So do to previous husbandry issues, I ended up taking out my little ball python a lot more frequently to give him baths and keep him warm. Now that all that has been (finally) corrected, I turn my attention to his stress.

Usually, when I'd go to pick him up, he'd just sit there and let it happen. But if I put my hand down to give him the option to climb on, he will either ignore it or go back into his hide. If I do pick him up, he huffs a little bit, and remains still for maybe a minute, but then he will stretch out and casually explore around. The only time I've seen him attempting to go anywhere quickly is when Id put him in the sink (the tub is too big for him) with Luke-warm water. I thought this was perhaps because the water wasn't the right temperature, but it felt almost like air temperature to me.

After some exploring, he sometimes will curl up close to me or on me (because I'm warm and I usually keep him on the bed with me when I have him out). Occasionally I'll go to pet him, because he's cute and it's a habit I haven't broken yet. He won't huff or ball up, but he'll sort of smack away my finger with the portion of his body I touched. Otherwise, he seems rather calm about everything.

He moves about his enclosure more frequently, going from one hide to the other. (One on the cool side, one on the warm). But this morning he was sitting outside his cool-side hide and felt cold. I checked the temperature of the warm hide, and it was where it needed to be (95-ish F). His cool side varies depending on what my roommate set the air-conditioner to...

Since he was outside his hide, Im a little worried I'm doing something wrong...