snail a la ale

as some of my readership may know - I inherited Henry's unwanted 'Christmas' snails. two of them, to be precise. in case you were curious, here's some facts about them:

• they're called bill and ben
• they need half a cuttle fish every 2 weeks or they'll absorb nutrients from each others' shells instead
• they are hermaphrodites
• rhiannon's been looking after them, and it's been giving her mum nightmares
• they lay on average 200 eggs per clutch, and lay 5-6 clutches per year
• the eggs have about a 90% viability
• if my calculations are correct, then, 2 x 200 x 5 x 0.9 gives me 1800 1st generation snails in a year
• they take about 4 months to reach maturity and can grow up to 7 or 8 cm tall and 20 cm long
• they are apparently giant african snails

I also found a really good site for snail recipes. snail in ale shall be my first attempt, I think. photos may follow.

also, anyone wanting to bring a pizza round instead of snail's welcome to - just send me a text or drop by! as of tomorrow I'll be living here.

away

since I last posted I've been to sizewell, turkey and wetheringsett. tomorrow I move to ipswich, and monday week* I start work. I presume then I'll have access to some sort of computing device, so all is not lost, gareth. if all else fails, ipswich library are gonna love me.

*thought it was monday, but things change, so a week more holiday!!

oh, and gareth - do you reckon we could make it 'til Christmas not communicating to each other except through blog? that would be fun.

daily sudoku

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Visit www.dailysudoku.com for more puzzles, solutions, hints, books and other resources.

gareth gates

today I wondered what happened to gareth gates and why he's no longer famous. I found out. there is good news though. perhaps.

more zooball photos

here and here

and while we're at it, the best end to a story...

...and I got the last laugh because they were all mute!

zooball

for those interested, here are zoo photos (other people took some)

here are ball photos (other people took all)

and the ball raised £320, thanks!

----a few better photos here, thanks phil----