Hey, Dude, this is Ping is He. So you wanna know about shampoo? Yeah, (hanging head, sadly.) my hoomin washed us once. Puma said she couldn't "find her center" for a week afterward whatever that means. It probably went down the tub drain. She's into all this transcendental crap I don't understand. Whatever. It makes her happy, and I can still snuggle with her in the hammy when she meditates cause she does that lying down. She tried folding up into a "lotus position" once, but she got her tail pinched in her back paws and she was like, really REALLY nasty for days until the kink worked out of her tail. (Deep sigh) Women....anyway, like I said, my hoomin washes us once or twice a year, she says "whether we need it or not." I'm thinking, like, NOT. The more often you wash us, the harder our sebacious glands (Puma spelled that one for me) will work to secrete smelly weasel grease BACK onto our skin and fur. It's a vicious cycle, Dude... The detergents in shampoo strip off the nautral oils we need for healthy skin, so the sebacious glands go into overdrive, trying to put it back. You can actually wind up with a smellier, greasier weasel than if you didn't bother to wash him so much in the first place! And think about it from our perspective, Dude. Smell is identity, it's *everything*. It *bothers* us when we smell like some artifical rosebush, or "Springtime Fresh." (Shuddering theatrically!) There is nowhere we can go to hide from those smells if they make us uncomfortable. Those are for hoomin laundry and toilet bowls, not for ferrets. Personally, it's kinda traumatic when I can't *smell* myself. So if you gotta do it, do it mild, mild, mild, and rinse, rinse, rinse. And remember--a healthy, happy weasel smells like a weasel for a reason! Be glad we don't get to choose what *you* smell like! Ping in MA [Posted in FML issue 5180]