Hello all, this is my first snake. I picked it up a week and a half ago and am loving it. I handle it every day (except after feeding) and it is very friendly. I had the tank set up prior to getting the snake but the temps were a little shaky the first day or so. My house is at 68* but was having troubles getting the cool side up to proper temperature. I am using two UTH (one on each side) and a 150W heat lamp on the warm side. My tems are staying steady at 94 and 82. The ambient temperature is lower than the ground temperature at 78ish. My humidity however is at 40 and the snake is starting to shed. The person at the pet shop told me the humidity is not a huge problem and to help the snake shed, mist it with water once in a while durring the shedding period, is this bad?

1. What should I do to cure the humidity problem? Should I invest in a mister?

2. I do not know the sex of the snake, is this something a pet store could determine?

3. It ate its first meal on Monday just fine. Did I feed the appropriate sized mouse (pic below)? Also today I found something weird in its cage, do you think this is the regurgitated mouse because it doesn't look like poop?

4. The snake is pretty young. 21" and have yet to determine the weight. I have a scale ordered but I am guessing the snake is about 9 weeks old, does this sound right? The pet shop that I bought the snake from reccomended a 55 gallon tank. I know this could be stressful for the snake but it seems to be acting normal. Is this going to cause me any problems?

Any info would be really helpful. I surf this site daily and cannot get enough, it's awesome.

Here are some pics, let me know what you think.