Yes, I did stuff while the computer was down
Stupid Computer... Bein' Down and Such...
The computer was "down" *in that I couldn't get on the internet*, but I still managed to keep a journal in Microsoft Word. Here ya go.
7/16/02: They’re both brown today. Hopefully, Speck’s will have crickets today. If they don’t, I’m going to be desperate enough to go to Petsmart. Right now, Cammy is dark brown. She has broken her green streak because Speck’s and Petsmart both ran out of crickets at the same time. I don’t know what to do. It’s torturous, waiting for my mom to get home. She’s the only way I can get to Speck’s and buy crickets. I hate this waiting... Well, Cammy is definitely not pregnant. Awhile, I thought that Cammy might have been pregnant, as her sides were bulging out more than usual. Turns out she had just eaten a lot of crickets. Now, she’s hungry, as is Dezzy. I feel so terrible. There’s nothing I can do, though. Oh, well. I guess I’ll just have to wait. *LATER* I just put the crickets in! Oh, I’m so relieved! Dezzy was half-asleep *I know this only because he was a shade of green*, but as soon as he woke up, he noticed what was going on, jumped onto the ground, and got one by the head! Take that, Petsmart *from whom I didn't buy the crickets*! Lol. Anyway, I also got some vermiculite for when Cammy finally lays eggs. I’ve read that some anoles will not mate unless there is a place to bury the eggs, so I figured “Why not?” and bought a bag. If it doesn’t work, oh well. It was only three bucks. Well, I’ve gotta go prepare the vermiculite.*LATER STILL* I’m back. I just put the vermiculite into a little Ziploc sandwich container. I’m starting to see why people get those little natural-looking water dishes. The sides come straight up from the floor, without any slope at all. Oh, well. Cammy will just have to drop into it from above :-p. Now to just put the tray into… Aww… Dezzy and Cammy are both asleep. How cute. And they are right above where I wanna put the tray. So putting the tray in there would automatically wake both of them up. I’ll let them sleep. Nicknole signing out.
7/17/02: Well, it seems that life just keeps getting better and better *and I'm not being sarcastic, either!*. You see, I went to the library this afternoon, in order to do some long-needed research on anoles. While researching, I found a beautiful and reliable site called . Within this site, I discovered some helpful information. What information is that, you may be asking? Well, the site says that one dependable way of sexing a green anole is to look at the head. An anole with a long, slender snout is a male. An anole with a short, stubby snout is a female. Now, just go to the Picture Gallery and tell me what you see. First of all, Dezzy has a long snout. Secondly, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, Cammy has a small, stubby snout! AND IT DOESN’T LOOK LIKE IT’S GETTING ANY LONGER! In other words, CAMILLO IS A FEMALE!!!!!!!!!!!!! *Ahem* Well, it is obvious that this is an important discovery, as it is the number one factor for determining many future actions, such as whether or not they will stay together and whether or not there could be eggs laid. While looking at Cammy, I’ve noticed that her sides are rather large. Whether this is food or eggs, I don’t know. She just ate. And her abdomen was already bulging. Is she gravid *pregnant*? Who knows...
7/25/02: Just got crickets. The Shatterbox ran out today. Also, a large female cricket died. She might have been pregnant. If she was, then either we lost the eggs or they’re hiding somewhere in the cage as we speak. Either way, Dezzy and Cammy snagged a cricket each. They are currently enjoying their dinner. Meanwhile, I will be cleaning the cricket cage, as I have consistently forgotten to clean it. ‘Twill take but a few minutes at the most. Nicknole signing out for cleaning duty. Ciao. *LATER*Okay. It’s clean now. I put the cricket food in the calcium dust lid, which I set inside the cricket cage. There was one crippled cricket *lost the use of his hind legs* who I placed inside the food “bowl.” When I looked at Cammy basking in the “sun,” I noticed she had two large bumps on the lower abdomen, near her back. I doubt it’s crickets, as it’s too symmetrical and too far from the intestine. In other words, if it were food, she would have to have eaten a LOT of crickets, which haven’t existed for a while. So I think she’s gravid! I’m not quite sure, but she seems to be! I’ll check tomorrow. If she doesn’t have the two large bumps tomorrow, I’ll check the vermiculite. That reminds me: I need allowance. My parents give me $10/wk., so I should be able to buy a second light fixture in four weeks, and another light in the fifth. Or at least, I’ll be able to pay it off. Anyway, I’m not sure how much it’s gonna take to get it to stay around 75 degrees in there *in order to get the eggs to be female—it’s the opposite of turtles: high temps = males; low temps = females*. I wouldn’t worry so much, except that, if we have a male, we might have to prepare for new babies within a year or two. And if he got them ALL pregnant... Oy. That would be bad. In other words, we would have... let’s see. Ten baby anoles as it is. Ten more for each female is... add in what we would already have… carry the two... 102 anoles! Well, anyway, the point is that we want only females. We’ll have to make sure we don’t make it too cold, because it would kill the eggs. We’ll need to get a good thermometer. Then again, we have a really good cooking thermometer in the kitchen. I think it would work. Anyhow, I hope so. I think I’ve figured out what I’m going to do with the cage that I will make. It’s going to be wood on all sides *except for the front; glass* and will have open air vents drilled in all around, which will be covered with a screen mesh for ventilation. Then, I will drill holes into the back of the cage so I can put little fake plants there. Then, I will have a removable bottom tray, which I will pull out every day and clean. Or, I’ll just put damp paper towels on the bottom, as Lizards and Snakes *the book from which I received the idea for a homemade cage* suggests. Anyway, it will take a lot of work and money to make it, so I’ll have to wait awhile. I’m getting kinda tired. Nicknole signing out.
7/27/02: Okay, I already updated today, but now it won’t let me back on to update any more. That’s really aggravating, but oh well. I’ll prolly have to send everything to Caranoles so she can put it on the internet through HER house. Anyway, the cage is gonna be 6’x2.5’x2’ *that’s HxLxW*. In other words, it’s going to be about a 225-gallon cage, which is more than eleven times bigger than the Shatterbox. If I actually finish this homemade cage, I won’t need Erica’s cage. This will be just fine. Anyhow, the anoles are happy. Nicknole out.
7/28/02: Woo! That was fun. For quite a while, Dezzy had been brownish. When I put crickets in, he eyed one for a while, then gave up when it left his field of vision. However, just as I had given up, I spotted some black thing moving up the curtains. Upon closer inspection, I discovered it was a jumping spider *for a picture of it, go to this spider site and look at the spider on the left; Dezzy's lunch has the same body shape, but less spots. Having read that they can be a good source of food for anoles, I quickly trapped it and dropped a few pinches of calcium dust onto it *it didn’t really need that much; it just kept running away when I would drop dust onto it*. Then, I opened the cage and dropped the bugger in. I waited around to watch, just to 1. Be a spectator; and 2. Make sure the spider didn’t get Dezzy first, but Dezzy didn’t like that. He eyed me with the same look a couple gives you when you’re getting in the way of them making out. Anyway, I left and watched from a distance. The spider was directly beneath Dezzy’s leaf, so he hung with his hind legs for a while, just waiting to “drop in” on his prey. Finally, he struck! … and missed. But by then, Dezzy and the spider were on the same leaf. *Breaking news: Aww! Poor Cammy! She tried to snag a cricket, but it jumped before she could get it! Poor girl! But she hasn’t given up yet… Oh, wait… Yes she has. Back to your scheduled program* Dezzy faced the spider head on. The spider moved its chelicerae in anticipation. The tension was so thick, you could cut it with a kni… no, wait, that’s just the humidity in Indiana. Anyway, Dezzy drew first and shot. In a flash, the spider was in his mouth and I was there with the camera. Finally, I got to get a picture of the anoles eating. About time! Anyway, my mom always complains about bugs in the house. I just felt like doing a favor. *contended sigh* Life is good again. The anoles are green, the house is spiderless, and I don’t have to wash anymore dishes today! Could it get any better? *Peanut gallery: Probably* Grr...
7/31/02: Just yesterday, we got three-dozen crickets. I swear, these anoles are turning into pigs! :-p I put a few in, since Dezzy was looking kind of hungry. It turns out Cammy was hungrier than Dezzy. Twelve crickets in five days... oy. I think I see a couple bumps on Cammy today. Well, it’s obvious that she’s going to become pregnant one of these days. Yay! I found the basking lamp *again*. The desk lamp is only supposed to handle 40-watt bulbs and under. Well, it survived the three days it was on. Now, the heavyweight equipment has been shipped in. Since it’d been in the garage for years, it needed some cleaning. However, it didn’t take but a few minutes.
8/1/02: Ladies and gentlemen, we have... well, at least ONE egg. There may be another one. If there is, I can’t see it. She’s lying on the leaf with only one side showing, so I can’t tell if there is or isn’t another one. As far as I can tell, the egg we already have is just fine. We’re not sure on a name yet, though. If the laws of TSD are correct, then we will have a female if the egg is kept at a temperature of about 80 degrees F. SIDENOTE: What is TSD, you ask? Well, it isn’t some weird hallucinogen whose use was made famous by John Lennon. It stands for “Temperature-dependent Sex Determination.” Basically *for lizards and snakes*, if the egg is kept at a temperature of 75-83 degrees F, it will be a female; by the same token, if it is kept at a temperature of 85+, it will be a male. Obviously, we want females *mainly because we don’t have enough room for TEN MORE MALE ANOLES!!!… Nor do we want any more female anoles becoming gravid, which would lead to MORE anoles… I like anoles, but I don’t want to end up with 102 of them… I’m just not that rich*. On to a less happy note, twenty-seven crickets died in the last two days. Apparently, they felt that cricket dung was an appropriate food source. However, when I counted the living crickets, I found that over thirty of them remained. Apparently, the loving soul at Speck’s decided that three dozen actually meant three SCORE and gave us over SIXTY CRICKETS!!!… Not that I’m complaining, by any means. I’m just saying that we love this new guy :-p. Maybe I’ll put some crickets in the Shatterbox... *sees the couple sleeping* Nah. They’re so cute when they’re asleep. I don’t wanna wake them yet. I’ll wait till the morning to wake them up. G’night, guys. Enjoy your sleep. Nicknole out.
8/2/02: Oy. I managed to get Cammy on film getting a cricket *though it was rather shaky*, but Dezzy… well, I’m guessing that he just wasn’t hungry. He stood there for about fifteen to twenty minutes, waiting for a cricket to come close enough as to where he could strike. However, he didn’t budge. Finally, I found it in my heart to get three more and put them in there. I guess he really wasn’t hungry after all. I think Cammy might have two eggs! Either that, or it’s the crickets that she’s had today. I think she only has one egg, since it’s pretty rare for a young female to have more than one egg per batch. YAY! I can put stuff on Tripod again! Finally! I just hope it’ll let me upload stuff. Wish me luck! *if you can read this, it obviously worked :-p* Oh, and on a really happy note, the crickets didn't all die *I feel so stupid*. Well, a FEW died. The rest of the "dead crickets," however, were only exoskeletons that were SHED by LIVE crickets. Well, I'm glad to know this for future reference. Lol. *sigh* "Now THAT'S comedy!"
Want to go back without the help of the stupid "Back" button on your browser that never works because it's a stupid piece of sh- *manager: "Nick, calm down"* Oh, sorry. Anyway, to go back, click your heels one time. *see? We're more energy efficient than Dorothy's stupid shoes! :-p*