What happened to summer?
What happened to summer? It has been rain, rain, rain this week. Rain is the bad news but the good news is that my wonderful hubby spent last weekend fixing the roof of my office and bug room. Although it was pouring and like a tropical monsoon here on Wednesday, not a drop fell inside! We have lived here for 11 years this month and in all that time it has leaked to varying degrees. We have had the roof redone twice but it was the drainage gully that caused so many problems. My hubby bought long lengths of plastic and made a completely new gully.
My house resembles a builders yard at the moment, hubby bought way too many plastic lengths which are lying in the lounge until we can work out what to do with them and he has plans to build wardrobes in the bedroom so the wood for that is taking up most of the hall. It is difficult to get in the front door at the moment. I really hope he will move some of it this weekend as next week he is deserting me for his annual European motorbike trip with his friends. My daughter is also abandoning me for the 24 hour Le Mans car race in France. It isn't fair, they have no interesting in animals and I have no understanding of why anyone would want to zoom around the alps on a motorbike (often in the rain) or camp at a male dominated, smelly, loud racetrack for several days! Anyway I shall be concentrating on work and trying to get on top of everything while they are away and I have decided to have a whole 'open weekend'. I will hopefully get the details on the website today. I won't have a drop in time as that hasn't worked so far on my open afternoons. It will be by appointment and no set slots so there will be plenty of time to look around and chat. It is Father's Day on the Sunday and what better present for dad than to buy him a new tarantula? (ok not what every dad wants but I know a lot of dads who would be delighted)
The bug room is still overflowing with new stock, even though I have had a busy week with lots of orders going out. I still have a few spiders from the show last month without a 'proper' home yet. Don't worry too much, they are fed and watered but could do with a bit more space. I am confident that by this time next week they will all be housed correctly. I am going on holiday at the beginning of July so I seriously need to cut down. I am putting lots of special offers on the site and the one day 'super offers' seem to be going a treat. I have looked at a couple of the things that I've sold and thought "why on earth did I sell it that cheaply" but I really can't leave my daughter looking after all these animals while we are away. I am trying very hard not to buy in new stock but I have a number of captive bred millipedes coming in next week. The offer was just too good to refuse. New things will still appear on the website as I have some spiders moulting which will soon be ready for sale and as I clear things next week I am bound to discover animals that are showing as out of stock but are actually available (I always under estimate rather than over estimate as I would hate to sell something that I don't actually have). It is very difficult to stay on top of things at this busy time of year.
Yesterday I had my nephew's three kids after school as usual on a Thursday and the youngest Izzy (5) needed help with her bugs project. I say help, nothing had been done and it was due to be in today! Anyway we managed to find some old beetles and display them in a box. Katie (just turned 8) did a write up on the computer and Izzy cut out some beetle photos from my latest Royal Entomological journal (which I was intending to keep intact). Their mum was very pleased with our efforts so let's hope the teacher is impressed too. I had thought that mealworms in various life stages would be good but Katie informed me that nothing live could be taken to school and Izzy wouldn't even hold the tub with the mealworms in it! I despair, in my day I took all manner of live animals to school - no health and safety in those days. It is a real shame that so few schools have any pets now.
Lastly I must just mention an email that made me laugh this week. I do get some very odd emails from all over the world and I do my best to reply to most of them. This guy wanted black scorpions that weighed between over 100g and preferably 200g. I have never been asked to weigh a bug before (as far as I recall) but when I weighed my largest Imperial scorpion (10g) and my largest pregnant Asian Forest scorpion (17g), I realised how gigantic a scorpion weighing 100-200g would be! The guy reckons they exist, "good luck with the search" is all I can say. It did get me thinking, perhaps I should sell my tarantulas by weight? One of the only moans I ever get is about the size of spiders, mind you I would need new scales as I think a spiderling would weigh zero on any scales that I own! I just wish people would ask me to measure spiders in advance, some people do, the body length is very accurate (don't get me started on leg span, a stupid way to measure a spider - in my opinion).
Hope everyone has a nice weekend. We are supposed to be taking loony Teddi on a Eurasier dog society walk in Richmond park this Sunday. I love Richmond park (great location for Stag beetles and just the right time of year) but I'm not going if it is raining!