Creuzer – Page 191 – Random things Creuzer

Why?

Why would somebody take a photo of this? It is an exersize machine. There isn’t some sexy athlete on it. Just an exercize machine and a box and some other junk in a corner.

Mom, why would you then SEND this photo that you took to your son? What is so special about it? You never said what I am supposed to get out of this photo.

The coolest feature on these digital camera is that little delete button so you can remove a photo before you get the urge to send some random image to your son. You could save people HOURS of torment trying to decipher some hidden meaning. Are you saying that I should get one?

I just don’t get it.

Why?

My sister is moving! Well, she has moved already if you want to get technical about it.

She moved from LaCrosse down to Milwaukee. She got a new job and a new apartment in Grafton I believe it is.

Good luck to you sis! Best wishes in your new endevours.s

Yet another reason….

why I dislike Microsoft.

[begin rant]

Amy bought an XBox over a year ago, right? I bought a controller that came with a headset and a free trial to XBox Live. I thought I would give it a go. I put in the card, and it needed a credit card to activate the service. I had THOUGHT I had selected to NOT automatically bill me.

I no longer have access to the console. It was never mine, it was Amy’s it has been in STORAGE for 4 months now.

I get my bank statement, and I am billed $49.95 or something like that. Ok, not a problem, I give them a call, and get it sorted out. WRONG. They must be using windows on their phone system. I call the phone number that is part of the charge. I fuss with their menu system, the computer tells me that it could take a while do to high call volume, and prompts me for my selection. I make my selection, and it starts go to into the next set of options and beep beep beep beep – they hang up on me. I try it again, same thing. By now I know the dialing sequence, so I jump the menus and get another layer deep into the menu before I get hung up on.

I go back and see if I had been billed before. I had, I got billed a year ago. I paid for a year of service I never used. Moral, check your bank statements carefully. Anyhow, I call THAT phone number as it is different then on the more recent charge. The computer answers, says it is MSN something rather or another, utters the usual gibberish in a foreign language to select that other language. The computer then hangs up on me, mid gibberish.

ENOUGH

You charging me for a service I never used AT LEAST ANSWER THE BLOODY PHONE. Heaven knows I PAID for it.

[/end rant]

My Planted Aquarium

Please forgive me that this post is reading backwards. I am still trying to figure out all these new-fangled tools. A few friends of mine have been buying plants for their tanks, and I thought I would toss in my 2 cents worth. I have had a planted tank for about 3 years now maybe? It is a 29 gallon tank that I had traded a 20 gallon tank for. The 29 had split a seem, and I knew I could fix it.

I did a lot of research on aquaculter when I set my newly repaired tank up. I have about 4 inches of substrate at the bottom of the tank. I know this is about 2 times what people suggest, but, hey, I got the 2 different sizes of rock on sale when I got the bigger bags. I mixed the 40 pounds of rock with a clay product called Laterite (sp?). The Laterite gives the plant roots something to cozy up to besides all that cold, hard rock. Actually, it provides the roots with a steady source of chiliated iron, which makes for healthy plants.

I am also doing something new (for me) with the tank. I am treating the tank with a “black water” additive. I happen to really like the nice, warm feeling of my “dirty” tea colored water. It probably has something to do with working on the St. Croix River for many years. I am just fond of nice, clean, brown water. I think the fish look better in it. I think the plants grow better in it. I think YOUR planted tank looks so…. Hospital Waiting Room, with it’s crystal clear water. Oh, speaking of crystal clear planted tank water, you don’t want to charcoal filter your planted tank. This removes all the nutrients and such that your plants need to stay healthy.

The proof is in the pudding as they say. Here you can see the Amazon sword plant that I bought over 2 years ago (I think it now numbers 7 or 8). I have to trim back the plant every month or so or it completely dominates the tank. I have recently moved to a new place, and heavily pruned the plant back. I had taken the plant out and devided it. I then put all my new, little plants in a bucket. I moved the tank and left the bucket at the old place. The plants where NOT happy about spending 3 days in the bucket hotel. They died back about 50% after I got them into their new home. Another heavy pruning, a little TLC, and my CO₂ injecting system has them in good health after a few months.

Here is where I run the hose from my CO₂ bottles into my Eheim canister filter. The canister filter holds the CO₂ in the water for a lot longer than any other way I know of. This greatly helps getting the CO₂ to diffuse into the water. I used one of the nipples that come with the really thin air hose to splice it with the thicker hoses. I drilled a small hole in the center ot the green plastic sheild and stuck the nipple into the filter pickup. The canister filter pump breaks up the bubbles into tiny little bubbles that stay in the tank for a while even after they are pumped back into it.