I like you I like you I like you I like you I like you

(Arachnophobes may want to avoid link-clickage in this post)

Just found one of these on my morning dogwalk. I didn't notice the zigzag web thing, I was too entranced by her amazing pop-art stripes and colours. Will take the camera with me later and see if I can get my very own pic of her. She was stunning.

The usual outdoor spider round here (the one in my icon, and the one who weaves webs at eye-level on the wood path) is Araneus diadematus - very beautiful and very common. Never seen a stripy one before, or even been aware of its existence. It's pleased me enormously - both encountering her, and the fact that the Internet was able to tell me what she was in under three minutes. YAY INTERNET!

In other news, I get to walk over to Grimmauld Place today. Last time I was there I discovered that a water leak had soaked into the bathroom floorboards and made them all collapsey... good daughter that I am, I told Mum, she told the housing association, and someone has to be there to let them in today to start fixing it.

...and the phone just rang. They're on their way and I'd better be too. Byeeeee!!!

I like you I like you I like you I like you I like you

(Arachnophobes may want to avoid link-clickage in this post)

Just found one of these on my morning dogwalk. I didn't notice the zigzag web thing, I was too entranced by her amazing pop-art stripes and colours. Will take the camera with me later and see if I can get my very own pic of her. She was stunning.

The usual outdoor spider round here (the one in my icon, and the one who weaves webs at eye-level on the wood path) is Araneus diadematus - very beautiful and very common. Never seen a stripy one before, or even been aware of its existence. It's pleased me enormously - both encountering her, and the fact that the Internet was able to tell me what she was in under three minutes. YAY INTERNET!

In other news, I get to walk over to Grimmauld Place today. Last time I was there I discovered that a water leak had soaked into the bathroom floorboards and made them all collapsey... good daughter that I am, I told Mum, she told the housing association, and someone has to be there to let them in today to start fixing it.

...and the phone just rang. They're on their way and I'd better be too. Byeeeee!!!

Love that dirty water

Got back from Grimmauld Place. The toilet was leaking and is fixed. Spike and Squish had a blast playing in Mum's jungley overgrown garden - so much fun that for a moment I wondered if keeping them in an apartment is cruelty after all.

Then I remembered that when we all lived there and they had free run of the garden, it was nothing more than a convenient toilet for them and they never really played in it - it's just the novelty value that makes it appealing now.

Spike's plastic kiddie pool is still in the garden, and since no-one's been near it for over a year the accumulation of rainwater, green slime, dirt, bugs and dead leaves in it made it look a bit like spinach and brown lentil soup. And Spike, the arsehole, waited till I was letting the plumbing guy in and showing him the problem and then went swimming in it. Ever seen a camouflage-coloured swamp collie? He stank like a fucking compost heap too.

Luckily, the leak was fixed quickly and I washed him off in Mum's bathtub before taking him home. A bit of extra dirt in that bathroom makes no odds.

Stopped off at Asda on the way home and bought pork ribs and fresh sardines for the spoilt furry royalty. It's worth it to see them happily crunching the bones, it really is...

Love that dirty water

Got back from Grimmauld Place. The toilet was leaking and is fixed. Spike and Squish had a blast playing in Mum's jungley overgrown garden - so much fun that for a moment I wondered if keeping them in an apartment is cruelty after all.

Then I remembered that when we all lived there and they had free run of the garden, it was nothing more than a convenient toilet for them and they never really played in it - it's just the novelty value that makes it appealing now.

Spike's plastic kiddie pool is still in the garden, and since no-one's been near it for over a year the accumulation of rainwater, green slime, dirt, bugs and dead leaves in it made it look a bit like spinach and brown lentil soup. And Spike, the arsehole, waited till I was letting the plumbing guy in and showing him the problem and then went swimming in it. Ever seen a camouflage-coloured swamp collie? He stank like a fucking compost heap too.

Luckily, the leak was fixed quickly and I washed him off in Mum's bathtub before taking him home. A bit of extra dirt in that bathroom makes no odds.

Stopped off at Asda on the way home and bought pork ribs and fresh sardines for the spoilt furry royalty. It's worth it to see them happily crunching the bones, it really is...