Sunshine at last

Sunshine at last, it's been a really nice week here. The bugs are all growing, breeding and thriving. It is a never ending job to feed and clean them all but I am gradually cutting down a bit. Once the schools and universities shut for the summer holidays, things are always a bit slower. I am trying to concentrate more on the multitude of bugs that I already have and stop buying in more and more. I am however getting some nice new spiderlings next week. It has been a week of appointments for me hairdressers, hospital for my back, youth club networking meeting yesterday and today I have the opticians! Tomorrow should be good as I am booked on a one day wildlife, first aid course at Tiggywinkles animal rescue centre. Last Friday's day out was very pleasant until I was leaving the exhibition centre at Olympia, London and fell straight over a bench. It was in the middle of the walkway, low to the ground and 'camouflaged' with the flooring (no alcohol involved). I didn't see it at all and have ended up with unbelievable, huge, multi coloured bruises on both legs and one arm. I am lucky that I didn't break anything.

I took some more bugs and beasties along to the youth club on Monday. The youngsters are now very keen to see my tarantulas and scorpions so I will probably take them in at the end of term in a couple of weeks time but I'm the only one handling them. As I always say "if anyone is going to get bitten by one of my animals, I would rather it was me".

I am trying even harder to get to grips with technology. I do realise that Facebook is important (getting towards 500 likes)and it seems I may need to spend a fortune having my website upgraded. It is now several years old and I am told that is ancient in this day and age. Hubby and I need to sit down and look at the demo for the new upgrade and work out if it is truly needed. Sadly I'm pretty sure that it is needed, the new site would be far more mobile friendly. This is vital for two reasons, a large number of my customers are ordering on mobile devices and Google are promoting the mobile friendly websites way ahead of the more traditional sites. Google searches are hugely important to my business, they regularly bring in new customers. There are a lot of improvements to the new package and I am really hoping to rearrange my tarantula section and go back to the old layout. Well I say "I" but I'm hoping my website guy can sort it for me. I fear it is going to prove to have been an expensive mistake changing the layout last year (or was it the year before?). It seemed a good idea to show each species separately with the sizes available but it has been much more work, there is no longer a way to search for a tarantula by size and the worst thing was that I could no longer reduce a spider by size, only species. This resulted in me having to set up a special offers page and have sometimes the same spider in two different places on the site and at two different prices. It also relies on me remembering to change the offers which takes time to sort out. I regretted it straight away but having paid for the changes and realising the enormity of putting it back as it was (once the entries had mostly been deleted) made me stick with it but now if I really need the upgrade then I really want to get it right!

Sticking with technology, my new BT Guardian phone is going well. I must sort out the answer machine (it either cuts in immediately or not at all - I will find the instruction booklet) but the main idea of stopping sales calls is working a treat. The phone asks everyone to state their name before I answer and then once they do I add them to my 'safe callers' list and they will just be put straight through next time. This week coming up I have a customer/friend coming over to set up an Intragram account for me. I don't think the poor guy knows what he is in for. One of the problems with me is that I am so impatient. I want the knowledge now, I don't want to have to learn it but as I said I am trying! (in more ways than one)

I was really pleased to see this week that my Giant Florida Katydids have laid eggs. I love Katydids but I haven't had any luck breeding them, fingers crossed that the eggs hatch in due course. I have plenty of Horse-head grasshoppers, I certainly seem to have got to grips with breeding these and I've found that they are surprisingly long lived for an insect (I love their weird and amazing faces). My scorpions are breeding well, I now have lots of Giant Asian Forest and Giant Shiny Burrowing babies. Unfortunately, although I can see that my Flat Rock scorpion is pregnant, she is still hanging on to give birth. The worry is that she will reabsorb the babies or worse still not be able to give birth and die. I'm not sure what conditions she needs to trigger the release of the babies but I think a trip out in the car is required! (I have mentioned before that I have frequently posted out scorpions only to be told a couple of weeks later that she has produced babies, it seems movement may lead to 'movement').

Well as ever, it's a busy day ahead. Walk the dog, see to the bugs, collect mother in-law, then off to the Opticians and supermarket for weekly shop. Hope you all have a good weekend and I don't get bitten by anything at Tiggywinkles, I don't need any more injuries this week! (that reminds me I was asked to take my Tetanus vaccination card with me)