My husband, Ryan, and I have two young rats as pets. We got them a couple months apart but when each was a baby.
Ratsy – The older of our two rats and, from what I can tell, the smarter. She’s black and white with a long strip of black running down her back. She also has a white “mohawk” pattern on her head. We had her for about 20 minutes in our house and then she disappeared in a teensy-weensy hole underneath our bathroom cabinet. A week later we had her out of the cabinet, much to her initial distress. She likes to sit with us when she isn’t crazy in heat.
Squidgie – [pronounced like the words "squid" and "gee" put together] This is our baby rat and she’s white and brown/grey. Initially we were going to call her Squirrelly, due to the fact that her brown spots look are squirrel-like in color. (Plus “Ratsy” and “Squirrelly” – come on, how cute is that?!) Unfortunately, Ratsy bit the crap out of her the first night we brought her home – we followed the “introducing a new rat” instructions to the letter, too! – and Squirrelly got shortened when I was afraid she’d bleed to death. Now the tables have turned and she picks fights with Ratsy, though thankfully no more blood has been shed. She follows Ratsy everywhere, much like the proverbial annoying younger sibling.
Here I was forcing Ratsy and Squidgie to bond. They are so cute, especially when Squidgie was so much tinier than Ratsy.
Ratsy, taken a few weeks ago (early November, 2007). She looks like that in a lot of pictures but I’m not sure what she’s doing.
Squidgie, the night we brought her home after her “run-in” with Ratsy. She was so teensy and helpless! 
