Austransplant- You could be right about the PC. Somehow, I have been lucky and do not yet have PC in my orchard. I don't know how this is possible as this is the 4th season with apple trees in my yard, and there are crab apples near by. Is this beginners luck? Nevertheless, I'm preparing myself (by attempting to obtain the Permethrin & Imidan) this year for that eventuality. Since they have never gotten established in my orchard, I wonder if it's simply because I bag my apples and have never let them get a foothold that I haven't seen them yet? (especially around the time just before bagging) I know my local orchards 20 minutes away have to deal with PC. If, like diseases, each variety showed more or less suceptibility to PC, it would be nice to see a chart somewhere (like they do with diseases) so that people could benefit from it. -Glenn

Tina, it's impossible to seal every nook and cranny in a home. Even brand new homes. We live in Oklahoma, home of the Brown Recluse/Fiddleback. However, they are now across all of the USA. A person can lose a limb (rarely though) if bit by one. Their bites rot the skin. We have a brand new storm door in the front. Paid big bucks for it because it has an invisible screen, I just love that door! But...the rubber weather stripping under it, like on all outside doors, has gradually worn off. Just last year when they were remodeling, the guys put new weather stripping on the back storm door. And half of it has worn off too. I ordered some draft stoppers, so every time I leave one of the doors open with just the storm door exposed, I put them at the bottom to keep spiders from coming in. How does one seal the areas when they come from the pipes to the sinks? We have a septic system so maybe that's why they can crawl up the pipes. It was even on the front page of the OKC paper a month ago about how spiders are extremely bad here this summer. So you can't convince me that it's possible to seal everything in and around a house. We've sealed everything we can visibly see and we still get spiders. But when we spray inside, we hardly get any at all.

My hackles went up increasingly as I read this thread. It is so annoying when they decrease the size of items, it messes up my recipes (and if the Breyer's ice cream box gets any smaller, they may as well sell it in single-serving containers). I wish they'd just leave the size/amount alone and simply raise the price when they want to implement price increases!! But even worse, they put HFCS in everything these days. And with cranberries, it's not like you can make it from scratch every time, as fresh cranberries are not available year-round.

I've had my Kohler Clairette for at least 10 years (kept it when I renovated my kitchen because I liked it so well) and I've never had a problem with functionality or finish. The spray stays on until I switch it to stream (and vice versa) with a little toggle button. It would bug me to have to hold a button to keep the spray on, or if it reset when I turn off the water. I don't have a problem with it not going back in place. However, if you pull down the sprayer/head and just leave it, it will dangle; it doesn't retract on its own. But the magnet is strong enough to hold it in place once the head is back near the starting point. (My BF leaves it dangling sometimes just to annoy me.) <<(after I wrote that I realized that sounds kinda dirty, but I'm talking about the faucet!) FWIW I got mine from Kohler. I've read that the big box stores might sell the same brands but lesser quality - not sure how that works but just saying. ETA: do you have a Pirch, Kohlers showroom, or similar store near you that has faucets hooked up to water sources? That might help make a decision. My mom bought a Grohe years ago that she replaced after just a couple months because the sprayer didn't stay on without holding the button. Had she been able to test it she would have known and never purchased it. It was a $500+ faucet that the store wouldn't let her return.