nylon, rain, and local wildlife

Today I learned that:

• If you need 20 yards (20 m) of ripstop nylon to make a dome tent, and you have a coupon that only gives you 40% off on one piece of fabric, the only colors available in 20 yard lengths will be the unpopular ones. I am now the proud owner of 20 yards of the brightest bluish teal I've ever seen, but it was better than black.
• If your husband is working on a computer he doesn't tolerate, and it is therefore sitting outside on the patio with the keyboard, mouse, and ethernet cables snaked in through the sliding glass door, the pollen and mold from the outdoors blow in through the cable-width gap during thunderstorms and make me pretty sick. But the computer stays dry.
• My carpet is so evil it kills scorpions.

Ok, that last one I'm not so sure about, but a scorpion crawled in around the cables and was dead when I found it on my sewing machine plug:


That was a little more excitement than I was looking for, wildlife-wise, so tomorrow or the next day I'll try to get some pictures of the latest pair of baby birds leaving the nest in the vine. Well, keeping in mind that the way things have been going around here, they'll probably get eaten by a hawk or something.