That's pretty scary about the toenails caught in the collar.  Since my
ferrets are caged when I'm not home, I only put collars on them when they
are out and about.  Cody usually gets hers off within an hour or so anyway.
I hear her jingling around......then I sorta notice it's quiet.  Then I spy
a collar on the floor.  Grrrrrrrrrr.
 
Speaking of toenails, I recently got D.  Jeans new book.  Does anyone else
have a problem with that typeface?  I found it distracting.  I do want to
put in my proverbial $.02 - her toenail trimming method is SUPER.  When I
put the ferretone on their lower bellies, they madly licked it off while I
quickly trimmed - no prob.  Also, I discovered that a regular human nail
clipper works better than the pet store scissor-like ones.
 
Finally, I enjoyed the story about the ferrets named Isis and Shu.  I'm
always telling people that ferrets have been domesticated for maybe 5,000,
maybe longer than cats, and that they were kept by ancient Egpytians........
WAIT A MINUTE!  I used to actually BE a for-real Egyptologist, able to read
and write hieroglyphics and leap tall pyramids in a single bound.  Yes,
reading and writing Middle Kingdom Hieroglyphics is great fun at cocktail
parties.  Off I went to my stash of dusty books.  I consulted my Ancient
Egyptian Grammar, Deutische Hieroglyphische Dictionaries, even Budge and and
Petrie.  I could not find a hieroglyphic word or symbol for ferret, weasel
or polecat.  This is perplexing, because they had a symbol for everything!
I also pored over books of drawings and paintings and reliefs - no ferrets.
There was one hunting scene with trained cheetahs....so could someone tell
me where this info about ferrets and Egyptians came from?  I would love to
track down the images, and maybe the actual hieroglyphics, too, and then I
could share it all with y'all, and Y'ALL could impress your friends at
parties, too!
 
Kat  (B'ast in Ancient Egyptian)
[Posted in FML issue 1607]