First of all I would like to thank everyone for responding so patiently to my many questions (especially Otter, who took the time to include additional helpful abbreviations and delightful derivations). Jitterbug and I have discovered a new ferret game which she loves. As I mentioned previously, she is a furball with phenomenal energy and me and my SO put together can't seem to play with her enough. (I'd like to mention that when I first got a ferret I was told that they were ideal for busy people because they sleep all day and only require about one hour of intense play time - HA!this is me ROTFL - Jitterbug might require one hour of intense sleeping, the rest of the day is for exercise and play). My solution has been to give her free reign of the apartment unless no one is home and I have developed a few games I can play while I get ready for work. First, when I get out of the shower if I towel off very brusquely she comes running thinking it is the tug of war towel game. She leaps to attack the offending towel and I can dry off while she has fun. This works particularly well when I dry my hair. I just bend over and let her play with the towel while I rub my hair dry. But today we developed a new game that works wonders. If there is a large plastic bag with handles lying around, Jitterbug loves to crawl inside (its a big bag and kind of stiff,so it couldn't wrap around her head and suffocate her). She loves it if I drag the bag by the handle while she's inside giving her a free ride. So I just stick my foot through the handle loop and while I walk around and get ready for work, she has a blast! Sometimes she jumps out of the bag, but I leave it on my ankle and keep getting ready while she leaps at it and eventually she gets back inside and rides some more! Of course we have other games to play when I have time to be more directly involved, but since I have to get ready for work sometimes, she'll forgive me if I walk around with the bag on my ankle. Let me know if any of you have developed other games for when your busy. Rebecca Jitterbug (what do ya mean your busy, it's time to play, now! now! now!) [Posted in FML issue 1649]