It’s Not Easy Being A Rockstar Guinea

Yes folks, Guinea came home for another visit – we generally “queue” couple months thereabouts for him to be available again, and I call him “the thing” to my friends all the time but well, I say it with love 🙂 We love the thing, with his crazy hairdo and sweet nature… and incessant pooping sigh. Well the poop are dry, hard pellets you can pick up with tissue (though this time round I found one on the back of my hand – placed there casually by the Miss so she could point out the obvious to me – “poop” – which really cracked Rockstar up.) 

There’s lots of articles about the benefits of pets to children’s development, and I especially liked this:

” …A pet brings increased sensitivity and awareness of the feelings and needs of others—both animals and humans…

… Students will see directly how their behavior and actions affect others…”

Also, I respect the Miss’ preschool for taking a little “risk,” which they do, while trying to provide the service of a “school pet.” I mean, you see all these articles about the benefits to kids’ learning and social development, but I bet despite all this one reason school pets are more rare in Hong Kong is because in Hong Kong you are going to get very angry and vocal parents if the thing (:D) nips/ scratches/ causes a rash/ dies. At the same time, we need more of these things (:D) here, in this fast-paced concrete jungle with all the iPads and iPhones and little kiddie apps (the difference even between Rocsktar’s and the Miss’ toddlerhood in terms of iPhone Apps and their usage within the space of 4.5 years still amazes me), particularly for the kids whose working parents are super swamped and can’t handle a full-time pet. 

While cabbing home with Guinea and the 3 large bags of his stuff (bedding, hay for chewing on, some dry food, travel cage AND separate large cardboard box because it’s safer for him to travel in the box), I catch the taxi driver glancing at me curiously in the rear view mirror when he hears me explain to Guinea we are in a cab and he’ll see the Miss soon (yes, I talk to animals. At least he knows his name is Guinea, and he can tell my tone is calm right? Shut up.) When I take the top off the box to show him who I’m talking to and explain the Guinea Pig Program at Safari Kid he says, “Oh, that really is very good, we need more of that. Kids nowadays get less and less interaction with nature or animals, and they need to learn to be kind to other living things.” And then he goes on, “You know there was this latest Mainland case – kid found a bunch of -” Puppies? Kittens? I couldn’t hear because I was trying to muffle him. “Burned the lot for entertainment, can you imagine -” STOP TALKING NOW.    

S-o, anyway, whenever  we get to have Guinea visit, we hope to give him the Full Rockstar Treatment 🙂 Think Makeshift Guinea Pig Spa Retreat…

Guinea Pig stars in……<drrrrum roll> “It’s Not Easy, Being A Rockstar Guinea”  

No Kidding.

“It’s not easy, being a Rockstar Guinea…..”

“Instead of walking, you get carried about everywhere…

Your staff are so ‘dedicated’ they even do it in their pajamas… (We need to work on an official dress code, here)…”

“You even get carried through lift lobbies…”

“And to the school bus!”

—

“You end up getting all these… these back rubs…

And… and head massages that make you want to hang your tongue out (if you could) and just make youzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz”

(For real, fans, he really did doze off – it turns out Rockstar is quite a good Guinea Pig Scalp Massager… and clean-cage-setter-upper :P)

“You can’t be too careful with the help these days, and you find that you still have to oversee everything…”

–

–

“And don’t get me started on hygiene.”

“Some fans feel sorry and offer you Lightning McQueen sticker rewards for your troubles, though…”

(Note: The Miss really is awarding him a sticker for allowing himself to be bathed… After she calmed down from -)

“That is, when they’re not screaming “WHAT YOU DOING TO GUINEA???” at your staff for putting you under the tap…”

(Note: we rinsed the thing (:D) off, particularly his hind quarters when he got a little pee on them, with lots and lots of water, and a little heavily diluted baby soap. Then we poured boiling water all around the tub to clean it, because yes that’s the same tub the kids use…)

“And don’t get me started about the blowouts…”

–

–

“A good Rockstar Guinea should always do competitor research…”

“…Even if Rockstar Collie doesn’t see it that way…”

(Kidding – the dog’s facial expression is because in the pic above we made her sit/stay for the photo op, and she hates posing for pictures; unfortunately she likes guinea pig food though, she we had to keep his dry food away from her :D)

(Note: Don’t try this at home folks, unless you’re super duper sure it isn’t going to end badly… JD’s a 13 year old Advanced Agility trained border collie (albeit “off-duty” she likes to pretend she’s not) who only herds animals larger than herself… Also, from the previous weekend stay we were quite sure JD didn’t have any adverse reactions to him)

–

–

“And I don’t know what to say about the Lift Selfies…”

“Uh, guys, that’s my butt…”

“Better… I think.”

“Now where’s my butt? Which end is my butt? …”

“Well, that’s all we have time for folks, excuse me while I get back to my back rub before the bus gets herezzzzzzz”

(Note: He got on the bus in his usual “safe travel cardboard box” for the ride back to school…)

Ps: No Guinea Pigs, Border Collies or Children were harmed in the making of this post.