BAVARIAN MEERIS! OH MY!

^^PRESS FOR CLOSE-UP^^
SQUEEEEEEEEEEE!
BAVARIAN MEERIS! YOU 
CAN'T LOVE JUST ONE!
WE LOVE THE PIC OF THEM
(JUST BENEATH AND RIGHT
UNDER THE FLOWER) OF
SO MANY MERRY MEERIS
ALL OUT AND ABOUT!
TOO ADORABLE
WE LOVE YOU EVERY
ONE, YOU BAVARIAN
MEERIS, WE FEEL
LIKE YOU ARE OURS!

Hey, Dave, Forgot to Say: I'm Sorry

You know, up until now I had forgotten the whole thing.
You never knew it even happened between your Dalai Lama
Bliss-Out and your Caffeinated Cup'O'Joy...how you were
in a haze, a stupor, barely even taking steps...and it's a corner,
I mean you were kinda jay-walking but this is an apology
not about you, it's about me, about me driving like a normal
human being...O.K. O.K. nobody's gonna buy that either, 
may as well just say: didn't see ya, nearly ran ya over,
sorry, don't live there NO more, good on ya, mate, 
you do good in the world, love your music when
i don't have a migraine, off we go now,
pip-pip!
To my readers, scratching your heads wondering
what I'm talking about, it snowed today but I got
blueberry pancakes take-out yesterday and everything
is fine, just fine.
love,
we're fine, HONEST!

FAIRY'S MUM GOES ALL PACIFIC NORTHWEST: CHOOSES LATTES OVER TEA!

WE could have warned her, should we have warned her? We have a cafe on every corner of every intersection of Seattle and I even told her the story about how I almost ran over Dave Matthews of the Dave Matthews Band after Dave spent a week with the Dalai Lama...and how turning a corner where one of the cafes with the strongest coffee is, NOBODY MEANDERS ACROSS THAT STREET BUT DAVE MATTHEWS WAS SO BLISSED OUT HE MEANDERED AND...well, he lives in the neighborhood and we all love him, but - seriously? The only thing in the world more powerful than what you are looking at (and bear - as in Paddington Bear or Vermont Bear or Winnie-the-Pooh Bear) in mind we haven't even tried Fairy's mum's brew not to mention her HOME-MADE BISCOTTI, what were we talking about? 

NOW that's what we're talking 
about! Fairy could be drinking
dreaming about the Dalai Lama and
her mum's new espresso machine
but nope! She's dreaming of joining
all of us in a WHEEEK!GRASS
FRENZY o'FRIENDS!
SQUEEEEEEEEE!
FAIRY, YOU GIVE US FAITH.
YOU GIVE US HOPE.
WE LOVE YOU.
YOU know that Stevie Wonder song
"Isn't She Lovely?"
We sing that for you!
(and if wee scootin' Vinny thinks
we're singin' it for him
we are in BIG TRUBBLE!)
LOVE YOU.
ALL US.
EVERY DAY.
ALL THE TIME!

MEET THE MEERIES: THE WIND BENEATH OUR WINGS

TODAY IT BEGAN SNOWING HEAVILY AND WE RECEIVED NOTICE IN OUR "INBOX" THAT THE SNOW IS TO CONTINUE UNTIL TOMORROW...WELL, THEY QUITE LEFT OFF THERE...

SO, BEING INDOORS WITH OUR TAKE-OUT BLUEBERRY PANCAKES AND MAPLE SYRUP AND SUCH-LIKE, we feel it's about time to introduce you to the meeries in our family who live near (not really, not near, we just said that) and far (now that's more like it, the far part, that part is true) that and the fact that anyone with a pair of cross-country skis or snowshoes (like MOM) is going to head right off to downtown here to get their ice cream cones and dance in the street, it's a Bellingham Tradition to get ice

cream when we have blizzards and can't get to Mt. Baker, we go en masse to the Ice Creamery to defy...well, we enjoy defiance in any way, shape, or form...but I digress!

MEET OUR VERY OWN WUNNERFUL FAMILY!!!! 

ABOVE PLEASE MEET "THE MEERIS OF BAVARIA" WHO OWN THE POET INGRID AND HER DEAR HELMUT! WE ARE SO BEYOND IN LOVE WITH THEM AND KNOW WE WOULD BE HAVING LOTS OF FUN, LOOK HOW MANY!

BOY ARE THEY SOME LUCKY MEERIS, THEY ARE.

HERE is where the luckiest Bavarian meeris in the world live,
is that a fine looking caviary OR WHAT? IT LOOKS HOME-MADE! Wish we had one, all neat and clean, but we are Americans and...'nuff said. What a beautiful place to live, 
Bavaria, and what beautiful souls to own, our own dear, precious
Ingrid and Helmut, introduced to us by...

FAIRY! Fairy, looks like you are preparing for a big sleep-over and getting everything "just so" for
your friends...OH! A Tale of 3 Piggies is our favorite book, too! But where is Marigold? Where is she going to sleep? 

Fairy lives with Marigold and they recently lost their own precious Mariella. We all lost a near and dear one recently...most of our friends experienced losses yet not a one missed any opportunity given them to console us, even in their own grief. That brings tears to our eyes, their losses, too...please do not think they are any less for now we are one family and every guinea pig, cavy, meeri dear as our own heartbeat!

Oh, well, we nearly forgot, THIS IS FAIRY'S HOUSE! Err...
mmmm....uh....Fairy....why is your dad wearing it and where are
you and he is beginning to remind us of Hugh Laurie! Yes, quite,
we could see "HOUSE" wearing a guinea pig house on his own
head...but where are you?

OH, you have gone outside! You know, Fairy, we had this picture of you as our screensaver, but every time mom turned her computer on she just wanted to pet and brush you and stared at the screen so long we had to put on something else, especially your cheek, she just wanted to comb it and give you scritchy-scrunchies and did she get anything done? Why, Fairy, she looked at you so much and petted and combed you so much she forgot why she turned the computer on in the first place so then she turned it off!

DID WE MENTION IT IS SNOWING BUT WE HAVE PANCAKES?

BAVARIAN MEERI, HOW PRETTY AND COLOURFUL AND SWIRLY! OH, LOOK AT THAT SWIRL IN THE BACK! NOW THAT'S A SWIRL IF EVER THERE WAS ONE!

OH NOW THAT THE SNOW IS COMING DOWN the Bavarian Meeris have all come 'round!
You black beauty in the straw, hay, grassy stuff,
we bet you glitter and your coat is so smooth after a nice comb-out! We love your floppy ears, too.
WE love ALL OF YOU! EVEN WHEN IT ISN'T SNOWING AND WE DON'T HAVE BLUEBERRY PANCAKES IN THE HOUSE!

BAVARIAN meeris send white roses to console us...did we mention the meeris also lost one of their own, too? And we
pray no more than one? For we just today got to last week's

emails...and...eyes closed in prayer and breath stuck in throat -

WHILE Fairy invents scritchy-scratchers to comfort us...although her dad actually brought this one back from London Towne where we are certain he dressed like Mr. Steed, with a bowler hat, umbrella, and impeccable sleuthing and spy skills...wonder what is

really contained within that "alleged" gift for dear Fairy? The code to the Queen's doggery where, with the push of a button, you could release all the Pembroke Welsh Corgis? AT ONE AND THE SAME TIME? WICKED! WICKED FUNNY! But there we go being swashbuckling Americans again, SORRY there, now you know we're just Pirates in disguise, Fairy, and yet you love us anyway. So kind you are.

And you lost your dear Mariella...grief knocked on your door,
on the Meeris door, on Jen who makes our fabulous cuddle cups' door...twas an epidemic of grief yet...tears glued us together into a bigger, howsoever broken, heart than ever before.

FRIENDS. UNDERSTOOD IN EVERY LANGUAGE.

NOW meet the new American kids on the block! The newest of the new, little bitty (though grown, yet having never had a home) Almond Joy! She owns CD3, who we know from "Molly the Owl"
watching and "Friday Nights at the Movies" with our Molly the Owl friendsies.

CD3 got Almond Joy to keep her very first guinea pig rescue, Millie Bea company...and it wasn't easy getting that Almond Joy! The rescue really put her through the ringer so now that she is home at last and ready to be Millie Bea's forever-friend...

CD3, how would you put it? All right then, I shall use your own words: "She's the Queen" yes, indeed, Millie Bea is like, "You got
a WHAT? for WHO? like...WHY?" And now each pig has that "separate but equal" status that we know all too well, even know
it here now, what with YumYum kicking me out after Raj passed...


Well, friends, there you have it.


We love you. You held us. You rocked us in your arms, sent us emails always, checked up on us, wrote poems for us, sent pictures to us, prayed for us, and never let us go, not for a minute even though you yourselves were grieving your own losses, dear Mariella and our meeri...


There is no language with a heart big enough to contain
the gratitude we wish to convey...
so in the gentlest, softest as rose-petals whisper..."thank you"
~

SATURDAY "PINPRICKS"

TONIGHT is Saturday and we expect snow tomorrow.
For the first time since Raj died, mom actually bathed, dressed
herself, went out for a decent meal, a latte, read the Rolling
Stone edition Connieeee sent her featuring an interview with her
favorite on-air personality, Jon Stewart of "The Daily Show"
and she ordered blueberry pancakes for breakfast tomorrow
in case we got snowed in. Then she got us freshly squeezed,

raw, organic carrot juice!

She has a word for days like these: "Pinpricks." They're good!
We gave up fighting for normalcy after we lost Raj. Her health-
care providers all come here anyway, she just kind of went into
shock, took care of us, and did the barest necessities...I can tell
the story most objectively having been here the shortest, but
everyone went to sleep in darkness and woke up in darkness
no matter what the hour was, and mom just kept saying to people
on the phone how great her friends were, that she couldn't believe
what wonderful friends she had! That was about all we felt we had.

But even though I'm the "new kid on the block" I lost something, too, when Raj died. Before he died, mom got me for him. Because he couldn't live without his brother Taj, who never came home.
And since YumYum was suddenly (surprisingly) behaving in an
unexpectedly magnanimous way towards newbies, he allowed not
one, but two new pigs to live with him in the brand new gigantic
pen that our anonymous benefactor bought for us...and he hasn't had a live-in friend since PandaPig, the original founder of our
Sanctuary, passed away: Now he has three! We all loved being
together, got along, each played, ate, drank, popcorned, slept,
and snuggled in perfect harmony and even though I'm the size
of a Pacific Northwest Logger, I am still a baby, too...and need a herd...and knew I was being groomed for the most important job ahead: to comfort Raj once his pneumonia was cured. Then he died sleeping next to mom under the covers that cruel night and both mom and YumYum became inconsolable and nobody remembers what I lost: this wee little scamp here, VinnyGuinea!
Now, YumYum and I share him and our own brand new gigantic
pig-pen is due to arrive Monday and can actually be attached to
YumYum's as long as mom is ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY CERTAIN that YumYum can't "get me" or that I can't jump over
given my hay trough vaulting abilities...


Thing is, it's Saturday and mom had her first pin-prick of Real
Life and Real Hope Day with a hot breakfast, latte, and the Rolling Stone. But I needed to tell you all that I lost something
too: the happiness of fitting in, of belonging, of having my own herd, of snuggling up in a fuzzy sleeping bag with that little scamp all soft and velvety...sharing a wheatgrass breakfast on
Runabout. We all lost a lot. 


But one pin-prick of hope, mom knows from experience, always
brings more. And, over time, pin-pricks of hope become intertwined into Joy which become threads of continuity which
become woven into a fabric where smiling replaces weeping which create a fabulous new quilt into which the pinpricks
of grief become fewer and fewer as the memories become
transformed into one's history that begins to mellow into smile
which will always bring with it tears but with those tears come
the recognition that our lives have been made all the more
beautiful because they were in them.


love,
Bhindi

I am not Bhindi.

WHERE'S MY BITS? WHADDA? WHADDA? WHADDA?

YESTERDAY on our Epic Runabout, mom got a good look
at Bhindi's bits and - lemme tell ya - they big enough to use
for the Olympig Shotpoot Commition this summer in England!

YOWZA-BANANZA!

So, during our twice daily antibiotic "bonding" ritual (mom,
seriously, do you really think we buy THAT?) she took a
good look down under to inspect the size of my bits...mebbe
mine would be used for the women's competition, mebbe 
girls under the age of 10...all she needed was some bits,
anything, anything...

Well, am I turning into a handsome so-and-so or WHAT?!

I'm so velvety soft, and I scoot so fast and make everybody

laugh especially scooting up and down my bright, high, orange, 
CARROTUS-GIGANTICUS...no one wants me to grow up 
and if I did then I'd have Bits and Chips or at least

a weiner in a bun...aren't I turning into...

(have I said that already?)

Mom just erased a lot of the post so getting off before she loses

what remains of my post along with the rest of her mind.

Gonna snow tomorrow,  so we thinking of our Bavarian meeris 
and Ingrid and Helmut and our Fairy and Marigold and her mum and Dad 
and our Millie Bea and Almond Joy in Wisconsin and the big party 
they gonna have in that warm, red, Mesa Guinea Pig Place.

love you,

VinnyGuinea: MAN-BITS WAITING TO SNEAK UP ON YOU

AND YOU WILL FEEL BAD FOR MAKING FUN OF ME!

UNLESS YOU SEE A LOT O'LIL BITS STUMBLIN' ABOUT

NOT CONNECTED TO MY MAN-PARTS AND...
ISN'T THAT HOW FAIRY MAGICALLY APPEARED?!
SOMETIMES THE BEST SURPRISES HAPPEN IN PRECIOUS, 
TINY, FURRY PACKAGES...
(i could be wrong, but seems like that's Fairy's story and I'm stickin' to it!)

DID I SAY IT GONNA SNOW? 

REUNITED AND IT FEELS SO GOOD!

TODAY VinnyGuinea and Bhindi pretty much

had the Run o'the RunAbout all day since I didn't

have the strength to leave the apartment; so they

indulged in massive, eager doses of popcorning, chase, 
treats, resting together in sleeping bags, cuddle cups,

square ferret houses with round holes & hidden 
treats with infinite jump-through opportunities
 pOpCoRnING-FULL-THROTTLE through
their HappyDayTogether!

AND IT WAS GOOD.

THEN I got too tired and needed to give them antibiotics

so placed them back into their cages to medicate them before

Molly Movie Night or I fell asleep, whichever came first.

AND IT WAS NOT GOOD.

BHINDI HAD A FIT! 

A

FIT.

HE'S quite the acrobat, much as Taj Mahal was, and finally
jumped right INTO HIS HAY TROUGH in an effort to see
what was on the other side: could it be Vinny? Could it?

IF he just s.t.r.e.t.c.h.e.d. far enough...was there any chance

he could find his best friend and maybe somehow find a way

to escape captivity of The Cage and regain the Wonder of their

SUPER SPECIAL DAY?

IF ONLY HE COULD STRETCH JUST A WEE BIT MORE?

ON TOP OF HIS PRECARIOUS PERCH

ATOP HIS PRECARIOUS HAY TROUGH, THE

FEEDING HOLES OF WHICH ARE LOCATED

ON THE BOTTOM?

WHILE YumYum eats his hay, Vinny looks Startled, as if
having an "out of body" experience...half of it is feeling the
meeries from Bavaria, the realization that the time to post their photographs has come and then it will be too late to take back
the affection that has grown between him and his dear friends
Fairy and Marigold and his new Bavarian meeries and once he
has posted his love for them...what next?


The OTHER "out of body" experience is urgent! Where is his
former cage and playmate Bhindi? He loves and adores YumYum
and wants to live with him but a time was, not so long ago, when
they all lived as one, before Raj died and mom and YumYum finally took leave of their senses, it was the last straw for both of them...

"What to do? What to do? What to do?"

"BHINDI!"
"VINNY!"
"PLEASE DON'T EVER LEAVE ME AGAIN!"
"PLEASE DON'T EVER LEAVE ME AGAIN!"
"I PROMISE!"
"I PROMISE, TOO!"


AND IT WAS GOOD.

Life Is SO UNFAIR!

ALL DAY like yesterday, today, and tomorrow,
the Pacific Northwest, particularly our furthest NW corner
of it, has been getting battered with wind, rain, sleet, ice,
snow in higher elevations and mountains, just not happy
dance weather and then today - for the first time in our
entire lives, we received our first ever party invitation
for piggies in a place called MESA!
While mom isn't exactly sure where Mesa is, she said
"sounds like an Arizona word, hot, a red place, with
plateaus that turn every color at sunrise and sunset...
dry, a place that would be such a happy place:
hot, dry, and PIGGIES GALORE!"
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEE! WE ROARED!
DOUBLE SQUEEEEEEE! WE SOARED!


oh cruel fates,
tis not to be
for mom is sick
and happy we
...are not.
(the "Mangosteen" thing really throwing me off here, sorry.)


oh cruel fates,
we take it back
you're kind to us
for LIVE we shall!
just not in Mesa
nor e'er we will.


ENOUGH WITH THE MANGOSTEEN, IT'S 
MESSIN' WID MY HEAD, NOW I KNOW
WHY MOM HAS TO LIVE HERE
AND EDWIN GOTTA LIVE THERE!
love,
Bhindi
not Mindy
not Cindy
not Windy
(well, only 60+mph...)
not Hindi
(actually is Hindi, but...?)

SHARED CUSTODY? NOT SO FAST!

Yesterday I wasn't feeling well and giving them their antibiotics and fresh food, water, hay, and the like (with lots of love time) was all I could manage but, boy was Bhindi out of sorts! He kept gnashing on his bars and pulling them back and forth the way

Coconut did when she wanted to run around with the boys and

couldn't if any one of them was not neutered and Edwin nicknamed

her "Black Douglas" because he always imagined her on that 

battlefield alongside "Braveheart" fighting to free Scotland.

(The same way when he came here to free my apartment

years of repressive chaos and clutter and he spoke these

unforgettable words, much the same Douglas McArthur 

did when he freed Edwin's native Homeland, the Philipinnes

of Japanese tyranny during World War II.) Edwin dramatically opened the front door much like Zorro would have, to save the day, looked around, didn't bother to even put

his backpack down: He Saw. He left. 

I said: "Where are you going? I thought you

came to help me?" (This was, after all, Presidents

Day, a day off...)

"I need a haircut."

And off he went.

Seriously.

Later, he renamed Bhindi "Mangosteen" and took

out a lot of garbage and did some cleaning then

 returned to Seattle. A grand time was had by all,

particularly MangoWHOZIT?

The point is...yesterday, Bhindi-Steen hadn't had 

any magical Vinny time and I hadn't even noticed.

Last night I remembered, placed Vinny in his

cage, the two played chase until I started falling

asleep, and Vinny went back into YumYum's

cage to sleep with him in their sleeping bag,

the one that saved their lives by keeping

them warm and by a Miracle having their

cage placed away from the others'

and so far, they are running about 

with more energy than I HAVE!

ON  MONDAY we expect to receive a generous gift of
the same pen you see on the top-left, the one shared by 
YumYum and VinnyGuinea with lots of space and no top.
 It can even be connected to the new one with a (very strong) divider (or three or ten) to keep the two males from actually
fighting while each can rub noses with Vinny when he
is in the other cage. Meanwhile, they love the configuration
of tiny, narrow mazes, large lanes, huts, boxes, cuddle cups,
hay, water, food, and lots of paw-print fleece lining their
playground and each has an abundance of time to share
with VinnyGuinea now that I understand how valuable it
is to each pig to be with him. FAVORITE OF FAVORITES:
THE ONE AND ONLY MAGIC CARROT!!!!!!!
(THANK YOU, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!) 
VINNY SCOOTS UP AND DOWN EL RAPIDO
 LIKE A SLIDING BOARD AND IT MUST
BE SEEN TO BE BELIEVED!)
My nurse came today and saw them doing their
NASCAR RACE-AROUND-YUM-YUM'S-CAGE
since I had just put them in their Runabout
and she could not stop laughing!
Now that's a good nurse!
thank you for all your love...
hope to make it to Molly Movie Night if no migraine,
You have all given me a new definition of the
word "friend" to which I now aspire...


love,
to all of you

A BETTER DAY?

So much love from all of
you feels like Fairy Dust surrounding
me in colors Bright and Beautiful.
This is how HOPE looks
inside of me, sitting on eggs
of Spring Renewal
covered in Sprinkles of Magical
LOVE from all of YOU.

RAINBOW

View from out the back door
of the wildlife sanctuary where
we used to live, where we
first started PandaPig's Peace 
Sanctuary With PandaPig and
YumYum and Bear the Beaver Pig.
Snow covers these hills now
and we miss waking up to the
sounds of birds, wind, rain,
and the fragrant storms that rolled
across the foothills from the 
North Cascades only 50 miles East...
But we also realize we need the
ease and access of downtown life,
the bustling cafes, our art galleries,
and having company once we are
able to get out again...still...
to smell the storms, the rain, and watch 
fawns pass beneath our window with
their moms, and eagles carry long,
heavy branches to bolster their nest
from the wind, snow, and rain...
what a sight just out our door!
Rainbow Bridge>who knows?
It's just where we once lived and loved.

VINNY THE RAPPER!

i'm a baby guinea pig

whose name is Vin~ny

and when i get BIG 
i gonna

call m'self 
O'BINNY!

but for now i'm tiny 
and i'm teeny,
soft, and fast!
and my mommy hopes my teeny,
babyVinny-ness will last!


{composed
by VinnyGuinea
to cheer up mom}


All COPYRIGHTS APPLY
to smokin' hot whole grain 
pancakes fresh outta the
skillet, dripping with organic, local
butter, smothered in authentic Canadian 
maple syrup served with AWESOME
 latte: freshly-brewed with
just-ground, fragrant beans
bird-friendly, rainforest-friendly,
organic, farmer equalitied (you know,
just can't remember the words)
single-sourced, no trees cut down,
no fossil fuels used during shipping
from Guatamala by bicycle courier
um...well, hell's bells, we know
we done it right cuz we in
Bellingham and you can't
do it wrong even if you try! 


BUZZER JUST WENT OFF,
ALL CUDDLE CUPS, HUTS,
GIGANTIC CARROT AND LEAF, 
TUNNELS, SLEEPING BAGS,
EVERYTHING WONDERFUL
WASHED, FRESH,
SANITIZED AND HOT TO
SNUGGLE INTO FOR OUR NAP!
~