#40 Let me bore you to sleep - Jason Newland (5th August 2018)

Hello and welcome to Jason Newland dot com. My throat sounded a bit croaky, or my voice rather, just then. Anyway, um, welcome to this um, yawny sleep session.

So this is a bore, let me bore you to sleep. Only listen to this, or watch it on YouTube, or on my website, when you can safely close your eyes. Because, I don't know about you, but I generally have my eyes closed when I sleep.

I know some people don't, but uh, generally I think sharks are one of the few animals that have their eyes open all the time when they sleep. Maybe caterpillars as well, I don't know. And uh, what did I say animals, I meant fish.

Sharks are, I suppose lots of fish, including sharks, have their uh, eyes open. Yeah. So, whales as well maybe.

Those big fish. Yeah. So, I was going to say fish, because sharks are fish, because they've got gills haven't they? Yeah.

Little elephants. So, I was going to say what the whole point of this is, it's just me talking about absolutely nothing for an amount of time. Usually the sessions last about an hour, ish.

But um, I'm not sure if I'm going to talk for that long. I feel like I could actually go to sleep myself. Andre is in the bedroom, asleep on my bed.

And um, for some reason he's started doing that again. He hasn't slept on my bed for months, until the last week. And he's on there nearly every day.

So, I don't really know what it is or why, but he seems to really like it in there. During the winter he's on the bed, underneath the covers, you know, quite a lot. So, this is uh, who knows what's going on with him.

But it's very comfy. It's a comfortable bed, and he likes comfort. He really does love comfort.

So, he gets to stretch out as well, because he's got quite a long body. Well, it's not as long as mine, but you know, he likes to just stretch right out and sleep like that. And he can't do that in any of the other places that he sleeps, because in his cage he's got a hammock.

He can't really stretch out in that, because it's more of a square hammock than a long hammock. I mean, I think he has a lot of comfortable, there's a comfortable sleep there, but he can't stretch his body. He's got a big round, it's actually like a cat scratcher, and with a space underneath.

I'm not really describing it very well, but he sleeps in there anyway, quite a lot. And he's got his bag. So, he's got this green bag that he sleeps in, green and brown bag, bag that he sleeps in.

Again, he doesn't, I don't think he really gets to stretch out. So, maybe that's what he likes. He likes a chance to stretch out and not have anything on top of him, just to be free.

Apart from the ceiling, but that's quite high up. I can't imagine he can even see the ceiling. His eyesight isn't great.

And it doesn't have to be. I suppose you don't need to duck. If you're three foot tall, you never need to duck to get through doors.

You need to watch out for your head, banging your head on the top of the doorframe. So, I guess it's just one of those things you don't really take much notice of. So, being a ferret, sleeping on a big bed, outstretched with a high ceiling, it's very much like being three foot tall, walking through doors.

I'm not quite sure how those quite breach. So, as I said, just the main point really about these recordings is I just talk and I'm probably going to talk about a little bit about what's been going on for me the last week or two weeks. So, I haven't actually recorded anything for over a week, I think.

I do lose track, but I think it's got to be about a week and it seems absolutely ages. I don't know. It's weird, isn't it? I mean, a week isn't a long time and it's just, you know, standing on a nail or something.

Of course, it's a long time then. Or stuck in a lift or elevator. Or your foot stuck down the toilet.

You know, I'm just saying it can be a long time, obviously, a week. I mean, just generally though, it's not a huge amount of time really to go without making a recording. By the way, that's Andre in the background.

He's arisen from his bed, or from my bed, actually. My bed. He's got one, two, three, four, four places that he sleeps other than my bed.

Five, including my bed. Six, actually, because he sleeps in my dirty... It sounds gross, but I've got a pile of dirty laundry on the floor and he's... At the moment, he's not doing that, but in the winter, he sleeps in there. So he crawls right up, right in the middle of it and just... I don't know where he is sometimes.

He just hides. But he's not hiding, he's just sleeping. I guess it's keeping him warm.

So he's got quite a few different places he sleeps. He's also got a couple of carrier bags that he sleeps in as well. So there's probably about eight different places.

And now he's the other side of the room eating his dinner, which is cat food. I'll give you an idea of how fussy he is. He refuses to eat cat food that's got jelly in it.

He will only eat cat food that's got gravy with it, that's mixed with gravy. Refuses to eat jelly. Most cat foods come with jelly.

Amazing just how fussy he is. He absolutely loves the cat food, but he also has dry favorite food as well, which is really good for his teeth. And it gives him some of the other vitamins and stuff that he needs.

And he's always got water, plenty of water available for him to drink all the time. He's got three different places he can get water from. But he's having a right old munch.

He's enjoying his dinner. He also loves chocolate, but I've stopped giving him chocolate because it's no good for him. It's not good for his stomach.

He loves to taste, but it upsets his stomach. I can see the results of his upset stomach, but I can't feel the results. So I don't know if it's causing him pain in his stomach.

And I thought about it recently, and if it is giving him stomach pains or heartburn or any of those things, then I don't want that to happen. And he can't tell me, can he? So I've stopped giving him... I didn't used to give him big bars of chocolate. I didn't turn up and just give him a whole Easter egg to eat.

I might have done that when he was a baby just for fun, but I used to give him pretty much anything he wanted when he was tiny, just to see what he'd do with it. I used to give him bananas. I remember when he was really little.

I mean, I'm talking... Well, he's three years old now. And so I've had him, it's August the 4th or 5th or something like that. I think it was the 1st of August on Monday now.

Wow, and probably nearly a week into August. Nearly. I don't know why he's making so much noise.

He's probably looking for little bits of food that might have dropped on the carpet. Yeah, I think he is. He's just laying there.

So he's three years old, pretty much now. I got him in September, three years ago. And he was about five weeks old when I got him.

And including his tail, he was pretty much the size of his head, including the whole body and everything and the tail. So he was tiny. He fit in the palm of my hand and he was very little.

Now he's fully grown and still, in some ways, he's probably cuter now than he was when he was a baby. It's just that face. I just fell in love with his face.

He's got this just cutest little face ever. And so I've had him for three years, nearly. Sort of another month and it'll be three years that I've had him.

So he'll have been born around probably sometime. I don't remember the exact date I got him. So it was in August sometime.

So he may have already been born by now, three years ago. And when I first got him, I actually got a friend who's also got one. And he said to me that the person, I think it's possibly the same mother, possibly, or who, I don't know.

It was a blood relative anyway of the one that my friends got. So Andre's related. And his friend who breeds them said that he said that his friend's got two that needed to be taken, really needed to be given a home.

There's two boys and they were brothers. And I thought about it. I had a brand new carpet.

I say brand new. I'd had it since May. So that's what, four months.

But it was still in really good condition and everything. And the flat was pretty much in good condition and everything. And I thought, did I really want to have the responsibility? And could I be bothered really? Part of me thought, yeah, and part of me thought, nah.

I'd already thought about getting a dog, but a little dog. I'd actually gone to the council. Well, I'd contacted the council, the local council, who are my landlord or landlady.

They're in charge of my home. Well, I'm in charge of the home, but they own it and they rented to me. And I said, well, I'd quite like to have a dog for therapeutic reasons, really.

Company and just maybe to help me emotionally and help me, you know, give me something that's missing from my life. Maybe give me a reason to get out of bed on those times that I don't feel, feel the need, you know, get me out of bed to take the dog for a walk. Oh, my back's itchy.

And so the lady on the phone at the council said, well, it's okay. You can have a dog as long as it's a small dog and you don't take it out into the communal garden and you make sure the dog does not disturb your neighbors with barking and things like that. I thought, well, fair enough.

I don't, if I did get a dog, I'd never, I never wanted a big dog anyway. I'm more a more lap dog person, really just a, you know, a little, a little dog with a pink bone, you know, that's the kind of dog that I would go for anyway. Just a little thing.

Just, just, just someone to love really, isn't it? I'm not in, I don't need, didn't feel the need to walk around with a dangerous looking dog. I don't really have that. Not really, never really appealed to me.

And even sort of dogs like Alsatians and big, big dogs just don't, apart from the fact that they've just been knocking stuff over. I mean, when I was just, when I was a kid, when I was, when I was a kid, when I was a kid, my family got a St. Bernard puppy and it was little, tiny, this little thing. It was probably, probably a bit bigger than Andre, but when it was, you know, when it first came to us, but it was puppy size, tiny little thing.

And it grew and it grew and it grew and it just became absolutely massive. Still the biggest dog I've ever seen to this day. Just, it weighed, it was taller than me and it weighed more than me.

And just couldn't, couldn't take it for a walk because it was too heavy. It was too big, too strong. Just was just, just not practical at all.

And they need a lot of attention. Rightly so, they should get lots of attention. They're beautiful.

And I think if you, if, really, if you have a dog, you need to be able to, or any kind of animal or children or whatever, you have to be able to be, spend time with them because otherwise there's no point having them, I suppose. So I thought as I wasn't working, I could get a dog, spend time with the dog, but also I needed an animal that could be left on its own for periods of time. If I ever do manage to get myself a job in the future, or I want to, need to go away for the weekend or for, you know, need to go to do something, I needed a dog that would be able to be left alone without barking and inviting friends around to play poker and, you know, having parties, raves, things like that.

And so causing trouble for the neighbors. So I had to be careful there. So I went to the, well, first of all, I went and spoke to a neighbor and said, I'm thinking of getting a dog, but it's only be a little one.

It won't be barking, you know, I'll get one that's quiet. And the neighbor looked at me like I just, I felt I was being looked at like I was, like she'd answered the door and I was sitting on a toilet. You know, like I just dragged the toilet downstairs, you know, unblocked it, you know, unconnected it from my own bathroom, dragged it down and just sat down and was just going to the toilet, waiting for her to answer the door.

That's kind of the kind of look. So I didn't, I guess that that person wasn't particularly into the idea of me having a dog, which I do understand from a sense of, I've had neighbors with dogs that have been barking all the time. And it's just, it can get, it's just not, not nice.

But I had this idea. I kind of thought, you know, I'm a quiet person and I can't imagine any animal that I had that would be noisy. I imagine all animals, any, you know, if I had a dog, even if I had a hyena or a lion, it wouldn't so much roar, just, I think a lion would probably just purr before eating me.

You know, so it's, it's kind of, I think if you're quiet, you know, it's like if you're a quiet person, then it's, you know, if you're shouting all the time, then other members of the family that maybe you raise may also become shouty. So, you know, we're all affected by what we're around, aren't we? It's just sort of standard stuff, I suppose. And so I went to the, it was an animal shelter sort of place, you know, where they've, a rescue center.

And I had a look around, funny enough, there was a big St. Bernard, which they couldn't give, they wouldn't even let anyone have because it needed to stay there because of problems it had. I don't know what it was, but it's brought back a few memories. I just don't like seeing animals in cages, not especially like dogs and stuff.

That's why I'd never, I know I put Andre in a cage, but it's a big cage for him. It's only at night when, when I'm in bed and I put him in there. He's got food, water.

He can't run around in there really, but he, you know, it's a, it's a much bigger than I think the average person, the average person, the average ferret would have. I mean, there's one, two, four levels to it, four levels. And there's two places he can sleep, or three, because sometimes he sleeps on one of the other landings.

There's no elevator or lift there. Staircase. Why would there be a staircase? But there is kind of like a staircase, but it's not.

It's, there's one, two, three, four, four different ramps that he can climb up to get to each level. Plus there's the hammock, and there's also another big sheltered thing that he can climb in and sleep in. It's like a, like a nest kind of thing, but I'm probably not describing it very well, but I'll be honest with you, I'm not trying really to put a lot of effort in describing it.

It's brown. It's made of a fabric, and there's a hole in it where he can get in. And in the winter, he spends quite a lot of time in there.

So as far as when I wake up, and I come to like, you know, open the door and say good morning to him, quite often he's in there. But during the summer, I don't think he goes in there at all. He seems to always be in the hammock.

Right, so I went to this animal rescue centre. It's in Essex. I forget where it is.

It's not a long way away from where I live. I think it's possibly two bus journeys. And there is a, on the way there, there's this river.

I don't know what the river is. I even seem like there is sort of like a little beach there as well. So it looks quite nice, like a nice little area.

So I went there on my own, I think the first time. And I asked to see, no actually, I went on the internet, onto their website first, and saw a couple of dogs that were there. One was a, not a Shih Tzu, it was a Pomeranian.

Pomeranian or something, I forget. It was a little cute little thing, big eyes. They need a lot of grooming as well.

So I think it costs quite a bit to keep them nice, because of their hair they have. Very beautiful dogs. And so I went there and I thought I'll have a look at, it's a little boy, it's a puppy.

I forget what his name was now. Anyway, I went and saw him. And I had a look at the other animals and stuff.

Decided against getting a chicken. And a rooster seemed like perhaps the wrong thing. You know, as far as the noise level goes.

And didn't have any elephants. So I just had a look at different animals. I had lots of little things running around.

They had horses, ponies. What other animals did they have? They had, I don't think they had any, although I didn't look, but I'm pretty sure they didn't have any ferrets or anything like that. Because I probably would have noticed that.

I probably would have had a look just out of interest. I'm pretty sure it wasn't. There was lots of dogs though, lots of dogs.

Some dogs which were kept separate from the others that were, you know, adult dogs. And then there was in the actual building where I think the lady that runs the place lived. She had loads of dogs running around together.

And there was these puppies. Misty. Is it Misty? No, it wouldn't have been Misty.

I think Misty was the name of the St. Bernard. Wow. Anyway, I went and saw the dog.

I said, can I have a look? And they brought out the little dog for me. And it was quite weird because the dog that was available, because it was the only one out of those two dogs. There was two brothers and sisters or whatever.

One was already, had a family potentially to go to and the other one hadn't. And you know, I had this idea, really had this idea that if I ever got myself a puppy for myself, I've lived in places with dogs, but never kind of had my own, never been like a daddy to a dog, you know. And I thought if I ever did go to a rescue place or go and see a litter of little puppies, the one that ran up to me and, you know, the dog would choose me.

That was my kind of idea. The dog would choose me. I wouldn't choose him or her, but they would choose me and then that would be, then I'd know that was the right one to take home.

But this puppy looked at me like I was, I just dragged that same toilet that I'd sat on at my neighbor's front door, dragged it with me by a big chain, took it on the bus, traveled all the way there, dragged it, maybe went for a swim and pulled it out, dried it off. And then, you know, I've dragged all the way through the, through the park and through the farm and sat down on it and started going to the toilet as the dogs were introduced to me and didn't come anywhere near me. And that sort of burst a little bubble.

I wasn't blowing bubbles. I was never like hubba-bubba. I wasn't blowing one through my mouth.

There was no bubble farts going on. So I just, I felt a little bit disappointed, you know, just thought, oh, it's my little fantasy gone. I really thought that the puppy would be all excited to see me and jump up.

It'd be like a little Disney movie, a Disney moment, you know, and jump up and start licking me. And I'd know that I had a, like a bond created for life, but it wasn't, it didn't happen that way. But I still thought, oh, it's just, it didn't stop me.

I still thought, yeah, you know, it's, you know, the dogs that I think the history with the little puppies was that the owner had the dog, the dog got pregnant, had the babies and the owner was too elderly, couldn't look after them all. So she had to let all of the dogs go. And then she went into a residential home or something like that.

I might have partly made that up. I'm sure the, um, the person in charge of this animal rescue center did tell me, but as I told you, I was busy. I was on the toilet, so I couldn't perhaps listen to everything that was being said.

I wasn't really on the toilet. So I thought about it and I, I left, got back on the bus, went home, had a few funny looks, but you know, standard. And I went back again.

I took a friend. Well, I didn't take a friend, I didn't take her with me. I mean, she's an adult.

She came with me. She, we traveled together. Neither of us, she didn't take me.

I didn't take her, you know, it wasn't, um, she's not my care worker. She's, she's just a friend. So we traveled to this place that she'd been to before.

I think that's where she gets her rescue dogs from because she's had a few over the years. So I went there and we went and had another sort of meet of the dog. This time I got a chance to take the little puppy for a walk around the grounds.

Did not want to have anything to do with me. Liked her, my friend, but didn't want anything to do with me, which was just Pomeranian. That's it, it was a Pomeranian.

And I was a little bit disappointed. I really thought that, I know logically, you know, obviously this puppy was, had connections with all these other dogs and was probably happy living there with, you know, I know like 20 dogs running around playing with each other. They'd probably be much happier being there than living on its own in a house with someone.

But, you know, they can't afford to feed and to keep all those dogs. They're there, you know, for a short time until they get found a home. So I, you know, I left and I said, I'll let you know.

I'm very interested, which I was, especially as it was, it was little, it was seemed quite quiet, but I kept going online and trying to research whether or not they're noisy. They can be, and apparently according to the internet, they can be very barky at times, which wouldn't necessarily bother me. But if it's going to affect my, the equilibrium between me and neighbors, then I need to, you know, think of that first before, because I knew that once, once I got the puppy and he lived here with me, I wouldn't want to let him go.

And, you know, he started being noisy and making lots of puppy noises and, you know, dog barking and stuff. It could cause problems, you know, so I didn't want to put myself into that position. So in the end, I decided against getting him and he was, he had another family that wanted him as well.

So it was, it was okay. So he, he went to a, he went to a happy home, which is good. So this was kind of in the probably July, August time.

And then my friend said, you know, about these two little ferrets that were available and did I want one? And I, and he said, you can have a cage and everything, you know, so it wouldn't cost me anything. It wouldn't cost me anything to buy the ferret. It was free if, you know, they just wanted me, they wanted him to have a, you know, a happy, safe home.

And I thought about it. I thought it'd be cool. But then I, you know, really kind of hummed and hard.

And when I say that, I didn't actually go hum and har, hum, har. I didn't actually do those sounds. But I did evaluate the various options concerning introducing a little furry ferret into my home.

And I kind of came to this decision, no, that was my decision. And I said, no, I said, thank you, but no, I'm not going. I'm not ready for the responsibility.

And so I decided not to. So I think I went into town, you know, a few weeks later, or a couple of weeks later, a week later, whatever. Went into town, just walking back from the bus stop, walking down the road towards where I live.

And there was my neighbor, my friend, and he had a cage. No, he didn't. No, he's holding these two little things.

And so what's that? And I think they might have had a cage, I forget. Anyway, I just wanted to meet them because he said, oh, I've got two little ferrets, two baby ferrets here. So I thought, can I come and meet them? Because I was intrigued, really.

And this, the bloke that greets them said, yeah, come in. Introduced them to me. And there was two, so they're both brothers.

And I just fell in love with Fondre. I don't know what it was. I don't even know what it was about him.

I think it was his face. And I remember I picked him up and he bit me. First thing he did was bite me.

And when I say bite me, I don't mean nip. I'm talking clamp, biting, really hard bite. And I think it was, I just fell in love with him.

And I don't know why. I just don't know what it was. And there was no difference really between the two of them.

They look different. But there's something about Fondre that just, that I just had feelings for him straight away. Just really.

And it was also about the fact that he wanted to destroy me and bite a hole in my hand. And he didn't like me at all. And that was, maybe it was a challenge.

I don't know. But it was probably one of the most exciting days I've had for a long time. Getting him, you know, it's better than any birthday or Christmas present I've ever had.

So the other ferret was going to another person, another friend, because they decided, another friend decided he wanted him. So I brought both of them upstairs here overnight just to look after both of them, just for the night. And they did not stop fighting the whole night.

They ran around the flat and they destroyed everything. And they were fighting and they were screaming and they were making all sorts of noises all night long. And all I was concerned really was the noise, you know, about disturbing the neighbors.

I was worried about that. So I know it was only one night, but in the morning I phoned my friend up and said, you need to take one of them back. I'll keep Andre because I saw he said I want him, but you need to take the other one back because I can't handle them both together.

I kind of regret that a little bit because I perhaps, I could have probably had both of them and they would have calmed down eventually. But it's okay. It is what it is.

But I kept Andre and shortly after he moved in here, he actually broke out of the cage. He didn't want to be in the cage at all. And it was like a, more like a hamster cage really.

But it was wooden, really strong wooden with metal bars. And he bent the bars. He bit through the wood and he bent the bars back and managed to get out, which was really, I don't know how he did it.

And it was really strange for the first few days, the first week. It's not having a new toy, you know, I wanted to keep playing with him. I want to keep picking him up and I wanted to pick him up and cuddle him and kiss him.

And, love, you know, but he wasn't, he was constantly biting me all the time. Every time I touched him, he tried to bite me and he got away with it quite a lot. I managed to hold him in a way that he wasn't able to get to me, but still, it took a week of holding him.

Well, maybe two weeks, but a week before he stopped trying to bite me at every opportunity. And then after that, he just bite me occasionally, like whenever he felt like it. And then eventually he stopped.

It's as if he didn't want anything to do with me. He's, it was interesting because he was so little, but he was so mischievous. He got into everything.

He completely destroyed my settee. He ripped the carpet up in every part of the flat. He ripped the carpet up on the edges, destroyed, he's ruined the carpet.

He just basically did whatever he wanted to do. I don't know how he got, he managed to get out places that he shouldn't have been able to get to considering how little he was. And, um, I did make some videos at the time where I was filming him.

And I wish I still had those videos because it would be nice to have kept them, but I've lost them along the way. But there was one moment when, probably in October, so I probably had him for two or three weeks and I was just sitting here in my chair. It might not be in this chair.

It might have been the old chair that I had, but I'm watching television. I've got a can of lager and I've got my dressing gown on. So I must have maybe had a bath and I'm just, I've got the heating on.

So I've got my dressing gown on. I'm just relaxing. And he climbs up my leg.

And this is one of the first time he's actually, he ever done this first time he ever did this. He used to climb up my leg to trying to bite me. But this time he didn't.

He climbed up my leg and he climbed onto the, I had my arm, the one that wasn't drinking, not that my arm was drinking, but my left arm was just resting on the armrest and he climbed up and he climbed up towards my arm. I thought he was going to bite my hand and he didn't. He climbed up my sleeve of my dressing gown and he went to sleep.

And that was the first time really that I felt close to him. And he was doing it quite, I mean, I remember for the rest of the night, I mean, he was sleeping there for a few hours. I was getting up.

I had to go and get another can of lager from the fridge, need to go to the toilet. I was trying to do all that stuff, but at the same time, trying not to disturb him because I felt so happy that he was finally trusting and felt close enough to me or comfortable with me to just fall asleep and allow himself to be vulnerable. And from then on, that was, I think for me, that was the, that was the change in our closeness.

That was when we really, it went from there and he was doing it quite a lot. He started climbing up my sleeves quite a lot, climbing to my top and go to sleep. So yeah, it's one of the best things in a sense that's happened to me in my life.

Having him, just seeing him grow up, seeing him change into like a little adult, seeing how his behavior has changed and, you know, by season even. So recently he's been really jumping around and playing, really playful. Other times of the year, he doesn't want to do anything.

He just wants to be left alone, just to relax and to do his own thing. But the last two weeks he's been biting me, not hard, just playfully on my ankle and then running away and looking back, wanting me to chase him. So it's, he does it when we go out for walks as well.

So he's got a lot of, he's got so much love inside him and he's just got great personality. He's a little munchkin, he really is a little monkey, but he's also so loving, so gentle as well with me most of the time. The only time he really bites me is when I'm playing with him and he likes to play rough.

So sometimes I get scratched and stuff, but that's, that's how he would play with another ferret. They like, they don't, they don't play softly, they play quite rough. I've got an itchy leg.

Do you know something about having him in my life? There's a few things, a few benefits. One is I get to talk to strangers, not that that's necessarily a good thing. I don't really want to, not that I want to talk to strangers, but it's, you know, let's say I go to the garage or, you know, people will stop and ask me questions about him and maybe you want to stroke him and stuff.

And it's, you know, it feels nice sometimes that he's being given attention. And when people say how, how pretty he is and how lovely he is and, you know, all that stuff, just, I like those compliments because although they're about him, it's just, I suppose as a parent, I kind of feel that, that sense of, well, it just feels nice being his daddy and that. And I know that the way that I've raised him, he is probably a lot different from maybe other ferrets that have been raised because I've raised him, he's a little bit of a, a little bit spoilt, probably a lot spoilt.

And I have babied him quite a lot, which probably hasn't done him any good if he ever ended up in a field on his own and, you know, had to fend for himself and be waiting there, waiting to be cuddled. And for someone to bring him some dinner, you know, that's, that's not much good for him. But my aim is that we'll never be in that situation.

Also, I'm not going to try and make out that I take him out every single day, but it's fairly regular. There are the occasional days throughout the year where I don't, but I take him for a walk, even if it's just around the block. And I kind of come to the realization that it's not about taking him for a walk.

It's, he just wants to be outside. He loves being outside. He's happy to just lay down on the grass.

He doesn't necessarily want to walk because he's not a dog. He doesn't need that. He doesn't need that long exercising walk, although I think it's probably good for him to get out and to build his muscles up.

And it's good for me as well to get some air and to walk about a bit. It's just strange that, you know, I've had him for nearly three years. It just seems a bit, just feels a bit strange, that's all.

And I want to do something for his birthday. I want to celebrate his birthday, but I don't know how. I don't know what I can do for him.

It's not like I can buy him a pizza. When he was a baby, when he first moved here, I used to get pizzas fairly often, actually, for a while. And I wasn't always on my own.

I might have friends eating as well. And they'd just be jumping up and grabbing a whole slice of pizza and running off. Or if I had someone here, whatever they had on their plate, he'd grab it and he'd run off and hide it.

Or there's a chocolate bar. Even if it was still in its wrapper, he'd grab it and run off. And he'd stash stuff.

And I had to clean up and he had stashes of, everything was hidden away in big piles all around the place. Underneath the settee or underneath the bed. I don't know how he got underneath the bed, but you know, whatever he could get, he could try and hide it.

He doesn't do it so much now with food as he did then when he was a baby, because his brother used to get to the food before he did and used to eat it. So he didn't get to eat as much as he wanted. So when he came up here, he went into that mode of stashing the food away for later, in case he didn't get fed again.

Not realizing that I was going to be feeding him every day. And he still hides some of the biscuits, some of the dry food in places, but generally he doesn't do as much of the hiding of food, as far as I'm aware anyway. He's still got his little stashes, I know he has, but not big stashes like he used to.

You know, he's still got places like a carrier bag, occasionally I'll have a little tidy up and there'll be a carrier bag in the kitchen and there'll be little bits of biscuit and little bits of his dry food hidden there. He's always got food available, always. I guess it's just the nature.

It's a little bit of a squirrel, I think. He's a squirrelly, squirrelly ferret. So yeah, I'm trying to think of some other stories.

I think one funny story is I took him into town and I met up with a friend and basically Andre crouched down to do a wee. I thought he was going to do a wee. So I picked him up because I was going to move him to a different section, so just behind the wall so people couldn't see it.

And he basically let it go all over me, all over my trousers, my shoes. And it was like he, I don't know where it all came from, but it was all over me. And people were laughing, standing around laughing.

I was absolutely covered in it on his wee. Even he was laughing. And I put him down and he started doing poos everywhere as well.

It was just this big puddle. And I was like, oh, it was, yeah, it's funny for him, not for me. Another time we was in the park and bearing in mind the information here is that for some reason he never likes water other than to drink.

If I take him for a walk, he won't walk anywhere near a puddle. He'll do a 10 mile detour to avoid walking through a puddle. He'll try a helicopter, you know, anything he can to avoid that puddle.

Getting in a bath, absolutely not his thing. He really, really doesn't like it. But a couple of years ago, I took him down the park, went to the duck pond and he just jumped in, jumped into the duck pond and started swimming.

So, who can figure what's going on there? So yeah, I think that's the end of this session. So I'm boring you by talking about Andre's life, talking about, well, not his life, but it's about the time that I got him. And that's it really.

There's nothing left to say. It's all over now. So I'm going to go.

Thank you for listening. Thank you for allowing me to bore you to sleep. And my website's got all my stuff on, so it's jasonnewland.com. You can listen to this recording on the website or on iTunes, where else, Spreaker, and on my Facebook page, Twitter, and various others that I can't think of off the top of my head.

So it's on lots of different podcasts, lots of different podcast hosts. I'm going to go. So thank you for listening or watching, if you're watching this on YouTube.

And I shall speak to you next time. Bye.