What to say to family and friends

now i just say "of course! my snakes are my family."

I grew up in reptiles, but my friends have never understood it. Its like my wife says now they live here you dont, you dont like it, theres the door! I knew I loved her for some reason:D

i have a picture of one of my snakes hanging in my cubical at work. someone walked by and saw it for the first time and nearly jumped out of her skin... i had to laugh.

she then said she hated snakes but she hated rats even worse... got another laugh when i told her i raised my own food for the snakes...and that was rats. i thought she was going to die lmao.

I really dont care if others think im strange for having snakes and rats. Im a pet nut.. i have dogs, cats, mice, rats, snakes, crested and leopard geckos, birds and *thinks* pet mealworms? ... so im used to people thinking im weird for having so many pets ;)

I pretty much just avoid the whole conversation... my snakes are in their own building so most people who come over don't even know I have them. I never bring it up and I won't show them to anyone unless they REALLY want to see them. Besides, I do lots of other stuff my family disapproves of...they can't possibly have time to lecture me on all of it. I think they gave up when I started jumping out of planes, lol.

i think its sad that certain pets are discriminated against. granted i would never own a spider or scorpion as a pet cuz i'm deathly afraid of them but to those who do...as long as they're careful around it and they take all neccessary precautions to not get bit/stung, then more power to 'em. i like snakes the same way other people like dogs or cats. my dad knows i want a snake but doesnt know i pretty much already have one...picking it up monday...cuz when we talked about me wanting one he said "snakes are disgusting, creepy lookin' things. why would you want one of them?"
my mom believes snakes are evil cuz the devil portrayed himself as one in the bible. i'm willing to bet my bottom dollar that if the devil had portrayed himself as a rabbit my mom would hate them too. whatever.
a few people i know and socialize with in church know i'm getting a snake and their reaction when i first told them was " oh, a...snake...ok." but they didn't give me any kind of nasty remarks about it. i just try to keep my tone a little nonchalant when i talk about having a snake as a pet, like its no big deal.
i know that if my parents know there were a snake in my house they wouldn't visit the house but they'd meet us somewhere in town, fine with me. i wouldn't have to worry about everything looking perfect for them, lol.
i was the kind of kid that played with all the creatures i found outside, except for the rattlesnakes, my dad went out of his way to kill them when they came too close to the house, probly because he thought i'd try to play with them too,lol. but yeah, i was picking up lizards, bugs, you name it. they were always like "ew gross! let it go." then when a bunch of lizards got into the house one summer my mom had me catch them and put them outside, while she "hid" ontop of the couch.
anyways, it upsets me when people talk about snakes like they're the devil and when someone starts to do that i just tune them out and turn my hearing aids off if i cant walk away at the moment. my bf doesn't like snakes either but he's tolerating the fact that one will be here, he just wants no part in caring for it, but he has to take me to pick it up and to get the rats cuz i dont drive.

I usually say there fine except the one that got free and is roaming the house .....joking

we have the BP normal, about to add a pinstripe, guinea pigs, alot of fish, an AMSTAFF (going on 10yrs with us), one APBT we rescued on thanksgiving day and a boxer (we call him our "accident") we also foster APBT's from time to time.

so in addition to the shock of us owning snakes we get the "that pit bull will turn against you and bite your face off one day" :confused:

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Originally Posted by mommanessy247

my mom believes snakes are evil cuz the devil portrayed himself as one in the bible. i'm willing to bet my bottom dollar that if the devil had portrayed himself as a rabbit my mom would hate them too. whatever.

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Has your mother read the bible?

"Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?"

Where does that say the devil was the serpent?

"And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou [art] cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:"

My snake eats rodents not dust. I think the bible was talking about other serpents. If God had a problem with my snake then clearly it should be eating dust. I don't recall the part of the bible where God let the serpent off the hook for the whole Eden mishap.

Good luck with your parents.

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Originally Posted by dembonez

most people are like OMG EWW SLIMY until i show them then they say OHHHH PRETTY!!!!:O

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lol i got a good example of that. i was at the mall and there was a reptile shop there. i bought a next bp and was walking around the mall waiting to get picked up by my sister manda panda (my older sister amanda, my good sister) and i walked in to hottopic and half the people in the store came up to me saying "OH MY GOSH THATS SUCK A PRETTY SNAKE!" or "WHERE DID U GET HER?!? I WANT ONE!" then i went through spencers. half the people in there avoided us once they saw my snake lol there were fine before they saw her. 3 girls actually scearmed when they realized i had a snake. i was laughing. but when i went back to the snake shop half the people in there were saying "eww y would anyone want snakes?" or "y r there snakes in the mall?" look if u dont like snakes dont go in the snake shop idiots! but most of the people i helped out were really cool and i got lots of phone #'s from people who had ball pythons hehehe. the snake world is divided in 2. thoses who love them or freak out. lol altho there are very few in the middle:O

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Originally Posted by Egapal

"And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou [art] cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:"

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Sounds more like a worm to me.