Foggy's Second Adventure with The Wonderful Magical Treasure Box....
 
After completing my morning chores accompanied by intense crunching,
crackling, Mrrr noises and wild chirping from Foggy's enclosure it was time
to do his dressing change so I opened the gate and reached in intending to
scoop Foggy up and carry him to the rocker to work on him.  However I
immediately encountered an unforseen snag in my usual routine with him.  As
I lifted him up he chomped down on the side seam of the Krinkly Sack and
wrapped his entire body around all if it he could reach and hung on for dear
life.  There was no way I could extract my large hand, one determined ferret
and a large and rather noisy sack thru the gateway to his enclosure.  Now
everyone knows how surprisingly strong a ferret can be when it wants to be,
and Foggy wasn't giving an inch.  I had a ferret with an Attitude and was at
a loss as to how I was going to get his dressings done.  I talked, pleaded,
and sternly demanded he relinquish that sack.  I might as well have been
talking to the wall.  Finally I wedged my other hand inside and after prying
his mouth open three times (Boy, is he quick) and pulling him in one
direction while pulling the sack in the other I managed to extricate Foggy
from his enclosure without the beloved sack!  He was making very distressed
noises and nearly breaking his neck to keep the sack in sight all the way.
I felt like a class A heel.  No amount of reassurance and petting would calm
his terror that the sack would vanish forever.
 
At this point I got an inspired thought...THE BOX!  With a firm grip on te
struggling fuzzy I dragged the box over to the rocker and held him tummy
down over the open box and scritched the white paper on top with my nails
until his curiosity got the best of him and he glanced down.  Then he
strained so far over the edge of my hand he looked more like a snake than a
ferret.  He withdrew up onto my arm and after rapidly looking back and forth
from his enclosure (where the precious Krinkly sack resided) to my face
several times he stopped and looked at me very seriously and intently for
several seconds... His message was loud and clear..."I am holding you
personally responsible for the security of my Krinkly Sack!  Anything
happens to that Sack and your Toast!" Then his head dove back over the side
reaching for the Wonderful Mysterious Treasure Box.
 
While all this by play was going on I had removed his dressings (more for
protection now than anything else as the skin is closed and only tiny
pinpoint spots mark the places the stitches were).  The leg ends are
extremely sensitive however and the dressings are insurance against any
possible bump or hard tap against something as that could be very painful
for him.  I try to let the legs be open to the air as many hours a day as I
can manage and have increased the time each day.  So his legs were exposed
to the air when he was lowered until his head vanished under the paper to
discover what was hidden from sight.  He wiggled first one way then another
for a bit then out popped his head with a mouthful of ribbons.  My first
reaction was 'Ribbons?'.  He tugged and he pulled and he tugged some more
but whatever he had chosen wasn't budging.  So I snuck my fingers under his
chin and felt around until I discovered a part of as ribbon that did not
seem to be one he had in his gripped between his teeth.  The next time he
started pulling again I pulled with him and the 'something' attached began
to emerge into view.  It was very soft and sort of furry and just kept
coming and coming.  When it was finally all out on top I could see he had
grabbed onto a tuft of ribbon sewn to one corner and that the other three
corners also had ribbons.  Only after dragging fuzzy and still chomped on
object up onto my lap did I get a good look at what he had.  It was the
biggest, softest, warmest, fluffy fleece blanket I have ever seen!
 
Immediately lifting him up I pulled it over my lap and laid him down on it
and removed the hand supporting his weight.  He was so surprised he dropped
the ribbons and just laid there with his mouth hanging open!  I had to laugh
at the look of stunned disbelief he had on his funny little face.  At first
he only moved a fraction of an inch and froze, but soon he was making larger
and larger movements with his bare legs and after only a couple of minutes
he was doing a pretty good imitation of an inch worm doing the breast
stroke.  He rolled, he swam on his tummy, he wriggled, and no matter where
his legs touched the blanket it was obvious it felt SOOOOO GOOD!  I felt he
had had enough after half an hour of chirps and moving all over and picked
him up to redress his legs.  And got a big shock!  For the first time, after
all the misery and pain Foggy had been thru, he Bit.  Not me.  the
dressings!  No amount of coaxing or insistent wrapping and rewrapping got me
anywhere, as fast as I wrapped one leg he had the dressing off another leg.
It wasn't long before I figured out there was no way he was going to allow
me to redress his legs - ever again!  I gave in to the inevitable and after
spreading the blanket over his entire floor area I left him purring and
chirping snuggled up in a large fold of his new gloriously soft blanket.
 
And just as I sat down to get this chapter of his healing onto paper I heard
the telltale Krinkle - Crackle that told me he had pulled his beloved
Krinkly Sack over to his nest and was contentedly contemplating his enormous
riches.
 
The Marvelous Magical Treasure Box is back in its corner and the fuzzy is
sound asleep with his wonderful new things...and yes, he is smiling from ear
to ear.
 
I have no doubt he is dreaming peaceful happy ferret dreams for the very
first time in his little life.
 
 'Nite all.....dayna
 dayna frazier   102046,3162
'resident of the 'Marvellous Menagerie of Mirthful Mayhem'
             MMOMM!!!
[Posted in FML issue 1580]