Okay, where to start…
The worker’s comp case, the Vicodin haze, the people I’ve totally blown off, or the part where I’ve moved on from Bug Girl to become Reptile Girl? (Though frankly, as Reptile Girl I end up raising a hell of a lot of bugs….)
Oh hell, start with the guilt.
Cantatus: Happy Birthday. Sorry it’s late and that I dropped off the face of the planet. I did think of you on Thanksgiving, and I hope you had an excellent birthday. And I hope this will get me past my guilt enough to log on and tell you this in person.
Daddy’s Little Commie: I’m glad you responded to my posts, I read it, I’ve been reading your blog, and somehow I always manage to read these things when I’m not in a position to respond, and then totally forget to later. I totally hope you guys move back up here, that’d be way cool 
And no, multiple posts are not a burden
Furina: They’ve taken me from 6 days off over Christmas/New Years down to 4, then down to 2. They’re still trying to give me some of the other day’s off, but no one seems to know exactly what’s going on yet… But there ARE two unpaid forced vacation days in there… unfortunately, one is after you leave 
We’ll work something out though. I can always call in sick if all else fails.
Okay.
So now is the part where I’m supposed to catch you up….
Two days before Thanksgiving, my foot slipped as I was getting up on one of the high lab chairs and I fell off, and bruised the living shit out of my ass (no pun intended). It involved a trip to emergency and a Vicodin prescription, which really helped me to relax about Monacita and I hosting our first Thanksgiving. Not that I was too stressed out about it (I’ve lived with every single one of our guests for at least 4 months or more) anyway, but it really took the edge off. My ass is still occasionally tender, but I still have Vicodin. Not that I’ve taken it in over a week, but it’s just nice to know it’s there.
This event, unfortunately, has created The Worker’s Comp Case that Wouldn’t Die. Mostly it’s a story of bureaucracy, paperwork, and doctor’s poking me in the massive bruise (I’m talking about a blue-black racing stripe across my ass here folks…) and asking if it hurts. To answer every last damn doctor: YES IT FUCKING HURTS!!!
The latest in said Case that Wouldn’t Die was a visit from one of the members of Environmental Health and Safety. (Because the Multipartner DNA Rendering Plant cares. Specifically, they care that I don’t sue them.) The lovely lady had me get in and out of the chair in question a few dozen times (never mind the fact that changing position like that still hurt at the time, plus sitting on my racing stripe was pretty fucking special…) then suggested that I needed a “spotter” for the chair, and that I should ask someone to come hold the chair for me every time I get in and out of it. No, I’m not making this up. I’m just hoping it goes away very very soon.
And last, but certainly not least, your dear VSC has finally migrated into the realm of Reptile Girl. This should really come as a surprise to no one if you think about it, though it was never exactly something I planned.
Turns out reptiles are like tattoos; once you get one, you want more. They’re addictive! Who knew. It started out so innocently, Monacita and I went away for the weekend, and we found a reptile store, where the nice guy told us about how Gold Dust Day Geckos were so easy to raise, they lived on baby food fruit! And they like to live in large colonies, and to get at least 2 so they won’t be lonely! And being the wishful thinking retard that I am occasionally prone to being, I bought it hook line and sinker. So I bought a pair of really pretty geckos, and a terrarium to keep them in.
And we brought them home. And I began to do research.
Yes, they eat baby food. You feed it to them in addition to crickets. Please note, you have to do things to the crickets first, like feed them nutritious stuff, and coat them in calcium. And I tried it, and my little bastards won’t take dead crickets. They only eat the live ones. Fuckers.
Oh, and they’re solitary creatures. They don’t like to be with other geckos in confined spaces, unless…..
…. Yes, you guessed it, unless they’re a breeding pair. Which, it turns out I have. For a few weeks you couldn’t walk through the living room without being subjected to The Gecko Peep Show. They seem to be past that phase now though… But she seems to be gaining weight. Would anyone care for a gecko? I may have some extras at some point…
Anyway, even with the pain in the ass of getting them food, and their terrarium at the right temperature and humidity (And for the love of god, do NOT put 2 inches of bark on the bottom of the tank, you will NEVER find the damn crickets again if you do….) we had another moment of insanity, as Monacita admitted that she’d always wanted a snake. So we went to the Vivarium, and I got Monacita a baby Child’s Python for Christmas. Fortunately, Kraken (the snake) eats frozen, dead mice, so we don’t have to keep live feeder mice around for her.
And while we were there, we found out about a reptile trade show that happens only once a year. It happened to be that coming weekend. So we went. And I bought a pair of poison dart frogs (different species, I’m not breeding those as well, at least, not yet…) to go in the bottom of the gecko tank, because frankly, the geckos only hang out in the top half of the damn thing.
When asked about this insanity, I explain that once you broach the world of reptiles and keeping insects and mice for said reptiles, you may as well get more, because it doesn’t make it any harder. The reality is though, I keep getting reptiles that don’t eat the same things. The geckos eat crickets, but the frogs are so small they live on fruit flies. So now I’m raising fruit fly cultures, because they’re almost impossible to find to buy on a regular basis. And the snake eats mice.
And, of course, on our last trip to the Vivarium (to get fruit fly cultures, and the media to grow more of my own…) I asked about reptiles that like to be held. Because I’d managed to buy somewhere in the realm of $250 worth of reptiles (not counting tanks, supplies, and food), but hadn’t gotten a damn thing I could hold. The geckos and frogs are too delicate to be touched any more than necessary. They’re just pretty. And Kraken is Monacita’s pet. Not that I don’t hold her, but I really did want a pet of my own to cuddle and adore (read: I will pet him and pat him, and hold him, and squeeze him, and hug him, and love him…..)
So for Christmas, Monacita got me a Blue Tongued Skink. His/Her name is Max. (No, we don’t know his/her sex.) Max is about two feet long, has a baby blue tongue, and eats damn near anything offered to him. And he is currently asleep, inside my jacket.
I love this thing. I really, truly love the damn thing. I’ve been looking into getting a purse dog bag so I can have a Purse Skink. And he eats everything. The geckos’ leftover crickets, Kraken’s left over pinkie mice, our left over turkey, and, earlier today when I wasn’t paying attention, an apple I was in the middle of eating.
That cracked me up. Max was sleeping inside my jacket again, and seemed oblivious to me eating my apple. I was reading while I ate, and Max climbed out of the jacket, and I looked down to see the skink doing his best to take a bite out of the apple.
So it’s finally true. The geckos and the frogs both eat the fruit flies, and the crickets (the frogs can get the tiniest ones down) Kraken eats the mice, and Max eats anything he can get in his mouth, including the crickets, the mice, and probably all the other reptiles in the house if he got a chance. But as I’ve been saying, it’s finally true. They do all eat the same thing… If you buy enough of them….
Oh, and last but not least, Monacita has decided that she wants to breed Child’s Pythons. So there should be another one of those coming eventually.
And the reptiles already out number us three to one.
