Tank birthday and I'm a Geezer

[Paul B]

This has been the fifth snowiest winter we have had in New York and so far this year we have had five feet of snow so far, and not once this year, or for 4 or 5 years have I seen anyone with a shovel coming around trying to make some money by shoveling.
I don't feel bad for young boys if they don't have money. I could easily have made $1,000.00 yesterday just by shoveling snow. I used to do it all the time. I do see truckloads of gardeners decending on neighborhoods with shovels making money because they are not lazy and could use $1,000.00 for a day's work.
There is so much money around but no one seems to want to make any.
It is hard work, but unless you are a Sissy, hard work is fine for good money.
In my town most people own a snow blower but we have a lot of old people who can't do it and on a day like today the snow plows piled snow in front of everyone's driveway and a snow blower is useless for that. I know as I just cleared my two driveways. I would have gladly paid someone to clear it, but no one came around. I guess they are all inside texting their friends about how much they need money and can't make any.

 

[Cdiggy]

Man, you are a pistol...

 

[Paul B]

Yes I am, and it snowed again last night for a change.

 

[Paul B]

This morning I was looking at my tank and just thinking. Yes, that gives me a headache. I was closely checking things out, watching the pair of pistol shrimp make tunnels all over the place while keeping one antenna on their favorite watchman gobi. Then I noticed one of my small striped cardinals who is dying of old age and will disappear in a couple of days. There is also one thread fin cardinal left as those small cardinals don't have a very long lifespan. The one I have left was the runt of the bunch and is still doing OK, but he looks very lonely as the five of them would spawn all the time.
When they are about to die of old age, they slow down for a few weeks and don't eat very much. They also lose all fear and fish that normally hide, stay out in the open just like an old person, they get a little senile and I can see it in their eyes. Fish sometimes pick on them, but they don't seem to care and I think they know their time is almost gone. (or maybe I give them to much credit) But those smaller fish have a limited lifespan, maybe 4 or 5 years and they may be 2 or 3 when we buy them. If they are spawning until the end, they lived out their life and there is nothing we can do for them.
Yesterday the Mother of a woman we know died. This was the best friend of my 88 year old Mother N Law's "Mother". Yes her Mother and she lived to 106 and was cognizant, walking without a cane and making home made pasta until the end. So if you have a 5 year old little cardinal or a 25 year old clownfish, that is all that you can expect to get out of them.
As I look at my tank I think I know why my tank doesn't seem to have any problems. The animals just seem at home, checking out their surroundings, searching for food and maybe realizing that they are all just going to die of old age. Right in the front of my tank there is a fairly large torch coral that the pistol shrimp made fall down. It is up side down on the gravel and it has been like that for two days. I will get to it eventually and it will be no worse for wear, but some people go nuts over the smallest thing. On this forum there is a guy (or girl) who has a clownfish with a little sore on it. He is dipping him in freshwater, then formalin then some ich medication and he is going to put him in quarantine. The fish just needs to be left alone and he will be fine. We all want a magic pill and it doesn't exist. I feel we over medicate, over quarantine and over stress many of these creatures that would do fine if we just left them alone and fed them appropriately.
I used to get all crazy and drag out the copper or some fluorescent medication that never really did anything but made the tank a cool color. Now, like some of my fish who are dying of old age, nothing bothers me any more and soon I will also slow down, stop eating and fade away. Hopefully, not for a while as I am not quite finished yet because there are still so many things I want to do.
I did everything on my bucket list so it is time to just make a new list.
The first thing on my list, many years ago when I was a little kid was to one day SCUBA dive on the Great Barrier Reef. That actually was my first dive, who would have thought. I wanted to travel to exotic places to dive and I dove in all those places and a lot more. I never got to date Christie Brinkley but my wife also looks like a Supermodel so I kind of did that through osmosis.
One of my larger acropora corals is half dead but that is actually a good thing as it is the clown gobi that is killing it by spawning on it every week or so. Where ever it lays eggs, kills that part of the coral but everyone has acropora, how many people have constantly spawning clown gobies?
My copperband butterfly grew a little larger than I would have liked and he has never gotten along with the old fireclown. The copperband circumnavates the tank every few minutes and on every pass he confronts the fireclown who is always nesting. The clown swims out, the copperband raises his spines and the play goes on. One would think they would tire of this or the copperband would take a short cut through the rock to avoid each other, but I guess it gives them a purpose in life. I love it.

 

[Paul B]

Tomorrow my tank will be 43 years old. I almost forgot

 

[Paul B]

Yesterday my Son n law came over to help me install brakes and a tie rod end on my car. I can easily do that myself as I have installed brakes probably over 100 times, I used to be a mechanic but he lives in Manhattan and has never worked on a car. I, myself would never think of having someone work on my car, it has never happened and as long as I can bend down, it will never happen.
So I showed him how to jack up the car and put jack stands under it and let him take off the wheels. This car, my PT Cruiser is a cheap car and for some stupid reason uses drum brakes on the rear. Even the wagons they used to travel west for the gold rush didn't use drum brakes but they still sometimes do on the rear of cheap cars. It doesn't make any sense to me as disk brakes are so much cheaper and much easier to install.
While we were out there in my driveway working on the car, 5 people came by to say, they never see anyone working on their cars any more. One guy who I didn't even know was driving by and jammed on his brakes and skid on the sand left over from all the snow. I thought it was a drive by shooting and I ducked under the car. He said Wow, I never see anyone working on a car.
I thought about it and it is true. I have not seen anyone working on a car in many years and I am not sure why. Maybe people are very wealthy. I am not sure how much it costs to install brakes on a car but the brakes and tie rod cost me about $100.00 and I get the good brakes, not the ones they give you if you have them installed by someone. The tie rod, for the people who don't know what that is, is a steel fitting that connects the wheel to the part of the car that steers it, so if that breaks, one wheel just goes which even way it wants to go and not necessarily where you want it to go so it is an important part of the car. I replaced the 4 brakes and tie rod in about an hour and fifteen minutes. I am not sure but that simple job would probably have cost close to a thousand dollars in a shop and I would have gotten the cheaper brakes. For all the people that live in a place with a lot of potholes like here in NY, you should check those tie rod ends occasionally. I realize most people don't even know how to jack up the car, much less how to check the tie rods, but maybe you can find someone that knows how to do that, or maybe you should learn how to jack up the car just in case. Oh I don't know. You get a flat tire. Unfortunately, if you have a shop test your tie rod ends, I am fairly sure they will sell you tie rod ends. Mine was in bad shape and there is only 50,000 miles on that car. You can check if you jack up the front of the car and try to move the wheel from side to side like you are turning left to right.
But with your hands on he tire left and right. It should not move and you should not hear a noise.
If I had to hire someone every time my car or boat broke, I would never be able to live here. Installing disk brakes is a simple job and I am sure you could get someone to show you how to do that in 5 minutes.
But I know, most people just don't want to do that and have no problem paying someone large sums of money to do these things.
I still have to pay to get my taxes done' or I would go to jail.

 

[Sobo's Reef]

End rant. Lol I'm a mechanic as well and I can't tell you how many cars have been thru in the past 2 months with bad tie rods/brakes/bent rims/blown out tires/etc. All from potholes Lol I agree with ya tho, if u can do it yourself and save some money, go right ahead, I can't tell u how much money I've saved over the years by getting discounts on parts and installing myself and saving on labor. If you're lucky enough to know how to do it then that's good, if youre not, then don't touch it. I'd rather see a car in the shop for repairs rather than a 5 car accident due to someone forgetting to install that part the right way Lol

 

[Paul B]

Well that's true, If you install brakes and have 2 or 3 parts left over, maybe you should let someone else look at it. I was a mechanic many years ago and am glad I got out of that. But at least I can save lots of money.
My car also has the bent rim and a bubble in the tire from the potholes. I just aligned it using a string but that is also something most people don't know about.
I am surprised I only needed one tie rod end.

 

[Sobo's Reef]

Yeah that's surprising. Usually its a lower control arm or a ball joint as well lol I've done a few alignments with a tape measure. its not fun but it gets the job done just fine.

 

[Paul B]

The A Frame bushings could stand changing but that ain't going to happen as i can't kneel down that long any more.

 

[Paul B]

Today I bought a bangai cardinal because I don't have to many swimming fish. If you look in my tank, although there are about 18 fish in there, you only see the copperband because all of the others are in caves, spawning someplace in the back or out for pizza. Mandarins do their own thing and you don't see much of them and the fireclowns hang out in bottles and only come out to chase away the copperband as they hate each other and have not been speaking for a couple of years.
Bangai cardinals stay out in the front and even though they don't swim much, they give some movement to the tank. I didn't look close at them so I don't know if they are a pair which was a stupid thing as I normally like to have a pair so they spawn. I think they change sex if their insurance covers the procedure.
This morning I got knee injections. This is a fairly new procedure that is supposed to lubricate your knees and it may last a few years or not at all. I am not sure what it is composed of, either mandarin slime, STP, protein skimmer effluent or ground up sea cucumbers. You get an injection in each knee for three weeks and hopefully I will be able to do back flips after it takes effect. I can do them now, but only once.
The injections themselves are not the most comfortable thing but his nurse was sort of a Supermodel so I couldn't scream or anything. As a matter of fact, I told him to push the thing in harder as I couldn't feel it.
It's a Man thing and I am sure she was impressed. I really didn't scream until I was all the way down the block.

 

[Cdiggy]

Heard great things about those shots. Supposed to repair tears and all kinds of stuff. No one guy that had his shoulder done. Doc said he was done and didn't need the other 2 which is good because they were $500 a piece out of pocket. Hope they work for you!

 

[Paul B]

I have had 3 shoulder and 3 knee operations but that all comes from working construction for 40 years. If you don't wear out your joints, you are not working hard enough. This morning the shots seem to be working although they are supposed to take some time, like 9 days. I also have only had one shot in each knee so far but I think I will be doing those back flips any day now. The shots didn't cost me anything except the co pay. I can't wait to get the rest of them. Maybe I could get them in my shoulders, ears, hands, elbows, toes, neck, and back. If they worked, that would bring you right back to when you were a teenager, acne and all. Dance

 

[Paul B]

Today I picked up a pair of bluestriped pipefish. I like to keep a pair of them in my tank but they have a short lifespan of only a few years and it is sometimes hard to find a pair together so when I see them, I buy them. These look a little young which is fine and they should start mating in a few weeks. They eat well in my tank because they get new born brine shrimp every day from the feeder that was designed for the mandarins and scooter bleenies. I may also get a couple of ruby red scooter bleenies as a store here has about 20 of them and they are fairly cheap.

 

[redfishbluefish]

I too have shoot knees. I've had both operated on about six years ago....but they are still on the way out. I'm pretty sure what you had injected was hyaluroran (rooster comb material), that typically requires 3 to 5 visits. It works well but only last between 6 months to a year, dependent on how much more abuse you beat your knees. Best of luck...and keep up updated.

 

[Paul B]

It's only knees. In a few years I would like me to get some of those good, new knees. Maybe two of those aluminum jobs as I don't want those cheap wooden ones because we have termite problems here on Long Island.

I found some pictures of my tank from 9 years ago.

 

[Paul B]

Here are the bluestripe pipefish at the feeder.

And the possum wrasse sneaks by also.

 

[Paul B]

Last night I was watching TV (no Sissy reality shows or anything like that) and my reef is next to my couch. I looked over at the tank and got the horrors.
The water had the same visibility as the East River that passes Manhattan. It was white with detritus. Then I noticed the problem. The copperband was having a rumble with the fireclown. Those two never got along and both grew up in the tank, but the fireclown is over 20 years old and the copperband is only a couple of years old so he is in better shape, but the clown is more experienced, has more friends and is meaner. The copperband grew a little large for the 6' tank and he likes to take long swims completely around the tank while the fireclown is a home body and just wants to lay in his Grand Marnier bottle and entice the female who is a real Babe, but she is a tease.
This time, the copperband took a short cut which took him practically into the Grand Marnier bottle and the clown went berserk. He was hissing and snarling while the copperband was pointing his dorsal spines at him, they spun around and dug a big hole out of the gravel, detritus was everywhere and it looked like the snow storm we had a few weeks ago. The rest of the fish just sat and watched in awe, waiting for a nice amphipod to become dislodged from the ruckus. Both fish emerged unscathed but I could tell they were both out for blood. Everything is calmed down now and I think they are waiting for me to leave as I can see the copperband sneaking up in the dark behind the bottle. There are some dark places in my tank where there are no torch corals and the copperband knows these places.
The bluestriped pipefish are staying on the far side of the tank as they don't have much defense from these two, larger fish and most of the hermit crabs are staying inside their shells. No one seems to know when another rumble will begin or who will come out victorious.

 

[Paul B]

I think a murder has been committed in my tank. I can't find one of my bluestripe pipefish and one of my dragon faced pipefish. There are only two things that could have happened. One, my cat ate them, and I don't have a cat. And two, a crab grew very large and attacked them. I am going with #2. On a few occasions in the past I have found large crabs that were either local or tropical. In the summer I add large amounts of amphipods, copepods and whatever else is in the mud I throw in there and sometimes a local blue claw or Japanese Shore crab gets through. Any blue claw crabs I would see as they swim, but the Japanese Shore crabs hide under rocks and pipefish are on their menu. Now I have to make a crab trap. I have all sorts of traps that I make depending on what I am trying to catch. If I have a pipefish eating crab, it would probably be larger than an inch and ugly. I don't know why, but the uglier the crab is, the more likely they are to eat your pipefish. I like my pipefish and hate it when crabs eat them. There isn't much room in my tank for a trap and if something is hiding in there it would be in the back where I can't get to. Luckily, I am still a little bit smarter than a crab so I will come up with something as this is what gives purpose to my life. That and Supermodels, you can't have to many of those.

Is this reef safe?

 

[Cdiggy]

Not only is it not reef safe, it's illegal!!! Now if it were just an inch or so bigger....