Where did this week go?

Where did this week go? I cannot believe that it is Friday again. I have been very busy taking care of my mother in-law after her hip replacement operation. She is out of hospital and back in her own flat but will need a lot of help until she is literally back on her feet again. The bank holiday Monday threw everything out, I have been catching up all week with the packing and posting. I intend to work hard on my paperwork pile over the next couple of days. Sadly nobody made an appointment to visit last Saturday or this Saturday. It was certainly the right decision to stop the open afternoons. I could not afford to run them when nobody turned up and at least this way I am not left waiting around. Sometimes several people turned up at once on an open afternoon, this caused chaos but with appointments I can space them out.

All is well in the bug house. My Cobalt Blue has dug a burrow and disappeared, hopefully this means that she mated before attacking the male and is now busy laying an egg sac? It could just mean that she is fed up with me checking on her and has decided to hide away. I put the newly matured male Guatemalan Blue spider in with my female. They seemed quite happy together so I left them alone and 'hopefully' they mated during the night, time will tell. My Wandering spider egg sac has properly hatched now, the tiny spiderlings are running all over the box. I need to house them in a larger tank today, with plenty of fruit flies. The other Wandering spider has also produced an egg sac this week so I will have even more babies in a few weeks time, unless someone makes me an offer for her. They would also need to collect, I cannot post a spider carrying an egg sac. I have also decided to change the common name of these spiders. Whatever I say people see 'Wandering spider' and think danger so I am simply calling them Giant Huntsman. Obviously the scientific name remains the same and people can always do a Google search on any spiders that they are worried about. I don't know how I ever lived without Google. I'm sure a day never goes by without me doing a search on something. My husband was looking at Google street pictures last night. The houses are very clear and so is my neighbour standing outside her garden! Talk about Big Brother is watching you.

On the subject of watching - I have realised that the Blue Tits in our camera nesting box this year, are in fact Great Tits. The eggs hatched this week and the parents are continually in and out of the box feeding them. It is amazing how fast the babies grow, perhaps it's to do with all the mealworms that I'm putting out for them.

I had a large number of spiderlings arrive yesterday. They are now on the website but please do let me know if you find any mistakes. I really would appreciate it! Cut & Paste is wonderful but it is very easy to get it wrong. One of my eagle eyed friends noticed that the original photo had been left on a new spider when I updated the site. I have rectified that one and 'hope' that all the rest are correct. It really is very difficult when everything is down to me. It isn't easy to proof read your own work. Somebody mentioned on the phone this week that perhaps their order was packed by someone else. I simply replied 'I wish', it is a strange concept but this business is entirely me. My family have nothing to do with my bug house at the bottom of the garden. My daughter may occasionally help with bits and pieces but nobody else would know how to pack the bugs or feed the spiders. It is a lot of responsibility, I try to stay fit and healthy but goodness knows what would happen if I were ever incapacitated. Let's not think about it!

Lastly this week I would like to mention humour in emails or the lack of it. It is very difficult to express emotion in an email, people often think I am serious when I'm not. My husband has added some Smiley's to my email toolbar and I have used a couple but they aren't very pretty. I'm sure I saw some spider ones some time ago? I have used them a couple of times but it is difficult to 'be funny' or 'ironic' in an email. My family would say that I have no sense of humour anyway but I would deny that. My sense of humour is just a little bit strange, like the rest of me!