Just like a boomerang or a bad penny, I still continue to turn up. It's good to see some of the old names still posting, although, for the most part, it seems to be a pretty new group. I've been a lurker pretty much for the past several years. Luis' illness and subsequent death just kind of put me in a fog to which I am only recently STARTING to come out of. To all of you who so kindly signed the book at Russon Bros., I want to send you my heartfelt thanks. I should have done this a long time ago, but, like I say, I am just starting to emerge. Let us hope that it continues......(I hear several groans in the audience from those who remember me.......she says with an evil grin.....LOL) Anyway, on to a lighter note. I am so looking forward to the Symposium this year. Never got to go to one before, but since it is in my hometown, (although I've lived in Utah - "Behind the Zion Curtain" - for about 25 years......so they tell me out here I am a native, too. They say after 20 years, your a native. Go figure.) I was able to mix pleasure with pleasure and see "friends-who-are-like-family" and what remaining family I DO have with the Symposium.......ah, the best of both worlds. On the zoo trip, might I suggest a visit to the "bird cage." Used to be touted as "the largest free flight bird cage in the world" or something or other to that effect. It was left over from when St. Louis had the World's Fair. I hope it is still there. Been at least 17 years since I was at the zoo, so I don't know, and if Mr. Church mentioned it already, I apologize. I was reading quickly this evening, trying to get "caught up" on email, as it were. I am down to one ferret of my own, although between my roommate and I we have five (the "Farmington Five"). My little Adrian just had adrenal surgery last Thursday. My little Angel came through it OK for an old man (a rescue, estimated age at around six.....guy brought him to my vet to be euthanized since he "didn't have time for him and he was his son's ferret and his son died..." or some other excuse. Dr. Joe doesn't euthanize healthy animals, but asked if he could have him, since he knew just the home. I had just lost my little Edith, so it worked out well......). He is doing better. Especially since he can now fight Mommy when she gives him his medicine. Tries to decorate me with it too, the little bugger. BTW, have any of you (and I'm sure you have.......) seen a "stoned" ferret? I insisted that Dr. Joe send me home with some pain med for him. (I know they deal with pain differently than us, but I've had abdominal surgery, and, darn it, it HURTS LIKE HELL.....) I gave him his tiny little dose each morning for two days. He would be fine (this was before he felt good enough to fight the meds.....) and then suddenly have the look of someone from the '70's on a really good "trip." Considering this mornings wrestling match, I decided he didn't need the pain med.....LOL! I guess I will have to be making a "ferret burrito" from now on.....sigh. It's actually a good thing. A weasel that doesn't fight taking his medicine isn't feeling too well, in my humble opinion, for what it's worth. My last vision of him before he "went to ground" was this look of "I WILL GET YOU!" on his face. It's amazing the amount of venom a little ferret can put on their expression when they felt you have "wronged" them. Thank God they don't have opposable thumbs or I would be afraid. Very, very afraid.....LOL! I shall try to turn up from time to time, just to drive everyone insane......<G> Catherine Behind The Zion Curtain "You have all the equipment, you just need to read the manual" - Elle Woods [Posted in FML issue 4787]