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One week until my prize winning cruise to the Caribbean

One week until my prize winning cruise to the Caribbean. There will be no blog for a while, this time next week we will be on our way! Entering competitions is my hobby and I have won some amazing prizes over the years. Just this year I have won a television, tickets to see Beyonce, a computer, gift cards, meal vouchers, dvds, books, trip to Switzerland, the cruise and plenty more. I never get bored with all the animals to care for and competitions to enter.

It is very difficult and stressful trying to organise everything to look after itself for my two week break but I'm getting there. My daughter, son, mother in-law etc will do their best to cope but I suspect the furry pets will fare better than the six and eight legged ones! Thanks to the new website I have sold a lot of stock in the last few weeks and I am on track to have everything cleaned and fed ready for next week. Due to the planned postal strikes Tuesday will have to be my last posting day before our holiday. I know that Royal Mail will still be running their Special Delivery service but it may cause delay and I could do without the worry just before going away! I'm still hoping the strikes will be called off.

I don't know if it was down to my moans but I have actually sold a large number of praying mantids this week. They are fascinating animals and I really love them but they are far too much hard work for way too little money. I'm sure when I restock after my holiday I will still have some mantids but I don't intend to keep the large numbers that I have kept this summer. The spiders are still outselling everything else so I will obviously be looking at getting plenty of new species when I return from the cruise. It looks like the ship has internet connection at all times so I will keep in daily contact with the family to see how things are going at home. I will not however be logging onto my website or using my work email address. I'm sure it will be chaos when I return as I get a large number of emails each day but I will deal with it afterwards. At least I will be tanned and relaxed (well relaxed for me, relaxed is not something I do very well). I am having to be tough and delete some of the emails that I get, I try to be polite and I reply to most of the emails that I receive but so many are asking for things that I don't have and asking about postage etc which are clearly shown on my website. I often reply to emails with a short reply because I just don't have the time to spend on them. It really is only me here doing everything and I don't think some people grasp that. Having said that, please don't stop telling me how well I am doing and how much you like my new site. I do read ALL my emails and the lovely comments keep me going. One guy wrote this week that my business is like a 'corner shop', I thought that was a great analogy. The new website is brilliant but it has vastly increased my workload and some days I struggle to cope (my hubby is getting pretty good at cooking dinner).

Well it is certainly looking autumnal now and I'm sure the weather will get colder soon. I haven't seen any frost here yet but I've heard some areas have had frost in the mornings this last week. I expect I will be using heat packs in my parcels when I get back. They are an amazing invention and work so well. I have very few problems posting out bugs in cold weather.

Thanks for your support over the transition from old antiquated website to new automated website. I will get out to the bug house now and dream of my long awaited rest next week.


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