Hey, business:
 
Although I was utterly charmed by Murphy falling asleep in my lap (a
favorite pastime of Freddy's when he was alive), I was a little concerned
at his failure to get wound up when I'd let him down and try to give him
tickle torture.  Scritching my fingernails across their ribs or scratching
their rump *always* got my other ferrets dancing away, mouths open and
feet bouncing as though they were spring-loaded, falling over their own
paws half the time in their excitement.  With Murphy... nothin'.  He
wasn't listless, but it was like he was just really polite -- too polite
to play.  Since he appears to be healthy (with the exception of being
a little ribsy and in need of a bath to floof up his coat), I wasn't
*too* worried, but I wondered if, perhaps, he hadn't had the proper
socialization as a kit.  I'd miss rough-housing with my fuzzbean if that
were the case.
 
Today, though, as I finished up my ferret-proofing and let Murf down to
run around my bathroom, I decided to give it yet another shot.  I tickled
his ribs and rolled him over to scritch his belly, and he reacted by
jumping up and bouncing off like a little Pepe le Pew.  Boingy, boingy,
boingy.  Beware of wardancing ferret.  =) I laughed out loud in surprise
and played "attack the spare pair of sweatpants" with him for a while, and
he was so good about grabbing onto my robe sleeve and not my hand itself.
He's remarkably well-behaved, but now he's playful, too.  I'm so glad.
 
Although I haven't taken any tonight, I took a couple of pictures of
Murphy last night, along with a short MPEG clip of him digging to China in
his waterbowl when I put him in the bathtub while I started
ferret-proofing my room.  I thought I'd share.  :)
 
http://members.limitless.org/~taan/lj/murphy.jpg -- Murf curled up in my
lap.  Like I could help melting at that sight.
 
http://members.limitless.org/~taan/lj/butmom.jpg -- "But Mom, I wanna
sleeepppp..." Someone would rather saw logs than have his picture taken. =)
 
http://members.limitless.org/~taan/lj/waterbowl.mpg -- Apparently, China
is *just* through the bottom of this water bowl.
 
I can't *wait* for my parents to meet him.  Considering they don't know
yet that I bought another ferret, this should be a nice surprise.  >g<
 
--Jess & Murphy   8:><:B
[Posted in FML issue 3585]