He's a fairly new addition to my family. The story behind him is pretty complex and sad:
My father's boss has a friend, who had a step-son, who was preparing to go to college, and needed to get rid of some "assets". Tori was one of them. The story behind this transfer gets even more complicated after this, so try to keep up...
Now the story behind this kid is that he recieved this snake when he was 13 years old, in the middle of a divorse between his parents. The father, wanting not to pay the mother child support, wanted to "persuade" his son through collective bargaining that he was the better choice of living with. So, the father, knowing his son is into common freaky things, goes to a reptile store and buys the most expensive, but dosile, snake there...a California King Snake that was intended for the breeding market.
So the father gave the kid the snake, and won custody because the kid testified that he liked life with his dad more that with his mom. So, the father gained the kid and the snake under his house.
Now the kid, I have met. He is a jack ass, who thought the snake was "fu##ing awesome to have, but I've got to dump it for college". Now, the first thing is he refered to the snake as "it" instead of him. People who own snakes, but refer to them as "it" only have them as materialistic things, and not true companions. Secondly, in the cage, there was a skull of a cat where he was supposed to curl up under. Now, anybody who thinks a snake is going to enjoy curling up on top of a skull obviously has the wrong idea about what snakes really are. A snake is not a blood thirsty animal that enjoys the symbols of death, they are just as normal as a pet than a cat or a dog, wanting to curl up where it's safe and warm. The kid obviously owned a snake for the wrong reason, and I could tell he was mistreated once I first held him (very jumpy)...
As the years passed, the father became more and more discusted with the snake, and by the time the kid was about to leave for college (last May), the father didn't want to deal with the snake. The kid didn't want the snake anymore, because he had realized that he didn't truely like him anyway, so the kid asked his mother to take it. The mother didn't want it, and complained to her new husband (the friend of my dad's boss) that the snake was something the mother was going to worry about constantly until they could get rid of him. So the step father made it his agenda to please the mother, and get rid of the snake as quickly as possible by telling all his friends that he had a snake that he needed to "dump on somebody else". The step-father had talked in person to my dad's boss, and my dad overheard the conversation and described me, how I love snakes and would usually be more than happy to take care of one in need of a home. So the step-father arranged for me to meet him and pick up the snake at the house, where the son was still gathering stuff up for college - the son was leaving for summer-classes, so he had to be in his dorm by June.
Now, I've got Tori in loving hands, where he has been properly fed and handled on a day-by-day basis. He's become a true member of my scaley family, and I love him to death!
~(: Piton Peludo...