Well, I haven’t posted for a few because I find that I’ve bored even myself with all the Ph and water talk.  My Ph, my weight, and my overall feeling of wellness is unchanged.  I don’t like going to get water gallons filled, and I am thinking of giving my experiment up.  I have had no symptoms of any detox from drinking the magic water, and even though I wanted to do this experiment for a month, I just don’t know that it’s even worth driving out of town every three days to have gallons of water refilled.  It bothers me to drink water from a big plastic jug, too, by the way.  I like getting my water from the tap.  I haven’t made my decision with 100% certainty yet, but I will be out of water tonight so I have to decide tomorrow.  Besides, as I stated, all this water talk made me think of my fish bowl.

So instead of blogging, we’ve been getting the fish tank going.  Going forward, let it be known as Basement Finishing Project Number One.  And when I say we, I mostly mean my husband.  Right now we’re in the construction phase, which involves power tools, and measuring, and difficult stuff you have to be strong for.  I am not strong.  I used to be strong, but I am no longer.  I’m the designated assistant.  Assistants do stuff like find and hand over the tools, hold things up while they’re being screwed in, hold the end of the two by four when it’s being cut, give approving thumbs up signals sometimes, and tell him all the OTHER things we should do with the basement.  You know, when Project Number One is done.  This will be a whole new place when I’m finished with it.

In case I didn’t mention the size, my fish bowl is 190 gallons.  It measures 5′ x 30″ x 24″.  It looks a little something like this currently:

Well, actually the water is much clearer since I took that picture.  The blue wood is the stand that we made for it a couple of years ago when we originally purchased the tank on Craig’s List and planned this project.  We painted it with some epoxy waterproofing paint.  There is a tray in the bottom that is sealed with a silicon sealant so that if the wet/dry filter ever overflows (God forbid) we’re covered without flooding the place.  One of my husband’s many ingenious ideas found on this project.  He also built a wet/dry filtration system from our old 55 gallon tank, plumbed all of the PVC, and is currently building the room around the tank.

We placed the tank so that it would enable us to create a little room around it to house the equipment and accessories.  It also encloses the rough in for the sink that was sticking out of the concrete floor of the basement.  See?  We’re problem solvers around here!  The builders put it in for a basement bar, but they didn’t leave enough space behind it to actually put in a bar!  So it has been sticking up out of the concrete, unused, since 1978.  Obviously a drain and sink are very useful in the world of fish keeping, so it’s like the silver lining that just won’t quit.  Enclosing it will also quiet the sounds of the water and the pump and such.  We don’t want to hear the tank, just see the fish.  We also didn’t want a commercially available stand because they’re ugly.  When the wall and room are completed, this tank will be framed out like a picture, or a window, and the framing will have gypsum painted walls just like the rest of the basement.  To the side, there is a double door into the room that we picked up at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore.  We would like to find some brass fish door handles for the double door, but haven’t come across them quite yet.  I plan on everything about this project being very cool, just so you know.

I hope fish like live music, because the drums are very near by and band practice is at our house!