Expo - day 2

So, day two (Sunday) was interesting.

Still didn't do much better with sales, though we did sell a few more things, and realized it was to our benefit to put up a "we accept credit cards" sign.  So we did.  Sold a few things, and talked to some more people who seemed mildly interested in adopting.  But you never can tell, cause I had a few people who said they'd call after the weekend was over, and today (Monday)... my phone didn't ring once.  Ah well.

It wasn't bad though, the day went by reasonably quickly.  Educated yet more people about the fact that they are chinchillas.  I think for the St. Charles expo, I'm going to hang one of our cage card holders on the expo cage and have a card in there "Hi, my name is Kandie.  I am a chinchilla.  My adoption fee is...."  And maybe I should bring a guinea pig, rabbit, gerbil, and hamster to show people the difference.  I think the best has to be the hamster.  That would be quite the overgrown hamster, wouldn't it? 

Well anyway, we did end up going through quite a few business cards on the second day, so who knows.  We'll see, right?

They had some exotic animals there as well, Cold Blooded Creatures, was the name of the place I believe.  So some pictures:

iguana

iguana (love the collar)

me and the iguana

alligator skink? (it's an "alligator _________" for sure)

black-throat monitor

black-throat monitor (that's not me petting it, but I did get to pet it!)

black-throat monitor

crocodile

albino burmese python

Bubba (american alligator) -- pic taken wide so you can see doors in background for size reference

And then there was this random guy who was there (no booth or anything) for both days with his cockatoos.  So of course I had to ask to hold one.

It's looking at me like I'm tasty.  This one was named Harley.

So today, we're back home and I managed to do just about nothing all day.  Imagine that.  No, but really.  I did clean some cages, sexed and separated the rats, and emailed the people bout that.  Also wrote out all the invoices that have been piling up in my inbox and on post-its so I can start putting together packages tomorrow and getting people shipping quotes.

Psycho is going home tomorrow, but I have yet to actually get her stuff ready.  That'll happen in the morning.  In the meantime, while emailing potential adoptive homes, I sent out a two-day notice to the person who's had the two male rats on hold (the older ones).  Also sent out an email to someone who emailed asking if we had rats.. awhile ago.. and never emailed me back.  Asked if she was still interested.  Emailed the first and second people on the list for rats about the babies -- first one is trying to set up a pickup on Thursday, and the second one said now's not a good time for them to adopt.  So, I'm going to wait on the third home until the first one comes and picks out what they want so I know for sure which ones are available.  And then after the third, we have I think another person or two in line for the babies.  So we'll see how that all goes.

Oh!  Ok, so back at the expo, I was talking to the lady who's in charge of the thing, and we were talking about how I didn't get any donations, which isn't really a huge deal, but at the same time, it was a tad odd cause like other rescue booths had a ton of donations, and she said that maybe, aside from the fact that people think small animals require a few pellets, some water, and are cheap to care for (ha! they should try owning one), she said that dogs tend to pull on their heartstrings cause they want to be petted and want to interact.  So.... I asked her what she'd think if we brought Shiloh to the St. Charles show.  Cause Shiloh, on a good day, wants to be petted, acts like a ham, and EVERYONE loves him.  Come on, if you've met him and petted him and he's closed his eyes and thrown his head back... you can't deny you didn't want to take him home.  She said we could bring whatever we want, whatever will make people aware, and really, he IS a rescue, he's just one that's never leaving, so I suppose it all works out.  So, I ended up pulling one of our small cages off of our cages for sale page and we're going to hang onto it for Shiloh to be in at the next pet expo.  And we may bring him to the one in later October as well.  We will see.

And, totally unrelated to anything, just for fun --

my dog, da movie star