After typing this, my AC started having issues 1-2 hours later. Had to shut it off overnight until now. I hate this thread. I hate this person. It was only around 100 yesterday.
This thread is like Ringu. I'm about to crawl OUT of the fridge... (I’m only daring to post in it b/c our house doesn’t have any AC for the evil spirits to knock out.)
Are you kidding me? You moron, it's hot!!! lol jk. I actually did... it was in the 80's at night, but with a fan on, it was alright... maybe a bit too warm, but I survived.
We replaced the central AC and heat, the duct work and the vents, everything about 3-4 years ago. Got a special gizmo that zaps the allergens, viruses and whatnot before the air heads towards the vents. Cost a bloody fortune, but after having the original setup for 25 years, we went berserk. Now our electric bill is half our water bill. That's City of Austin Utilities for you. We get electricity from an area coop, but City of Austin water after we were annexed about 20 years ago. Sure, we would have had a low electric bill regardless, but the city utilities are crazy expensive.
No, in Louisiana that's what they call those big wooden air conditioners that have recirculating water running down inside, assuming they still exist. I called them water coolers. About 3 blocks from our house, back in the Fifties, someone had a huge water cooler in their backyard. They lived on a corner lot and it was just inside their fence. It was about the size of a VW van standing on one end. I used to stop and stare at it from time to time. The thing fascinated me. Perhaps it slipped into my subconscious, later leading me to purchase aquariums and keep fish. By the way, I have a huge empty aquarium in my garage. Well, not all that huge. 90 gallons.
It's hot on my block, somebody turn the fan on I've been paid, I'm just tryin' to turn my mans on And get my bread strong, streets miss me when I'm gone I "Put On" for my city like Jeezy's song Please believe me homes, matter fact check my stats I ain't drop in three years, but I'm back Where the money at? That's the first question You better pack a strap, that's the first lesson Hard times got the whole United States stressin' I'm writin' a book, "How to Survive in a Recession" Mr. Obama, we so tired of sellin' crack If you lookin' for me ask the streets where I'm at
It's 24"x36" and quite tall, with a wooden stand and top. The stand itself is rather tall. All too tall and too deep from front to back for me to work on these days. I'm not as flexible as I once was. I used to have a 6' 135 gal. tank on a nice wrought iron stand, but that was years ago. It was a beautiful tank, with large schools of Congo Tetras (3 doz.) and Clown Loaches (2 doz.), a smaller school of Cardinal Tetras (about 20), as well as dwarf Central American cichlids, some odds and ends, with an Eheim and undergravel filter with powerheads, all producing a good current the schools of fish enjoyed. I considered it a semi-aggressive tank. Mostly they got along, aside from the occasional murder. The Congo's scatter their eggs, which they did more than once. The Cardinals considered it food. Big mistake. I was sitting, watching the tank one evening while still in Houston, the Congo's breeding, when a few of the Cardinals dared to go for the eggs. A male Congo over 4.5" plus a long feather on it's tail swooped in and took a Cardinal by the head, and after a struggle getting it down, ate the damn thing. I sat there with my mouth open. That Congo's mouth never quite closed the same way again, but he lived a long time, for a tetra. The Cardinals left them alone after that, but I didn't have a breeder tank large enough to breed the Congo's. It was impossible without one. I had a couple of smaller tanks for breeding the dwarf cichlids. I moved from Houston to Austin in 1980 and moved the tank with some help from friends, and actually managed to successfully move most of the fish. That was a job. After a disaster while on vacation in the early '90's, an outlet tube managing to slip off, spraying most of a bookshelf of SF classics I'd had for 25-30 years, emptying dozens of gallons of water on the floor and killing the fish, I sold the tank and decided to get back in the hobby after the kids were grown and out of the house. Some of the clown loaches were well over 15 years old. I had had them that long, and some were large when I bought them. Damn near killed me. That happened, and after putting it off for a few years, I bought this tank. It was going into a small room I use as an office. Sort of crowded. Desk, PC and monitor, speakers, several bookshelves, photos and things from traveling, so I thought a smaller tank would be a good idea. A mistake on my part.
I've had to deal with 4 AC issues in the past few months at our 4 properties. Had to replace one. Get the fan and motor fixed on another. The circuit board on another. And a simple cleaning of the drain line on the other.
As I was speaking to the guy fixing the third problem, my granddaughter, who rents a house from us in Florida, messaged me saying the rental house AC wasn't working. I yelled a few choice expletives. Fortunately it was the easiest one to fix.
That’s a great story. Keeping an aquarium is very rewarding and one of the few things I don’t get bored watching. I use ehiem for most of my tanks. Great filters that you rarely have to touch. I love those clown loaches. I met a guy when I lived in DFW that built a 400 gallon acrylic river tank for his clown loaches. It was massive- 12x4x4 (I think). I traded some clowns to him for an eheim. That thing really inspired me. I tend to convert small vases or cookie jars into small tanks with live plants. I’ve come to enjoy it so much that I keep the tanks more for the greenery than anything else. I was getting into discus when I moved back to Houston. I had six and none of them survived the move. That was the last time I spent a lot of money on fish. Now I keep a massively overgrown 72 gallon bow front with whatever tetras are on sale. Im currently setting up a 16 gallon biorb acrylic sphere for brackish water Hawaiian Opae Ula shrimp. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for about 10 years and the time is right. Luckily for me the best seller for these things in Texas lives in Pearland. If I ever get organized with my pics I’ll start an aquarium thread.