IT HAPPENED AGAIN LAST NIGHT. I don't know who made this decision--and I can't decide if it's an excellent decision or a terrible one--but someone at OBP/PBS has decided to air a documentary called Ferrets: The Pursuit of Excellence. I've caught snippets of it for a while now, but never the whole thing; somehow I only run into this documentary when it's either extremely late at night or when I'm nursing a hangover. But I get really excited whenever I stumble upon it, as I did last night/this morning, because Ferrets: The Pursuit of Excellence is quite possibly the most fucked up thing I've ever seen.

Obviously, it's less about the actual ferrets and more about ferret-obsessed people, every single one of whom is relentlessly, utterly depressing.

Ferrets is just one in a series of four documentaries by Mark Lewis about "the ambition, the determination and the passion of those who pursue distinction in unconventional fields," according to PBS, but I can't imagine any of Lewis' other documentaries even hold a candle to this terrifying, amazing film about ferret people. Every time Ferrets is on, I find it impossible to turn it off--whether you're watching these people win ribbons at ferret shows or watching them gleefully slide their ferrets across their kitchens' linoleum floors, the whole thing's just riveting and creepy and sad and hilarious and bizarre.

Anyway, after last night I decided I was going to buy Ferrets: The Pursuit of Excellence on DVD so I could finally watch the whole thing, but it turns out it's on a few more times in the next few days. Unfortunately, it looks like OPB's trend of only showing this batshit craziness in batshit crazy time slots looks to continue: It next airs tomorrow morning (Thursday, August 28) at 4 a.m. on OPB's Channel 10, and again on Sunday, August 31, at 9 am on OPB's Channel 10.1.

I have entered these times in my iCal. I wholeheartedly recommend that you do the same.