The chinchilla suddenly plumped out, and maybe grew a couple of inches taller too. I've switched from calling her "little girl" to "little lady."

I was appreciating her the other day when Tovar and I dropped by the pet store. They had a chinchilla that jumped in fright when we just approached the enclosure. Lucy does still get frightened easily, but she's afraid of sudden movements, not of people. If you move slowly she's really chill, and completely okay with being petted, even on her tummy! Still hates being picked up, but is mellow once captured.

Tovar and Lucy have recently bonded! Tovar can now reach my raisin hiding spot, and Lucy has discovered this as well, so instead of running to the far side of the cage when she sees Tovar, she now gets excited to see him and rushes toward him ;)

Speaking of relationships, another one that's going really well is with the chinchilla. That persistence and effort to get her tamed down during those first few months paid off. She's really friendly now. I don't pick her up much anymore: she doesn't like it and I don't like fighting with her over it, but now that I've stopped picking her up she doesn't run away anymore when I reach into the cage, but just hangs out to be petted. And she does the cutest little chin tilt to help you hit just the right spot. She's got these big fluffy cheeks and this teeny tiny mouth that's just adorable :)

Things are also going well with Josh the fish. I can see why Betas are winners in the fish pet evolution wars. They're so beautiful, like leaves or fire with all the fins rippling. Not bad for a little critter that costs a few dollars. Josh has been much happier ever since switching over to his 3 gallon tank, thanks to everyone for the tank size advice.

After getting fed up with the lack of friendliness of Lucy and debating on getting rid of her, I decided to keep her, but stopped taking her out for awhile. I figured that since she hated being taken out so much, and I didn't really feel like fighting with her, that I'd just take a break.

But, when I took her out after not handling for her a little while, she was cuddly! It seems that she missed being held!

So now we're appreciating each other and enjoying each other's company ;) I've gotten better at tuning into how she's feeling too. I hold her more securely than I used to, and I notice when she jerks at a sound and hold her more firmly when that happens. This helps keep her generally calm and happy. It makes sense, she feels more secure when being held more securely.

I've also gotten more confident and firm in how I take her out of her cage, going along with the theme of getting fed up and not trying so hard to coddle her. This also has been much more effective for making both of us happier. She doesn't try to bite anymore, and while she still struggles when I take her out, the process takes a fraction of the time, and she doesn't have time to make a big deal out of it before I get her tucked and comfortable under my chin.

So it seems that I've got the warm snuggly that I wanted after all :)

I'm having a relationship makeover with Patri too ;)

My knees are healing. They're not done yet though. The way I can tell is that it still feels funny to kneel. It hurt last week. It doesn't hurt anymore this week, but they're still tender, and they also hurt if I poke where the scars are. I don't do that very often ;)

( more on knees )

I've officially decided to keep Lucy the chinchilla. Its just nice having a living creature in the living room. While she's not the pet of my dreams, she actually is friendly when no one is attempting to pick her up.

I took a class on blogging as marketing last night. We were talking more about things like elevator statements and brainstorming what we offer as entrepreneurs, and very little about blogging, but what we went over was very valuable. I wasn't going to take the full series of classes, because the third one conflicts with the improv class that I'm signed up for, but having seen how good the first of the series is, I think I'm going to forgo a night of fun and personal growth in favor if career growth.

In general I'm pretty happy with how things are going coaching wise. I have my pie chart up on the wall reminding me that I want to be spending a large chunk of time on coaching related work, and I've been doing that. I also got back my results yesterday that I passed my written exam for certification, and my oral is coming up in a month. I will then be a CPCC from my school.

I've been doing practice triads with two groups. I'm feeling better about coaching since starting this up. Practicing and talking with other coaches provides a lot of support, and I missed it while I was on my own.

I finished my series of classes with Support Network, although I still need to make up the one that I missed. I hadn't realized it when I signed up, but I learned that I'm going to get a certification from them too, which will look nice on my resume. I'm still overwhelmed by the amount of material that we were given, but Lorraine has enthusiastically assured us that this is how most people feel when completing the training, and that we're all going to do just fine.

( more on support network class experience )

I seem to have stopped losing weight. ( more about weight )

I've been in a generally good mood today, which has resulted in my wanting to keep Lucy ;) I figure given what I said last time about not making choices when depressed, perhaps I should say the same for days when I'm hitting 7/8s on the happy side. Should I decide on a good solid 5 day? ;)

( Graphs Are Cool )

I've started by calling the breeder back and seeing if she has resources for selling Lucy.

I was going to wait. Hang onto Lucy and give her a chance for a little bit longer, and/or wait until I have another pet, since it is really nice to have something alive in the living room.

However, I'm realizing that its not good to wait. Since reaching the state of "being on the fence" the quality of care I've been giving her has declined. I'm still making sure she's fed and watered, but I haven't given her dust baths every day like I used to, and I've only been taking her out once every 2 or 3 days instead of every day, which means she's getting a little jumpier when she is out.

I'd like to sell her and get a little money back, since all said and done I probably ended up spending around $500 getting her all set up. About $150 for the chinchilla, $150 + shipping for the giant cage, and all of those wheels and dust baths and dust and food and hay somehow adds up. But I really don't know what the going rate is for a chinchilla. She's tame, and still pretty young, so I think she's about as optimal as a pet chinchilla can be. $200-100 seems reasonable.

I looked on craigslist, but I didn't see a category for selling pets. I'll look into selling her a little bit more, and then just give her away to the rescue society if that doesn't work out. If anyone wants to take her and doesn't want to pay me let me know, odds are that I'll find it hard to sell her and just end up giving her to you.

I feel guilty about wasting all that money and not having things work out, and about abandoning a pet. And I still feel guilty about giving Mouse away when I was paranoid about germs regarding preemie stuff with Tovar, so this adds to that guilt.

But its not the end of the world, and hopefully I'll find a pet who is a better fit.

Joshua the fish is doing great. He's very happy in his 3 gallon fish tank, which I just changed, and his fins are pretty and healthy.

( rambling about Lucy the chinchilla )

The hard work has paid off, Lucy the Chinchilla has gotten much more tame. I wouldn't go so far as to say that she likes people, but she's at least very curious about and not afraid of them. And she might even like me just a touch ;) I think that's about as much as one can hope for from a chinchilla. She still hates the act of being picked up, but she's calm once held, for a chinchilla, and along with that calmness, she usually doesn't poop all over the place anymore.

I've gone through many rounds of nicknames for Lucy, and have finally found one that I really like. Lucy-fur!! :)

( diet )

( anxiety and baby making )

( misc )

We're working it out, she's staying. Big changes:

• I only take her out during the day -- she's too hyperactive to tolerate being held at night.
  
• I don't catch her in the corner in her cage -- her cage is very large, and I was catching her in a corner, but I've since learned how to encourage her out of the corner and catch her on the side instead.
  
• Raisins! She didn't like them when I first got her home, but now that she's bigger she's into them. Its such a relief to have a good treat to tempt her with!
  

With all of the above, she hasn't barked at me very much or bitten me at all. This evening I'm especially encouraged because she didn't fight me very much at all when I took her out of her cage.

So, we're making progress. I don't know if she'll ever like me, as I'd like with a pet, but at least she seems to mind me much less. I've been making a point of taking her out for at least five minutes every day since getting her, which is what I've heard is the most important part for taming a little critter.

This all is so important to me because chinchillas live for about 10-15 years. I want to have a good relationship with a pet if we're going to have her for that long!

Lucy is very tame, in that she's not afraid of humans. She's not tame, in that she doesn't like me. She's mellow enough during the day, when I pick her up when she's up from her nocturnal sleep for a meal break, but even then she barks at and occasionally bites me when I go to pick her up, and when I picked her up at night tonight, when she was awake, she wanted nothing to do with me, and even barked at me while I was holding her, which she hadn't done before.

I picked a chinchilla that was young because I figured it would bond to me. However, all of the chinchillas were wiggly and trying to get away, so I figured that's just how they were and that they'd tame, but now I don't think so. I can tame a chinchilla to not be scared, but I don't think I can tame one to like me.

Mouse, my old pet rat, was a fabulous pet. I picked him because he was the most curious about humans and friendly.

I think I'm probably going to see if the breeder will take her back. I figure I'll give her another week but this doesn't bode well. I'm really tempted to get another rat, but Patri's arm broke out in welts when he held Mouse, and even though we didn't notice other allergen correlations when I was living at the ABL, he still could have been having a minor less noticeable reaction. Patri's supportive of my getting a rat, so I'll think about it, but I know I shouldn't. Cats and dogs are out of the question, Patri's definitely allergic to dogs and we're both allergic to cats.

Having thought about it more, I think I might try another chinchilla. The breeder I bought this one from was a bit rough with her chins, picking them up by the tail, which the books advised not to do, and none of them seemed friendly. If I get another one I'll go elsewhere and see if I can find one who seems interested in humans, like Mouse was.

The chinchilla is adorable. Tovar named her Lucy, named after Reichart & Emi's dog, whom Tovar was very fond of during our recent visit. We've had Lucy the chinchilla for three days now. In that amount of time she's practically a new chinchilla. We've been handling her a lot and she's mellowed out and gotten much friendlier. anahas has friends who raise chinchillas and says that Lucy is already very tame. I've been really relieved since the shift in Lucy's behavior last night, because prior to that I thought that the chinchilla hated me ;)