What a week!

What a week! I really don't feel like writing my blog today because I am struggling to say anything positive, as you all know I like a good moan but honestly it has been torment. Having a new kitchen fitted is just a nightmare when you are working from home. I can't even fully explain it but briefly the kitchen and dining room are out of bounds which means that I need to go into the garden to get from my office on one side to the rest of the house on the other. Teddi is adorable but I have had to take her everywhere with me as all the doors are left open. I cannot go out because I am really busy with work and Teddi gets sick almost as soon as the car starts up! It has been warm, something I'm delighted about but Teddi has a thick coat and it is far too hot in the bug house for her. She has spent her week shredding the newspapers that I use for packing orders, I hope to get my hubby to put a photo on here (he did put a photo on last week's blog - due to popular demand). I took several photos on my mobile phone, she looks so cute and it's a small price to pay but oh the mess. I can't hoover because Teddi is terrified of the hoover. Everywhere I go is covered in dirt and dust and mess and noise and I have no control. I've mentioned before that I am a control freak and I like to be totally organised! Yesterday I decided to lock the doors and hide in my office, that is after the plumbers had left, they were in every room in the house bleeding radiators and in and out of my office to reach the boiler. I always have paperwork to do but I was just in the middle of everything when the power tripped out and whoosh my work was gone. Teddi has never had so many walks. I keep going into the woods across the road to regain my sanity. The guy fitting the kitchen is lovely, it's not his fault, he works solidly but I'm stressed out of my mind.

Moving on - I watched in amazement this week as one of my adult Horse-head grasshoppers laid her eggs. If I hadn't been sent a photo of the procedure by the guy who originally bred them, I would have wondered what was going on. The grasshopper buried her entire body into the peat on the base of the terrarium (several inches deep). She was left sitting there 'perched on her elbows', it was so comical, it looked like something was pulling her down from beneath or that she had fallen into quicksand and was trying to stop herself sinking. It was probably the highlight of my week. I also watched in amazement as an adult Tail-less Whip scorpion completed his moult. He sat next to the moult drying and looked huge, the skin left behind is fascinating, I have it sitting on my desk (another thing to photograph). I really like these scorpion like creatures and I'm delighted to have bred them. I think another of my adults is pregnant. They are very nocturnal, I never see them eat but the food disappears and they are still alive so I assume they do eat. Georgie (our teenage daughter) is having a better week than me, she is off rescuing monkeys that were used in a laboratory. She has gone with a friend of mine to relocate the monkeys to various European zoos. When I spoke to her yesterday she was having a great time. She will be finishing college soon and hopes to get an animal related job.

The battle goes on with the Pallid cockroaches in my bug house. I really need to eradicate them as they colonise everywhere. My Ethiopian crickets are at last breeding again and I hope to put them back on the website soon but there are still a few cockroaches left in their tank. I do think that I have finally got rid of all the Surinam cockroaches but it has taken several years. It must be a nightmare to live in a hot country and have to contend with cockroach infestations. The larger species are no problem, it's just the smaller species that seem to escape and cause problems. I breed and sell a large number of cockroaches these days. I do think that on the whole they are cute animals. Hissing cockroaches are one of my favourite bugs. I know that a lot of cockroaches are used as food for spiders, scorpions and various reptiles but I think they can be good pets in their own right. I never use Hissing cockroaches as food, they are definitely pets to me.

Another couple of updates, after all this time my last South American Fishing spider has finally moulted and sadly it's a male. No patter of tiny feet on the horizon now as I'm left with two adult males. One of my Peruvian Orange Rump spiders has matured into a male, he looks stunning, they are such a 'leggy' species. I hope now that at least one of the pair I have left matures into a female. Fingers crossed. I have never seen an adult of this species before, they are very attractive but they certainly like to kick off hairs.

I got a few new spiders in this week. Somebody offered me Orange Baboon spiderlings and I'm really glad that I took them as they came extremely well packaged and in individual tubs. Although I run a postal business I do prefer to see in advance what I'm buying but on this occasion they were great and not newly hatched either. All are feeding well and look like they have just moulted. If you do have any surplus stock that you would like to sell please do let me know. However please give me a price, I don't want to upset anyone so I would rather have a set price that I can say yes or no to. Negotiating is ok but I need a starting point as some people expect a very high price that is way off what I would pay. I hate haggling so it is easier to say no when someone is totally unrealistic.

Surprisingly I feel a bit better writing this and thanks to those people who have already listened to my moans on the phone this week and sympathised with me. I know it will be worth it in the end, no pain no gain etc. but as I look around at my normally 'fairly' tidy office which is now full of kitchen contents, I truly hate it all at the moment.