As far as scratching at your arms or something when they need to go to the
bathroom or want water, I have found that my ferrets will do that too.
Sometimes I will, when I ssee they are quite tired, pull them into my lap to
curl up when I'm watching TV or reading, so I can stay there a while and not
disturb them- try to get across that "I'm just a big ferret, you can curl up
with me too" attitude to them.  Well. it hasnt been easy.  My little one
Rune (18 months now) who I raised since she was 6 weeks old is the only one
who really does that on her own accord and will even sniff out my moods and
snuggle up with me when I'm feeling a bit down... she's VERY perceptive.
 
However.  Sometimes my new one or the older ones will sometimes try to hop
out of my lap and go sleep elsewhere and since I have always been told that
it's best to let them down when you want instead of them (since they could
start say, nipping and then you release them, its reinforcing behavior that
this will allow thenm to get down.  (strictly hypothetical example, never
had it happen)) I will keep them in my lap for a while.  If they start
squirming too much and are then more awake than asleep, thus defeating my
goal of having them sleep in my lap or something with me, I will let them
go.  They almost always either run to get water or go to their bathroom
corner and then curl up with the other ferrets.  After a while of this I
have gotten used to those particular signals from my girls, guess they
trained me pretty good!  And I can usually tell when they wanna go do
something or just wanna go curl up somewhere else.  I've taken to sitting in
their sleepy corners.  Then they curl up all over me.  =)
[Posted in FML issue 1891]