Day Twenty Two -late-

[ink_in_hand]

Barely could even get this out. for Dial. From the minute I woke up I've been hit with a migraine and around the time I would have started trying to to do my daily pic I discovered that Onge, my ball python is starting to get mouth rot, cue running around trying to figure out what I can do for her here at home and thoroughly cleaning her enclosure like mad while getting her old one out of storage.

Almost didn't bother even trying today. Someday I'll get back to Dial and draw him again when I'm not stressing the fuck out.

And I know I've fallen behind a bit with some of my comments in places, I'll try to get to those as soon as I can.

Comments

[eerian_sadow]

you did this with a migraine? and with worrying about your python? damn, honey; you're good. he looks great.

i hope you're feeling better today and that you're able to get your python's mouth rot cleared up with a minimum of problems. *hugs*

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

It helps that drawing has been something I've turned to as a stress reliever all my life (as long as there's some creativity left), so it's not as great a feat as it initially sounds. And with migraines I find it easier to bear when I can distract myself even if looking at a backlit screen makes it more unpleasant. But thank you, thank you muchly.

Right now I'm doing a daily swab of hydrogen peroxide with a q-tip as a home treatment while I figure out/find a proper veterinarian that can help with this. And she's being such a good sport about it all, minimum of fuss. Also even with my fingers practically in her mouth she hasn't once even threatened to bite, which I really wouldn't blame her if she did.

[eerian_sadow]

you know, i write as relief from migraines so i totally understand there. (the words just don't always make as much sense as i had intended afterward.) it's still a feat to make not-wobbly lines like that though, at least for me.

i'm glad she's being a good sport. taking care of an angry snake would not make it go any easier for either of you.

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

*amazed* I would so fail if I were trying to write with a migraine, trying to write is difficult enough as is. So yeah, I get what you mean. And my art doesn't always turn out well when migraine influenced but at least it's a distraction.

Onge has to go and hide a while after I do her mouth too, but she definitely could be taking this worse. Really need to find an extra special treat for her somehow, she's always been a sweetheart.

[eerian_sadow]

we'll just be mutually amazed, then. ~_^

i can't blame her at all. i'd probably need to go hide for a bit after having my dignity manhandled like that too. poor Onge. definitely need to find high quality snake treats. (though i have no idea as to what that would entail. eerian =/= snake person. eerian = cat person.)

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

Her full name is Onge-Mokoko, after a place in Cameroon, one of the countries ball pythons are native to. And if you're not squeamish, a snake treat for a ball python would entail a gerbil, another animal native to that area of Africa. But with mouth rot, it's recommended not to feed your snake while they still have the infection.

[eerian_sadow]

yeah, i can see where feeding them while they have mouth rot could end very badly. :( and you know, i have no trouble feeding them at all, as long as someone else tells me what they need. i used to give mice to the snake in our classroom in third grade with no troubles at all.

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

Really wish I could feed her, get her strength up as her grip is quite weak. *nod* Been breeding my own mice for her, as it's cheaper, plus whenever I get too many mice to manage they get donated to the local raptor rescue.

And it's always nice to meet another who has no issues with their diet.

[eerian_sadow]

i bet the local raptor rescue appreciates that. those birds are beautiful and wonderful, but expensive to feed.

you know, i really have more problems with the snakes themselves than what they eat. it's not even that i'm afraid of them, either. they just give me that creepy crawly feeling down my spine whenever i'm too close. (though that probably came from living in rattlesnake country where you're taught from the earliest ages that "OMGSNAKESAREBAD!!! and don't really get taught the differences between the ones that will kill you and the ones that won't til much later...)

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

*nods* The lady in charge has her own breeding mice, but every bit helps.

Well see, that sort of aversion I can wrap my head around, as they posed an actual threat instead of just being creepy.

[eerian_sadow]

oh yeah. huge actual threat, since in a teeny little spot-on-the-map town isn't much of a deterrent for them. they really would do things like decide to nest in the school playground over the summer or hang out in the local parks. there was a population boom that put a stop to a lot of that right before we moved away, but that didn't stop the fear from being pretty well ingrained. i do handle seeing snakes a lot better now than i used to, though.

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

See, that's rather sad. Michigan has one rattler and it's rather rare, so we were taught how to recognize it in relation to all the other harmless snakes we've got. So while I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around the 'all snakes are bad' mindset, there are places that I forget that do have to manage a balanced relationship with an animal that is dangerous, and that can be very lethal. Especially to those who are unaware of the danger.

[eerian_sadow]

i wish we had been taught to recognize that and the cottonmouth as dangerous and that the others native to our part of the state as perfectly okay (because they totally are! i loved the hog nosed snakes that lived under our house because they were great helpers in the war against indoor pests), but that's not the way they do it at all out there. wouldn't be so bad if they weren't so prevalent, but they're everywhere and so...

it's an interesting contrast between eastern and western kansas, though. the diamond back rattler doesn't come over into the easter part of the state much because the climate is wrong for them and so people out here are like "what? kansas has dangerous snakes? really?" (though i do tend to want to hit them with large, solid objects when they prove themselves to be that ignorant.)

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

We get hog nosed snakes too, though their puff up display once had an uncle of mine convinced they were cobras. yeah-no I love those snakes, and apparently I used to play with them all the time when they were everywhere as a child though I don't remember.

That's weird, never would have guessed they were only in one half of Kansas. So you could sorta group me with those people, but then I've never lived or even visited there.

[eerian_sadow]

wow, cobras? really? uh... those aren't even native to this continent.

yep, apparently they don't like how "moist" eastern kansas is. (and that's entirely a relative term, because the humidity isn't really that much greater, but apparently it's just enough.) being non-local definitely excuses it, but really people in the state, even the moist parts, should be aware of the things that can kill you in your home region. cause from Kansas City, it's not as far west as you might think before you'll start encountering them alongside the road when your car breaks down.

[ink-in-hand.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my uncle is uh, special. In the willfully ignorant kind of way, a couple of summers back he said he caught a cobra and got it in a bucket, first thought it was someone's escaped pet or something but no, there's this haggared little hog nosed annoyed at being bothered by two legged giants instead.

Sometimes I enjoy the Darwin Awards more than I morally should, if just because people don't bother to do research in this vast information age.

[eerian_sadow]

poor snake!

i also enjoy the Darwin Awards more than i should. (but i also feel better about knowing that those sorts of idiots will no longer be attempting to raise other human beings and send them out to join the rest of the population.)