The awesome morphs and my inability to outright afford the ones I want led me to breed ball pythons.

Numerous recommendations about ball pythons' sweetness and docile personality from breeders at my first reptile show, plus balls' good looks and moderate bulk (relative to corn snakes and boas in particular--the other two snakes I was researching seriously) led me to decide on ball pythons as my preferred pet snake. ...also I caught sight of my first piebald ($2000!), and decided they were the most beautiful animals. Ever. In the entire world.

I decided to go with snakes instead of tortoises because of ease of maintenance, space requirements, and owning high-energy hunting dogs.

And last but not least: the Tucson reptile show happened to be on my birthday that year. At some point during the week leading up to it I realized that I was 30 years old, and living 2000 miles from my snake-o-phobic Mom and I could buy myself a pet reptile for a birthday present to myself I jolly well wanted one.

(NOTE: I didn't buy a ball python at that show. I bought 2 used tortoise books, one book on corns, one on balls, and one on boas. And then I went back the next day and bought a 20-gallon tank. Which scared the ****ens out of my husband, because then he knew I was serious about it...)