Hi!
My name is Ziggy and my mom has been lurking on the list for about two
months now. We wanted to take the opportunity to introduce ourselves and
make some comments.
Mom and Dad got their first ferret in 1987, while they were in graduate
school in upstate New York. That was a little sable female named Felicia,
and she was the start of a ferret dynasty. The grad school years were
blessed by several more ferrets, and Mom says thank god Citibank gave credit
cards to people who made $11 thousand a year! Their ignorance was
bottomless, but they have muddled through over the years even though several
of my brothers and sisters have gone on to invade roomier, more ethereal
spaces.
I am a three year old brown on brown male, slim, athletic, and highly
intellectual. I share my cage with my brothers Spot, who is about 7 months
old, and, if you'll pardon me, a real dork; and Othello ("Ozzie"), a 7 to 8
year old albino who is getting on in years and has some problems (blind from
cataracts, severe dental disease). Mom and Dad don't know how old he is
because they found him in a ten gallon aquarium in a petstore, sniffling,
wheezing, lonely, pretty much full grown--he was a return and when Mom and
Dad saw him, Mom turned to Dad and said "Go home and get the license. He's
not going back into that tank". She sat on the floor with him in her lap
until Dad came back with the ferret permit and the checkbook.
I became head of the family this spring, when my 9 year old brother Zoot, a
handsome bruiser of a sable male, passed on. Zoot and I have very different
management styles; I prefer to manipulate the humans into getting what I
want, whereas Zoot favored a sharp nip on the big toe when he didn't get
enough attention. Either way, I think I'm doing fine. I keep my people and
brothers in line, and Dad keeps his carpet repair skills up. It's a good
trade.
Well, the primary reason I wanted to post was put my two cents in on the
whole raisins-as-ferret-treats issue. I have only this to say: THANK YOU
THANK YOU THANK YOU! I have never had such complete pleasure in my entire
life. I have been taught to "polecat"--sit up on my fanny and balance
myself upright--for raisins. It's a trivial trick really. I do it on my
own whenever the red raisin canister is in sight. I am not fooled by the
Quaker Oats canister either. Humans are very foolish to think we can be
hoodwinked like that. Othello likes them too, although Spot thinks they are
yucky. In this area, Mom is a dork; she won't give me more than 2 or three
a day, and she won't let me eat Spot's rejects if I've had my quota. I may
have mentioned earlier that Spot is a dork. Mom says she loves him anyway.
Anyhow, that's us, our little
five-person-three-four-legged-two-two-legged-family. Mom learns new stuff
from the FML every day, and tells us about it. We visit with her when she
is on the computer--the Ferretone bottle is next to the computer--and she
reads the interesting bits to us too. She is concerned because Dad took a
job someplace called Ca-Ca land (we were sorta wondering where he
disappeared to...Mom has been kinda lonely, and that phone thing goes off
all the time), and she says we have to move there too. She says we can ride
in our Sherpa (we like to sleep in it anyhow, when we're tired of playing),
but that we have to be very, very quiet. I'm not supposed to dig while in
some big metal flying tube for five hours. Yeah, right. That's right up
there with the Quaker Oats canister. Anyhow, that's probably a month or so
off. I'll take it under advisement. She would like to hear (privately)
from anyone (or, anyone's "friend") who has accomplished such a travel feat.
It's really making her nervous. Especially getting through airport
security.
Anyway, we send our regards and thanks to everyone in ferret land. And to
those who's friends have passed over, cry not: there are at least two remote
controls apiece, and the raisins fall like rain at regular intervals. Every
ferret knows that!
Cheers,
Ziggy, Othello, and Spot
(and Mom, who is also called Katy)
[Posted in FML issue 1756]
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