California 2 Puerto Rico

I am so sick of ticks. Stefan and I could pick ticks off of Kuta and Monkey, all day long.

Literally. We spend at least a few hours a week, yanking those little blood suckers off of our poor pups. And, it’s not like we don’t try and protect our dogs, it’s just that nothing seems to work. We have our dogs on Advantix (a monthly treatment) and we are constantly giving them flea/tick bathes. As a matter of fact, we have bathed them twice in the last 3 days and we still spent 30 minutes picking ticks off of the dogs today.

Our friends RT and Nora had to take their dogs to the vet to be sedated in order to remove all of the ticks from them.

Another friend uses tick pesticides intended for horses, on his dog.

I don’t know what else to do. Ticks are so gross!! Does anyone else have any suggestions on how we can keep the ticks off of our dogs in Puerto Rico?!

Popularity: 8% [?]

AAAAAACK! There are so many mosquitoes in my office today! I definitely have an itchy spot for every hour I have been down here today, not to mention the red slap marks I have all over my back and legs from trying to slap the little suckers.

Note to Self: Prioritize Air Conditioning for Offices and Master Bedroom before summer time and the real mosquito season is in full effect!

Popularity: 46% [?]

I’ve been playing the roll of gardener for the past week or two, since the guys are concentrating on the inside of the house. As I’ve been watering, weeding and planting, (I’ll leave the pica pica to Stefan ;)…) I’ve been getting ideas for how we are going to lay out the garden(s) and outside living areas. There is a HUGE mango tree near the back of the house that I want to put a swing in and I got the idea that I wanted to clear out an area under the tree for a table and chairs as well. So, I raked out under the tree, pulled the weeds and was prepping to dig out a decent sized tree to transplant into the front yard. I grabbed the pickaxe and round nose shovel and went to work.

On my first swing of the pickaxe, I hit the BIGGEST centipede I have ever seen. Lucky for me, I chopped it in half, otherwise I could have been in big trouble. I went up to the house and grabbed my camera, but the pictures came out too dark, so I photoshopped this reenactment for you…

Behold! Summer the giant centipede slayer!!!

Seriously, though, the centipede I came across under the mango tree was pretty close in size to the one pictured above. Scary! It makes me a little nervous having the dogs running around, being as a centipede that size could easily kill a dog. I’m going to have to fashion some sort of centipede-proof doggy boots for Kuta and Monkey…

Popularity: 38% [?]

Stefan and I have been really busy and will have some pictures to share in the next couple of days, but let me tell you this…The freaks come out at night, here in Puerto Rico.

And by “freaks”, I mean BIG, creepy crawly creatures.

I was working in my office last night (which is downstairs) and I saw something in the doorway out of the corner of my eye. I squinted to get a better look and thought it might just be some construction debris (we have plenty of that…), but upon further inspection, it turned out to be a HUGE toad. Seriously it had to have been a couple of pounds, at least.

I am working late again tonight and I went out to get my shoes that I left on the front porch. Apparently some tarantula had other plans for my pink Pumas, because he was looking longingly at them when I opened the front door.

Screens for the office windows has just moved up the priority list…

Popularity: 22% [?]