How this Geezer did it in the beginning

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Yesterday I took my 4 $1,000.00 Koi back to the store for the winter. They are actually 10 cent goldfish but no one knows that so I can say to the neighbors they are Koi. :fish2:
I make sure to buy the multi colored goldfish so they look like Koi. I bring them back to the store because my "Koi" pond is only about 10" deep and the "Koi" would freeze solid in the winter. Next year I will again buy some 10 cent "Koi" to impress my neighbors. In those 4 months they double in size.
I felt bad leaving them in the store in a tank, they looked so sad to be in a small tank instead of their "Koi" pond. They even believe they are Koi because I fed them Koi food. :smokin:
I also had some Very rare and expensive "African, tree frogs" (who were really just 20 cent toads) They were just in there to eat any mosquito larvae anyway. :facepalm:
 
Lol Paul.

They, make pond heaters to keep them from freezing.... Not sure it would work in only ten inches though. Handy guy like you, I'm sure would've invented something or changed something with the pond by now if you felt it was worth while... But hey if you run out of ideas, there's one for you!
 
I wouldn't even have to get that crazy, an air pump would keep the thing from freezing solid but it is in my back yard and is a very small pond. I don't go back there in the winter as it is sometimes covered in snow. I will go for the 40 cents a year to buy new goldfish, er, I mean Koi.

I think I fixed the problem with my gravity fed ATO line being clogged with bubbles. I installed a second line from the same bucket and put a Tee fitting right at my fill valve on the tank. The second line has a tiny powerhead on it in the bucket. That powerhead is on a timer and will run a few minutes every day which should purge the tubing of bubbles. The system is still gravity fed because I don't like depending on pumps for anything important but the pump will just run water through the tube and back to the bucket. I will know in a few weeks if it is working or not. If not, I may need a slightly more powerful powerhead as the one I am using is tiny and the tubing is 1/8" so there is a lot of resistance. :smokin:
 
Paul B said:
I wouldn't even have to get that crazy, an air pump would keep the thing from freezing solid but it is in my back yard and is a very small pond. I don't go back there in the winter as it is sometimes covered in snow. I will go for the 40 cents a year to buy new goldfish, er, I mean Koi.

I think I fixed the problem with my gravity fed ATO line being clogged with bubbles. I installed a second line from the same bucket and put a Tee fitting right at my fill valve on the tank. The second line has a tiny powerhead on it in the bucket. That powerhead is on a timer and will run a few minutes every day which should purge the tubing of bubbles. The system is still gravity fed because I don't like depending on pumps for anything important but the pump will just run water through the tube and back to the bucket. I will know in a few weeks if it is working or not. If not, I may need a slightly more powerful powerhead as the one I am using is tiny and the tubing is 1/8" so there is a lot of resistance. :smokin:
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Paul,
Keep us posted on this and if it works can you post some pics?
 
Thank God I am retired and I don't have to waste all that time working any more. That was fifty years of my life that I can forget. (40 as an electrician) But there were some interesting times, one that I thought about last night. About 2:15 this morning for some stupid reason this guy popped into my head. Lets call him Tony. Oh wait, that's his real name, so I will call him Jack to protect his privacy.
Jack was completely bald, more so than I am but at that time I had Einstein hair. Him and I were working together on a motorized scaffold so we had to stand close to each other. One day Jack comes in with a full wig on. Not one of those little Frank Sinatra or William Shatner wigs, but a "full" wig. It looked like he took an ice cream scoop and hollowed out a raccoon and put it on his head. Jack was so bald that he didn't even have eyebrows, but it didn't matter because this thing went down to his eyes. If it was 1/2" lower, he also could have used it for eyelashes.
So anyway, bald Jack comes in wearing this dead animal and starts working like I am not going to notice. It was like if you are in a bare room, with nothing in it but you, and all of a sudden Big Foot is standing in front of you wearing a coon skin cap doing the Macarana.
I mean you can't make this stuff up. So i didn't say anything because he didn't and I went about my work. When I spoke to him, I couldn't look right at him because he looked so much like a cross between a bad Elvis Presley impressionist and Peppi Le Pew. I kept expecting him to break out in a rendition of Jail House Rock. So for the rest of my time there jack wore that wig and no one said anything. One more thing about Jack. He was dating our bookkeeper, who had nine kids. Nine. :wavehand:
 
In the early days of this hobby we didn't make as much money as many of us do now, but salt water was brand new so everything was very expensive. Almost everything was made for freshwater and rusted badly in salt water.
In those days, the early 70s I was an apprentice electrician bringing home $52.00 a week. (That is not a misprint). The minimum wage was $1.25 an hour and that is what I made. So fish and equipment was hard to buy on that type of salary, especially if you were married like I was in 1974 and had to pay rent.
(I think I posted this story so If I did, don't read it again, just close your eyes and hum for 10 minutes or watch Dancing with the Stars)
But then, like now making money was easy, as long as you were a little smarter than the next guy. If I had to depend on my salary, I would have had to eat dog food, and I didn't have a dog. But there were ways to earn money. One way I made money was to buy a Willy's Jeep with a plow.
Willy's was the company that make Jeeps for the US Army.
I bough one for $700.00 from a school. They used it to plow the snow around the school. My wife was furious at me for spending all that money on this, "not real good looking" vehicle. It needed a lot of work so I had to do a full engine job with pistons, rings, valves etc. I did all that in a couple of days. Then one Monday everyone in New York woke up to 18" of snow that was not predicted. New York was covered and nothing was moving as in 1974, there were no 4 wheel drives unless you had a Jeep.
I was working in the Chrysler Building in Manhattan and subways were not running. I got in my Jeep and plowed the Grand Central Parkway the 18 miles to the Chrysler Building and I parked on the sidewalk in front of the Building. All of Long Island followed me in. I went inside to a phonebooth. Yes a phoonbooth and called my office. They told me I was nuts and to go home.
I then plowed the Grand Central parkway all the way home and started to find customers. I got home that night and my new wife thought I was just out having fun all day in the snow. She said, "How much did you make $15.00" I had my Army jacket on and the pockets were full of fives and tens. I pulled out about $1,400.00 (or $1,800.00) and threw it on the bed.
We both jumped in the pile of money and threw it all over the place. It doesn't sound like a lot of money, but at that time
That was about 14 weeks salary.
Then every time it snowed, I did very well until 4 wheel drives were common and everyone was plowing snow. I sold that Jeep for the same $700.00 I paid for it.

 
That gray panel under the door of the Jeep was from a radiator cover in the Chrysler cover. I had to fix some rot. The floor was a 1/4" thick piece of diamond plate and the gas tank I took from a boat and put it behind the seat.In the back was 200lbs of elevator weights.
 
That thing was a Willy's Jeep. There never was a stronger vehicle than a Willys. It was just built for work and nothing else as it was lousy on a highway. In low range in first gear it would only go about 4 MPH but it would go through walls or climb up them.
I could push snow drifts that were 7' high. The snow would go over the plow and over the roof but you could not slow down that Jeep. I once hit a concrete bench buried in the snow. I almost went through the window (no seat belts then) and I broke the welds on the plow, but the Jeep didn't stop.
It could drive over any vehicle built today as everything in it was cast iron.
I later installed big tires with very thick snow chains.
 
There are not to many of them around anymore as they were all worked to death. I was amazed when I pulled apart that engine to re build it. The piston rods were about a foot long which is where all the power comes from. There is no timing chain, just 2 big steel gars with a pipe over them pouring oil on it. The valves were huge with four in the head and four in the block. The clutch looked like it was built for a large truck instead of a little Jeep. Both axles were cast iron and both were straight axels so the front axel looked like the rear axel. The front wheel gears that allowed it to go into 4 wheel drive were encased in steel housings not rubber boots like modern trucks. You could not dent the "sheet metal" that was much heavier than a truck today. They were not built for lightness or mileage.
The entire ignition system was encased in iron pipes including the ignition wires as it was built to be driven completely underwater. A snorkel kit was added on if you needed to drive it underwater. You could drive through water about 5 feet deep. Try that with a Range Rover or Toyota. :rolleyes:
The springs were leaf springs with 9 leaf's in each one so it rode like a tank with no spring at all. But you could probably put 1,000lbs in it, if you could figure out how to fit it as it was a small vehicle. I once drove it to manhattan and up a flight of cement stairs right into a building I was working in next to the UN building. I loved that thing. :dance:

Mine was the M38A1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willys_MB
 
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Hi Paul. Long-time reader of your posts, first-time post-er. You have a great sense of humor and a great writing style. You really should think about writing a book about your life, experiences, what you've learned, and your philosophy. I bet it would be a best seller and you could get a supermodel to come and sit next to you at book signings. As long as your wife is out of town.

Anyway, on to my question. How often do you dose your simple calcium and alkalinity supplements, and how much do you add? I've scoured the forums and used the search function to no avail. Thanks. Nick.
 
You really should think about writing a book about your life, experiences, what you've learned, and your philosophy. I bet it would be a best seller and you could get a supermodel to come and sit next to you at book signings. As long as your wife is out of town.
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Dr. X (if that is your real name) Thank you. I would write a book but I wouldn't learn anything from it because I know how it ends.
As for the Supermodels, I have worked with a few of them but they would not let me put the wings on the Victoria Secret Supermodels as I could not reach their shoulders, they are all like 9' tall and very skinny. I saw three of them once shareing an M&M. But it was an M&M peanut so they had some left over.
My wife (who also looks like a Supermodel) actually points out good looking girls to me. Maybe she is trying to tell me something. But we have a great marriage and she knows there are very few Supermodels who date retired electrician fish Geeks, even though they could make a flat screen TV out of two coconut shells and a dead frog.

I dose about 4 ozs of that calcium and baking soda a few times a week but I usually forget, then I double up. I use one of those tubes that that aquarium 2 part Epoxy comes in for the measurement and it looks like 2 ounces will fit in there. As I said many times, I am not really exact on too many things where it doesn't really matter. I mean, if I am not testing anyway, what difference does it make how much I am adding? I do get the water tested occasionally, maybe twice a year in an LFS. They like to buy those test kits so I use theirs.
My calcium and alk seems fine and the fish and corals don't seem to mind so it must be fine. I know most people frown on my testing procedures but those same people would never add mud, NSW, ice melter or baking soda to their tanks. And some of them just have a natural frown all the time. I strive for healthy animals and right now, for this minute my creatures are as healthy as they could be. Virtually all my fish are spawning except the copperband. (I would say he was also spawning but I didn't think I could get away with it) I still need to get out to the ocean and get some water as it has been way to long but with Christmas (which is also my birthday):hb2: and my Grand Son who is due like today, it has been to hectic. I babysit occasionally because my Daughter is not in great shape being very pregnant and my wife works to keep me living in the lap of luxury as I do. :facepalm:
I spend very little time on the tank and I don't have to vacuum, test, quarantine, clean dosers, pumps, powerheads or any of that stuff, I am not sure why. Well I don't have dosers and my pumps are so old and detritus has a hard time sticking to aged wood. :confused:
I got a $100.00 gift certificate for Christmas, or my Birthday, I forget, but it is for a LFS. I don't know if I want a coral or a fish, I have to many fish and no real place to put a nice coral, but I will figure it out as I don't really need $100.00 worth of worms.
I found two fish in my tank that I thought disappeared months ago and I thought they were history. One is a tiny, bright red gobi of some kind who lives in a bottle and the other one is some type of watchman gobi but it could be a grouper as I can't get a good look at it and I totally forgot when, or even if I bought the thing. :fish2:
I removed the evil bio pellets as some of my corals croaked when I was in Hawaii and some places on my SPS bleached. Since I removed the pellets most of the corals re grew and the rest are on the mend. The LPS are really expanding and I could tell they are very happy. The empty bio pellet reactor is still in there and I may fill it with colored pieces of plastic or fake fish as I think it is a cool looking thing, although useless. I will probably re make it into either a vacuum cleaner, can opener or toaster. :eek:

Christmas Eve was great as I am sure it was for anyone else who may have made a mistake and started to read this. We (or I) am of Sicilian ancestry and we have fish on that day. We eat fish almost every day but on Christmas Eve we are noisier. We had calamari 3 different ways, octopus, scungeel, clams, a few ways, oysters, shrimp and 3 different types of fish.
When it was time for desert and my Birthday cake we had to leave because we were watching Greta, my Grand Daughter and she was getting antsy so we took my birthday cake home with us. On Christmad day we took the cake and brought it to my Daughters in lower Manhattan for Christmas dinner with the rest of the family. Just as dinner was about to be served, my wife got sick with a fever and we left. I just about got her home and she got real sick and had a fairly high temperature. She is much better now, but I still have not seen my birthday cake which is still in Mahnattan. So far, my cake had a better time than I did.
Happy New Year. :celeb3:





I painted Teddy's name on the wall as he should be here any time now.



This was probably 8 years ago. But she still is a Supermodel.

 
Is this witty dry humor sort of a common thing between guys like us?
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There is no place for humor in this serious and austere hobby. :dance:
That is the problem, this is a hobby and not that important. It's not like we are sewing those tags on stuffed animals that say "Do not to remove under penalty of the law" or placing the wings on Victoria Secret models or even making those little plastic things that are on the tips of shoe laces so you can get the thing through the hole in your shoe. We are keeping fish. For hundreds of thousands of years people just ate fish. Now we are trying to keep them alive when they were perfectly happy, and alive in the sea minding their own business. Fish are all over the place in the bible. Remember when they were walking through the desert eating Mrs. Pauls Fish Sticks? Mrs Paul was Saint Pauls Mother. (That is how he became a fisherman, or was he a carpenter? I know he wasn't an electrician) Now we get crazier than Justin Bieber's groupies.
I know people really love their fish, name them, put them in their will, get tattooe's of them etc. But they are basically food that we want to keep alive. It is the same thing as trying to keep a Hostess Twinkie alive, only a little harder.
Many of us keep a tank as a thing of beauty. Some of us should get a girlfriend, I'm just saying.:rolleye1: I love this hobby as much as anyone, but I realize it is a hobby and we are not building space shuttles. :sad2:
Some people (no one on here I'm sure) take this "hobby" much to seriousely. spend way to much money on it and worry to much. Just my opinion of course as I want to be PC although I realize I rarely am.:rolleye1:
To me there are far more important things in life even though I still care for my tank. But if my wife gets sick or my Grand kid, I will leave the tank in a minute, even if the heater is broken, there are red bugs, black ich, flukes, flounders, bryopsis the PO4 is off the scale and the scale is broken, the hermit crab is making love to the hippo tang and it is 8 below zero outside with the stock market crashing. We need priorities. I think I have them. (I just turned around to look at my tank. I am on a swivel chair, the tank looks fine so now I can go about my business, whatever that is as I am retired) :dance:
So to end this rather ridiculous post. I bid you good night.
If I offended anyone, get over it, it is not that important.
References:
Me
 
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