Dear Ferret Folks-
 
I remember that a long time ago there was a discussion about bitey
weasels, and the advice given was to bite back.  Well, I have become
an animal communicator.  I have started communicating my vast, urgent
disapproval of Puma's new biting habit to her.
 
Yep, I bit her.
 
The first time I peeled her off of my shin, and I swear her fangs came
out of my flesh with a POP!  I picked her up like a cob of corn and
nipped the middle of her back, firmly.  She turned to look at me over her
shoulder and hissssed.....Then I put her on the floor and she scurried
away to sulk beneath the sofa.  All in all I've bitten her five times,
and I notice that the intervals between the need for retaliatory bites
are growing longer and longer.  She only bit me twice today, after coming
up to my leg, laying down, and appearing to think real hard, as if she
were working something out in her mind.  Then, a tentative bite...not one
of her good ol' fashioned bites to the bone that I had become used to in
recent weeks.  No, these were more along the lines of exploratory bites.
 
Sometimes now she's just coming up to me, sitting down next to my foot
and looking up at me for a long while, then she scurries off with no bite
at all.  This is good, yes, this is *very* good.
 
I'm hoping I don't get some exotic disease from this, and have to explain
to my very nice General Practitioner that actually, I've been swallowing
a little ferret fur lately.
 
Grooming, no, actually I wasn't grooming my ferrets with my tounge...
actually, I've become an animal communicator....
 
Alexandra in MA
[Posted in FML issue 5342]