Hello to all,
 
I'm VERY wiped out and ready to go to bed.  Now for one of the worst
possible stories in my ferret history so far.
 
My dad had let his and my ferrets out for the day.  He has 4 and I have
2.  Well he's gotten into the (NOW) bad habit of trusting them to stay
in their ferret proofed room.  He had let them out at 10 a.m. and by the
time I got back home at 5:30 p.m. they were still out.
 
I was lounging by the couch when I heard a sneezing (ferret) coming from
the vent VERY close by.  For some reason, I figured that it was possibly
a mouse (I know, what was I thinking???!!!) We have been having troubles
with mice latley.  By the time my dad had gotten home at 6:30 p.m. and
went to go put the ferrets away, Johnnie (his) was missing.  We searched
the 2 lounge chairs, in desk drawers, plastic bags, closet, entertainment
center and anywhere else possible.  I had made a mention to him that I
had heard a noise coming from the vents and that we should check in the
basement.  Him thinking that she would come out of a chair checks the
room again in a half hour only to come up empty handed.
 
He goes to pull the computer desk back from the wall and finds that
Johnnie had PULLED off the vent from the wall and scratched her way into
the venting systems.  Thinking the worst in that Johnnie was electrocuted
by making her way into the furnace we made our way down into the basement
with flashlight and a bag of treats in hand.
 
We started to knock on the vent after checking the furnace (which LUCKLY
WASN'T ON!)  Didn't take but 2 minutes before I thought about taking the
vent cover off the side of the vent and looking in there.  We banged and
stuck the flashlight to see if we could find something.  We started
shaking treats when we see movement in one of the insulated plastic vent
(thing) that connects with the main vent.  It took her awhile to make her
way through but when my dad pulled her out, she's was dirty and shaking.
Poor girl... It was into the cage and she headed STRAIGHT to the hammock
where everyone kinda checked her out to she where she had been before she
was out like a light.
 
We were lucky that the other 5 didn't follow her, they were all sacked up
in the toy box.  After she was put away, it was nail after nail back into
the vent on the wall and we made sure it was secure this time.  I will
not EVER leave them unsupervised again.  The strange thing is we have
done this countless times and had NO problems.  I wonder what made her
decided to do it this time?
 
We will check on her progress tommorow just to make sure she is doing
well.  We were very upset for awhile.
 
Oh yeah, and coming out from the basment, I stepped on a plastic thing,
with sharp type nailish things coming out of it which jammed in my foot.
(Sorry for not being able to describe stuff very well!!!!!!!!)  My foot
still hurts and I do have to wobble on it, but I will live.
 
Anyway, my arms are really tired and I NEED to get to bed as it is
12:08 a.m. Monday morning and I need to be up in 5 hours to go to
work!!!!  Didn't realize it was that late GOODNESS!!!!!!!
 
Good luck to all those with sick fuzzies!!!
 
Alison~ George and Grizzly
Ken and Doreen~ Laser, Stevie, Doc and the once missing Johnnie
[Posted in FML issue 3928]