“A young animal may leave some droppings or urine on your shoulder but this generally stops once it’s a little older.” Quoted from ‘The Rat’ by About Pets publishers.
This is part of my research into the feasibility of having rats and small children under the same roof. Even though I kept rats as a child, I didn’t want to remember those times, joyous though they were, and allow my current attitudes to be rose-tinted. Admittedly, male rats have freakishly outsized testicles (ratpacks), which must be alarming to females of the species.
My life has been partly shaped by rats. (Aha! I hear you proclaim, just as you’d guessed!) I don’t just mean gnawed into shape, but rather there have been some pivotal moments in my life concerning this much-maligned beast.
My first great acting role was in the musical the ‘Pied Piper of Hamlyn’. I was the piper, as I was one of only two boys skilled enough on the recorder to lend credence to the role. I wore a motley satin suit of red and gold, and spirited both rats and children away with my spectral piping abilities. I count this a turning point in my life, where I grew to love the adoration of crowds…
My first real experience of grief involved leaving my pet rat, Adrian No 1, in too bright a patch of sun, and his water and life ran out, one shortly before the other. I buried him in the garden, and after the grief had lessened, dug him up a few times to observe the passage of decay. If there are any laboratory workers reading this, check no rats are reading over your shoulder…
Rats look kind of the same, so I replaced him with Adrian No 2.
Some childhood books worth rereading…: Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. A brilliant social fable, scurrilously destroyed by a film version. Who are those intelligent rats living under the rose bush? Is there something sinister to their tale?
The Rats by James Herbert. Horrifying horror, which in retrospect a child should not have read. (Rats gnawing human flesh etc.)
And finally, the Pit and the Pendulum, a short story by Edgar Allan Poe. (Again, the threat of gnawed flesh… What was I reading as a youngster?)
London was hopelessly overpopulated in the 14th- 15th centuries, fortunately the Black Rat helped reduce the population by at least a third, and HELLO! It was the fleas that were to blame for the plague…
I remember an album I used to listen to when I was about 14, by the Stranglers, I think called Rattus Norvegicus. It had a gimlet-eyed rodent on the cover, and was very punky. I remember that the drummer of the band the Damned called himself Rat Scabies. (Who knows, maybe he still does?)
Before you worry that I am having some post-goth-punk crisis, I am just having a twisted trip down memory lane, as I consider buying a rat for my son as a pet. (Purists would say a rat cannot be ‘bought’). Apparently one can buy big fat cane rats, as big as medium-sized dogs, as pets, or even for the pot… Mmmm roasted rat…
I don’t see that becoming one of the great flavours of the 21st century: Barbecued Beef, Chicken or rat noodles? Maybe you too have eaten in dodgy Chinese restaurants, where the ‘chicken’ chow mein tastes just a little toooo gamey… Chalk it all up to experience, I say, even if it does make me sound ninety-three.
Rats are the new dog! Ever seen a maltese poodle in a maze? I would personally love to see the author of ‘Who Moved My Cheese’, that tiny ‘motivational’ tomelet thrown into a giant maze, covered in cheese essence, and hunted down by red-eyed sewer rats. Why don’t you re-engineer that corporation, buddy…
How much is that rodent in the window?
The one with the pink hairy tail
How much is that rodent in the window?
The one that makes girlies go pale…
Hug a rat today. And then have your shoulder laundered.
(If you have persevered, and read this all the way through, trust me, I haven’t lost my marbles. Yet.)
