by the time we arrived most of the fluffy little cuties were quite sleepy and settled in for a nap, high above the reach of most visitors. There was one very happy, very friendly little corgie romping around who was more than eager to step in for pets and appreciation, so I found myself spending more time with that little sweetie. As much as I love the raccoons, I also understand how anyone can wind up cranky when woken from their nap prematurely, so better to let them get their Zs. 

Baby Rat Growth & development: Crew of the Nostromo first two weeks

Bright lights, bright lights!

Day 1:

Ripley, our other rat mama, had her litter on the 16th of February. Although she gave birth to 10 babies 3 were stillborn.  As sad as that may be I still find it preferable to how we lost some of Deadpool's little Deadites later down the line. I can only hope that these lost squeaks didn't suffer long, if at all. We didn't remove the stillborns from the cage and Ripley took care of them in her own way, as nature does. Making them took a lot of energy out of her, so it's only fair that she be allowed to recycle them, which is what they're naturally wired to do.