This will start out sounding like a sad email, but trust me, it gets much
happier!
 
Last Friday I went to a lovely local tattoo parlour and had Amelia's
pawprint tattooed onto my arm, with a nice celtic border.  People who
have been on the FML for at least a couple of months may remember that
she passed away in April.  I had her make the pawprints back around
Christmastime, back when I'd almost lost her once and was having to face
her mortality.  I will always have her at my side now.  What made the
experience all the more poignant is that you can see my vet's office from
the tattoo shop's waiting room.  Kinda felt like a final pilgrimage to
keep her soul with mine always.
 
And then, because life with weasels is too precious to ever give up, even
with the knowledge that they will leave someday--on Saturday we brought
home Panteleimon and Setanta, aka Pan and Seti.  I will say up front that
they came from a pet store rather than a shelter.  It's not how I meant
things to happen, but when I saw Setanta, he was the spitting, spitting
image of my departed Cully and I could not leave him.  At least this pet
shop clearly took very good care of the ferrets, they have been
well-handled, ears were clean, nails were clipped, etc.
 
Anyway, the important part is that Pan and Seti live with me now.  Both
of them are supposedly 3 months old or so, born between 3/11 and 3/17,
according to their Marshall's paperwork.  I m not sure I believe that they
are both 3 months--I think Pan is probably a couple of weeks younger and
the store people said Setanta was 2 months although I'd believe 3 for him,
but since we ll never really know, I can comfortably declare St.  Patrick
s Day their official birthday.  Pan is slightly built, a classic example
of a whippet shape, long and slender with a pointy face.  He has a cream
colored undercoat and very dark brown guard hairs with nearly black feet
and tail, white toes on his front feet, a white bib, dark eye patches, a
neat speckled grey smudge between his eyes, and his eyes are an intense
deep garnet that flash super brightly when they catch the light just
right.  He s the more cautious and skittish of the two, careful to check
things out thoroughly and jumping at noises often.  I felt he was a little
too skinny when I brought him home; he s been eating like a little horse
since then and is noticably rounder.  He was the smallest male in the bin
of ferrets and I think maybe he got out-competed for food most of the
time.  Despite being small though he throws himself right into play and
is quick and agile.  He also likes to turn the pages of books and tries
to hide books under the furniture.  Within 24 hours he d figured out the
principle of litterboxes despite never having seen one before.  So he s
the dark quiet type, deceptively smart.  Seti, on the other hand, is big
and boisterous and is going to be a very large ferret when he grows up
judging from the size of his feet and ears, especially if he really is
only 2 months now.  He has a golden-cream undercoat and milk-chocolate
guard hairs, legs and feet, no mask at all, and ruby red eyes (except
for the eyes, he looks just like Cully did at about age 6).  He s the
happy-go-lucky sort, the kind of ferret who will accidentally leap
sideways off the bed while jumping around and playing, then bounce right
back up onto the bed again thinking it was all a big laugh.  He s very
people-oriented, probably thanks to the staff at the pet shop making a
fuss over him (they were all sad to see him go), and is a bold explorer
of new rooms.  He assumes the world is there just for his entertainment,
and he will be the one to watch for things like climbing up the curtains
or leaping over tall barricades to get to where he wants to go (Pan, I
think, will be the one who figures out how doorknobs work).
 
Both of them are very affectionate and clearly _like_ people, which is
awfully gratifying.  They'll even allow themselves to be held for as much
as 20 seconds or so before rushing off again ;-) And best of all, they
like each other!  I've never had ferrets that liked each other.
 
OK, this is getting long now--I could gush about the new boys for pages
and pages :) These are the days to live well now and remember in the
future...
 
Regina
 
Regina Harrison [log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask]
http://www.channel1.com/users/regina/
blog: http://www.channel1.com/users/regina/zblog.html
 
Is that my business?  Well, what is my business?  Do I know?  Did I ever
know?  Let s not go into that.  You re not human tonight, Marlowe.  Maybe
I never was or ever will be... Maybe we all get like this in the cold
half-lit world where always the wrong thing happens and never the right.
--Raymond Chandler, The Little Sister
[Posted in FML issue 3827]