Modified 2009 price list.

Well, I think maybe I waited a year too long to retire. Man, my back has been KILLING me. Working on the babies has always been hard on my back, but this year it starts yelping like crazy after only about an hour of standing at the workspace counter doing my chores. Maybe it's the way I hold my head looking down on the work area........ Beats me, but I know I just can't be putting in the hours like I used to.

So with that in mind, I just went and modified my 2009 price list. Basically I have eliminated the ability for anyone to purchase most of the cheaper animals at retail prices. Which means that I am just not going to be setting them up and carrying and feeding for them until they can sell at retail. If they don't get pre-ordered at wholesale, which means I can sell them right out of the egg when they hatch, then when they DO hatch, they will just get bulked out as soon as possible.

I hope this doesn't sound way too mercenary of me, but quite honestly, it's just not worth the pain I get in my back to make those few extra dollars per animal over the wholesale prices. It seems to take about an hour for the pain to start, and several hours for it to subside. Heck with that. I'm planning on only setting up the bare minimum of animals (ie: the cream of the crop), and to heck with the rest of them. Actually the only cheaper animals I'm NOT bulking out will be the Fluorescents. And that is only because they are such eye candy, that I just don't mind keeping them around for a bit longer.

Anyway, figured I should explain what is going on before someone tries to order some of that stuff at retail and then finds they cannot. And I certainly hope everyone understands my reasons.....

BTW, thanks to everyone who is helping me by buying off the animals so I can head into retirement as quickly as possible. Sales have been pretty brisk, and I am thankful that even with the economy being so bad, people are still finding it within themselves to help me out this year.

Thank you all..... :wavey:

Wow, sorry to hear about you back. Back pain is no fun at all.

I hope my deposit has me grandfathered, I did pay the rest today via paypal.

Hope it better!

Thank YOU for the great adds!! Bummed I can't take more off your hands.

Yeah, today I felt like I was spinning in circles. I had so much to do that I didn't even know where to start. Everything seemed like it needed to be the *top* priority. When I looked at all the clutches hatching out, I felt my mind recoiling in shock at the amount of work ahead of me. Heck I have a whole stack of emails waiting for me to reply to concerning shipping out animals next week. Some orders are just waiting for one or two animals to hatch out.

I know I'll get through it, but damn it scares the hell out of me. I guess I'm always afraid I'm going to fall down on the job and some animals will suffer because I just can't get to everything fast enough.

If I could get the pain in my back to ease up, that would help a lot. Guess I'll go browse through the local drug store over the next day or two and see what I can find there that may help. I certainly can't be dopey headed though. It's tough enough trying to keep my thoughts straight while sexing babies yet thinking about what else I need to be doing as well. I don't know how many times I would sex a snake, close the lid, then think, "now what the heck sex was that critter?" And have to do it again.

Oh yeah, and the Daytona Beach Expo is a mere 7 weeks away..... How in the world can it be July already?

Rich, those stick-on heat packs have worked really well for me when I "had to" do a 360 mile bike ride...

If you need help for a day or two this weekend- say the word.

Alieve Rich its great stuff and doesn't dope you up

Rich, I am so sorry to hear about your back. I had to go to the emergency room last week because I woke up one morning and literally couldn't move without my body locking up in pain. My husband literally had to dress me before rushing me off to the emergency room. Lower back pain is crippling and awful. I have not tried those stick on heat pads Nanci suggested, but I think I will be picking up a few of those myself.

Maybe Alieve and those heat pads will help you too. As long as you are not locking up it might work.....

Yeah, well this is a bad sign. I woke up this morning with neck and back pain. I doubt it will get better as the day wears on.......

Getting old is better than the alternative....but not by much.....

Sorry to hear about your back pain, Rich. I had one bout of it for a few weeks and it was hell. But, those heat packs do work wonders. =) Also, I'm not quite sure if you guys have it in Florida, but if you do, you should try using Salonpas. It's a medicated over the counter pain relieving patch. When I had my back pains, I had like 10 of them all over my lower back. Lol. It's a little smelly though. But, it sure did help my back pains.

I wish I could help you out over there. Though, I'm not quite sure how much help I would be anyway if I could, since I'm new to the hobby and all. But, I'm also wayyyyyyy too far from you. >.<;;;

Well Connie found some Aleve around here, so I popped two of them. Seems to have helped quite a bit. Supposed to run to Sam's Club tomorrow, so I'll see if I can get a 5 gallon bucket of them to hold me through this season.

Thanks....

Rich, have you tried doing any yoga/stretching? Maybe taking a few short breaks during the day and before you go to bed to release your muscles . . . it might help you feel better in the morning . . . glad the Aleve is working

Yeah, I try taking breaks as often as is possible, but the pain seems to be from cumulative stress and workload during the day. The pain starts earlier while working and takes longer to recede during the breaks. Used to be I could work for three hours or more before the back pain. Now I'm lucky to get in an hour before the twinges start. Used to just be mid to upper back pain, but now lower back pain is making itself known.

I did take a few hours off yesterday and went to the local gunshow. But the work load is ever increasing this time of year. Every day I am setting up new snakes to get them feeding. So every day the workload is increasing accordingly. To give you an example, if I am setting up say 100 babies per day (just using round numbers, it can vary depending on the number of clutches and how many are in each clutch that haven't been bulked out), then on a weekly basis the work load looks like this....

Week 1 - 700 babies needing to be fed
Week 2 - 1400 babies needing to be fed
Week 3 - 2100 babies needing to be fed
Week 4 - 2800 babies needing to be fed
Week 5 - 3500 babies needing to be fed

So if you figure on roughly 1 minute per baby JUST cleaning and feeding them, here's the workload in manhours.

Week 1 - 11.6 mh
Week 2 - 23.3 mh
Week 3 - 35 mh
Week 4 - 46.6 mh
Week 5 - 58.3 mh

And this doesn't cover anything other then the actual cleaning and feeding. There is a lot more stuff associated with this season, as you can well imagine.

Of course, the time involved actually setting up the babies (identifying, sexing, labelling) takes a LOT more time then 1 minute per baby, so the absolute worst time is right now when the setup is taking place with all the new clutches hatching out (and I have to go through each clutch a couple times per week to make sure the water dishes are clean). Once the clutches are all done hatching, the relative workload just seems to get easier in comparison.

Yes, there are a lot of things I am going to miss about this business when I retire from it this year, but this crushing workload DEFINITELY is not one of them. It got so that I have been actually dreading this time of year for the past several years. It's a lot of fun seeing the new stuff hatching out, but on the other hand the workload has gotten increasingly more difficult to bear up under.

This year I am bulking out a LOT of stuff that I would normally set up to sell over the next year. That is going to help immensely, but I still have an awful lot of animals being set up. I don't mind bulking out stuff like Butters, Lavenders, and Blood Reds, although they normally sell well throughout the year, but I just can't bring myself to do that for Butter Motleys, Lavender Motleys, and Hypo Blood Reds, even though I am producing a bunch of them. But I may have to get over that eventually as the workload keeps pressing down on us. Connie is pitching right in there helping me with the babies, but she is taking on far too much in an effort to keep ME from collapsing under the work load.

No, I am glad this will be the last year we have to go through this....

Oh, man, Rich . . . I feel for you, I really do. My mom has a bad back and I know what it is like for her some days . . . I hurt my back at work one time and what is amazing is that you don't realize how much your back is involved in until it is hurting

Honestly, if I was in FL, I would come over and help you out with the feeding and cleaning. It would be cool just to see everything that you have. Maybe you can find some volunteers? If you're planning on bulking out a lot of the low-end corns, anyway, maybe you could offer a trade to people? Come help out cleaning/feeding/labeling and they get a free corn! Plus, get time to spend with a corn snake master

Just a thought . . . there seems to be a lot of people on the forum who are in FL . . .

Rich, my husband has decided that you and Connie are logistical geniuses. There's no other possible way you could do what you do at ALL, let alone stay apparently sane while doing so. I know what it's like to work in pain, and worse yet, what it's like to know that you've got to keep doing that for the forseeable future. Just keep taking it one day at a time, and remember that the end IS getting closer. One benefit of a relentless schedule is that while the days are long, the months are short.

You and Connie are in a lot of people's prayers.