As you may have remember me mentioning when I talked about my new home, we were left with an aquarium downstairs. Four fish - Fugly, Pucker, Lindsay and Frank, who were named by Marlon, Fatima, Marilyn and Claudine. For a while I had no idea what two of them were - they were big, flat silver fish. Later, Dave's cousin Vinnie, who now is my cousin Vinnie (*giggles*) told me they were silver dollars. The other two I thought were goldfish. But after going to the pet store and seeing others fish like it in a tank saying 'Parrot Fish', I'm not too sure anymore. But I went online, and looked up the care of parrot fish, and no, my two fish are NOT parrot fish. After many trips to the Long Beach aquarium, I remembered what parrot fish look like.

I've always loved pets, but have never been great at taking care of them. That's what sisters are for. So now, I've noticed that there's a weird brown growth on some of the artificial plants in the tank. After some online searching, I've discovered that this is brown algae, flourishing because I haven't cleaned out some of the water - something I'm supposed to do every 2 weeks or so. Damn, isn't that what a filter is for? I guess not. I'm pretty clueless with this aquarium stuff.

After a little research (I'm really good at research) I went out and bought some water testing strips to check out the nitrate, nitrite, ph and hard water levels in my tank (there's an all in one strip - isn't that neat?) and I discovered that my poor fishies' nitrate levels are at the max level for nitrates. Which is caused by poor water levels and too much waste. Eew. Conditions which make it like Disneyland for algae.

So today is my day off, my day alone (Dave is on call). I've bought some books, a siphon, gravel cleaner, and some other things which will aid me in my quest to save my fishes' lives. It won't be easy, mind you. The fish tank is built into the wall, so it makes it pretty difficult to maneuver in the secret room behind the tank, which is where I must go to do my dirty work. I'm worried that I might freak out the poor little guys, but you gotta do what you gotta do to save lives!

Wish me luck!