Convincing parents

It's getting near time for a house. watch out then. Hehehehehehe

The way I convinced my gf that reptiles are awesome was by telling her "i know you like the pretty ones, here let me show you pictures of a colorful species called 'panther chameleons'"

We attended one reptile show. She had to have a panther chameleon. Having him totally convinced her that it was a great idea to have a personal zoo.

Since then, she has said that the ONLY reptiles I need permission for (and likely won't get easily) are hots, snakes that might break 40lbs, big lizards, big turtles, etc.. the kind of stuff that requires extra steps in planning the caging/care/maintenance.

Not only that, but she now has a couple of pairs of snakes and geckos as well herself. It's kind of funny, because I know a bit more about what is "out there" that she can tell me the traits she likes in animals, and I can tell her "you know, I know exactly what you want. Its 'X'", and I'll be right.

For example, I knew she wanted ball pythons. She wasn't as interested in carpet pythons as I am, because they are too active. She basically said she wanted a snake that wasn't too fat, wasn't too skinny, wasn't very active (the exact words were something along the line of "actually, it'd be nice if it had the general personality of a rock, so it could just hang out while the TV was on"), was pretty with some yellow coloration or earth tones perhaps, and had some cool morphs to breed for. Bingo.

Right now we hover around keeping a dozen or so different species of animals. Except for a few individuals to add to current breeding projects, we're pretty much set for the next decade.