Missing the bus & my adventure throughout the day :D

Public transit 101

Oh the joys of Not so public transit. Without any notice, the 502 to Aldergrove doesn't show up. after a nice 25 minute wait, being 9 minutes early for the bus, none show up. at 10:15 the bus FINALLY shows up. although it's not going to Aldergrove. so i sit and wait. and wait. and wait. for the next bus to come. which takes forever, and leaves me with a nice window of 2.5 hours till the next bus. nice eh? so here  i sit at the Aldergrove water park,  having just run into an old friend from Abbotsford, Heidi. And i know what your thinking as you read this. WHAT DOES IT HAVE TO DO WITH PETS!!! well let me tell you. Heidi &  Will have the MOST ADORABLE PUPPY IN THE ENTIRE WORLD. it is the most affectionate puppy i have ever met. imideatly, without hesitation,  rolled over and demanded belly rubs. and when i stopped, she  decided to try her hand at convincing me to bestow more tummy rubbing love on her in the way of over-zealously licking my feet. HOW ADORABLE!!!!  So i guess my bus not showing up was a blessing in  disguise, because i get to write this wonderful post about old friends and their pets. and vent about how  he park washroom here has a mighty bug infestation. HOW AM I SUPPOST TO WASH MY HANDS WHEN BEATLES ARE FALLING INTO MY NECK... not 1, not 2, but 3 bloody beetles. and all the girls in the next washroom are hearing is my profane and soprano screaming as i try to get them off me.(i hate beetles.) Too bad the pool wasn't operational, cause i could definitly use a dip in the pool hehe. and it's so  CHEAP!!!


AND because i know my mom never reads this(at least i think) i do have an admonition to make. i LOVE Aldergrove. from the farm air, to the beautiful parks, downtown Aldergrove is truly a beauty. EVEN the lack of shopping venues are ok with me. because i can hop on a bus, and in minutes, be in Abbotsford, where the BIGGEST MALL IN BC is being built right now. HOW COOL IS THAT? by now i'm sure you all know how much i LOVE SHOPPING!!!. so it must come as no surprise that Abbotsford has a certain apeal now that theres going to be WICKED shopping to be done there. In fact, if i could find a pet friendly apartment
there, within the right price range, and one that would allow my birds, cats, dog, and ALL my fish, i'd be there in a heartbeat. Not to mention light rapid  transit would be a plus. how cool would it be to get from Abbotsford to New West in 25 minutes? Well i'm going to get back to my movie, and the long wait for that
bloody bus. I'm watching The Lovely Bones right now and i must say, i'm Very impressed. it's well written story, and nice balance of Spiritual/Reality. the blending of the two worlds is very nice. whats also nice is the
water park and the nice breeze bringing wisps of cool moisture my way. Very nice :D Anyways, back to my

movie :D
Draft Saved : 1:24pm 8/21/2010

Well I've finished watching the Lovely Bones now, & i have to admit it was AMAZING... It had enough thrill factor, had enough gushy parts, moments that made me tear up. Peter Jackson did an inspiring job at finishing the film. It tied all the loose ends up, unlike some of the other movies I've watched recently. A+++++x100000. Seriously, you have to see it! and i'll stop gushing over the movie now. hehe. Well i'm sitting at Timmies, South Fraser & Gladwin street Abbotsford. And like mentioned before, since my mom Rarely has time to read this, i won't hesitate to admit, i wanna live back here. i truly miss Abbotsford. only because it's so close knit, for a huge city, it feels like everything just a short walk away, the malls & shopping are all on one street, or just off it, and the area is just fantastic.


Anyways, i'm going to finish up on here, then head to a pay phone to see whats keeping Linda(Lisa's mom) since i mentioned 4pm. (as i reminisce about Lisa being late or never showing. haha sorry Lisa :P <3 ya
I think i might head to Petcetera while i'm in Abbotsford today :D

Well I've got maybe 30 minutes left on my laptop battery, might as well get in an episode of SATC :D I'll be sure to give an update as to how the Scentsy show went !!!!

Pet Solutions Pt II

Petsolutions was a bust. As i sat at my computer desk today, looking at a bird cage & some plants(Aquatic) i was forced into the realization that their products are cheap, but USPS Shipping is NOT. almost 40 $ Shipping for a filter. Pfft. so not impressed. And to top it all off, Pet Solutions can't ship LIVE ANYTHING over the boarder. i tried to see how much Brine Shrimp would cost after tax & shipping and all that, and it aint gonna happen. they can't ship living things. how sad is that? back to the drawing board. Gotta find me some brine shrimp. my fish LOVED live food.

Although pet solutions is a GREAT!!! site, for Canadians looking for Fantastic deals on aquatic related supplies, i suggest big Al's & Pacific Aquatics in surrey. I've also heard good reviews about Rogers on scott road.(surrey again)

PetSolutions.com

Who else has never heard of this place? i decided to click one of my ads on here, for "THE BEST DEAL FISH TANKS." well, one of them caught my eye. well two. but i'll talk about that one later :P

after a few clicks, i ended up on Www.petsolutions.com , A Walmart of pets web-store. i think whats more interesting about this site is the prices AND selection. although it's no Big Als or Petsmart, the selection is unbeatable. When i go to petsmart, i want to see what I'm buying. even tho it's through a computer screen. well at pet solutions, i can see EVERYTHING. there is always multiple pictures of whats for sale.


AND they have WICKED selection of Fresh & Saltwater fish. But wait. i haven't come to the best part yet :D


THIS IS THE FIRST STORE I HAVE FOUND IN MONTHS THAT SELLS LIVE BRINE SHRIM:P!!!! now my cichlids & Tropical tanks can enjoy the wonders of LIVE food. :D so exciting.


Tropical fish wise, they have THE BRIGHTEST fish i have ever seen. most of the fish come from award winning breeders, like their Discus & cichlids. which i think is awesome. when i order my first batch of fish from there, I'll let you guy's N gal's know how they are :D

Dog grooming Part II

Well Laura and mom did a good job, She looked so good. Im not sure if Laura took pictures or not, but if they did i'll throw a few up in a bit.

So with multiple break-in's in the apartment building, I'm going to spend my day sitting at this desk making sure no one tries to nail a screw driver through my lock & Handle. (How wonderful. i spend 3 years telling everyone that my apartment is awesome aside from a not so nice landlord/owner, and that it's not typical Whalley, and what happens, we have drug dealers move in next door, & friends/neighbors get broken into. BUT a good note to this all, Neither neighbors pets got hurt.(I'd be super sad if kitties got hurt.)

Dog grooming

Well today Laura & I get to tackle a neighbors dog. she is one of those puppies that instantly gets matted just by looking at her. Laura hasn't had much experience with dogs, she's just practicing. But she tackled Maggies dog, and she turned out well :) so hopefully this one is good :D I'll ad pictures & More info later, Migraines & Bright computer screens don't mix well.

Big Al's Pet store(ONLINE) Possible Filter review & HEXAGON HOOD(FINALLY!!!)

In my quest to utilize some PayPal bucks that I've accumulated from Live-person, i decided to give Big Al's Pet store a try.

I found their pricing to be VERY reasonable, as I've mentioned before, i'm a huge fan of petsmart, only because their pet supplies are SO CHEAP. well Big Al's is maybe 50-75 cents either way diffrence, (i'm thinking a 22lb bag of gravel) so there pretty much equal. And really, how much does it cost me to get there, and back,  Plus grabbing a coffee on the way, i end up spending like 10 bucks after I've left the house just on the trip & Food alone. How much easier is it to sit at home, in pj's, and go pet store shopping ? SUPER EASY!!!!


Lets not forget the BEST PART EVER!!!. I found a hexagon hood for my tank :D :D :D :D :D it's a plastic hood, WITH LIGHT. my tank is 17.2inches wide, the hood fits 18inches wide. the width of the panels is 10 inches, my hex is 9.8inches. so it's pretty damn close. I've been looking for a hex hood for MONTHS!!!!!. since Lorne found me my first hexagon.(yay for crappy Tenants who trash an apartment & then leave all their junk behind. *TWO THUMBS UP*) except Lorne & i had to tidy the place up. well mostly Lorne, i helped a lil bit :P


PLUS i found a few new filters i wanna give a shot. REVIEWS coming ASAP soon as i get em. they are called -            
 - Penn plax cascade 200 power filter. i eventually want to give a good review of the CANISTER filters of the same brand name, but that will be for the eventual discus tank. :D
http://www.bigalsonline.ca/BigAlsCA/ctl3664/cp17903/si1319661/cl0/pennplaxcascade200powerfilter

If anyone's had any good/bad experience with this filter, PLEASE Comment about your experience, how it was good/bad, etc. TELL ME WHAT YOU THOUGHT!!! hehe


OR let me know of a good filter to test out. (Please don't say aqueon. Please don't say aqueon. (I CAN"T STAND MINE...


Forgive the choppy nature, i'm just learning how to add photo's to the blog :D

Hexagons are FUN!!!

I decided to share my Hexagon fish tanks with the world today. I LOVE Them so much, i have a tropical and cichlid tank, and the cichlid one is still under construction, but coming along nicely :D

So I promised some of my facebook friends a picture or video update of my sisters new fish tank that  i just designed, it's not done, were still planting it, but for the most part it's looking pretty good. i still have to build the Hood for the tank, it came without a lid(YAY for petsmart's breeder tanks :D.

I bought three ghost shrimp from petsmart, they were .99Cents each, and one of them died :-( poor Invertebre's. but at .99C each, i'm not too worried about replacing it. probably stress. We got some Corkscrew plants, some caladara(did i spell that right? i hope so), Some tall Grassy plant, & of course a few "Bamboo" ish plants. I don't have the proper Fish tank lights yet, i just bought her a cheap "GLOBE" florescent light. I'm going to take the fixture into King Ed or Pacific Aquatics and get a Floramax Light bulb for her tank, & 1 i believe it's called a Grow or Glow light? it's for accenting Tropical fish colors. and of course a Black or Blue florescent light so that the tank has set day & night times. The hood should take me a few weeks to assemble and get up & running, and i might just invest in the same set up for my tank. LAURA!!! UR ONE LUCKY GURL FOR GETTING YOUR TANK DONE FOR FREE!!!! I think i deserve a shopping trip for my french dinner night. Julia Childs Beef Bouginon Mmmm

So the pictures are HOPEFULLY going to be in this post, if they don't work PLEASE let me know so i can fix it :D it's been quite some time since i've done the BLOG thing, and need to get the hang of things again :P

After mindless attempts at uploading using Bloggers upload function UNSUCCESSFULLY, I've given in and gotten myself an ImageShack account. Maybe it's Karma? maybe i'm just not ment to show the world my newest fish tank? MAYBE it's a higher power telling me to invest in some good batteries & take the damn video. Irregardless, a Fantastic set of photo's is soon to follow. Talk about redundancy? i've said pretty much the same thing three times already. but seriously, I think i'm ready to upload the  

From Fish tank(Laura's)

From Fish tank(Laura's)

From Fish tank(Laura's)

BC Exotic Bird Society` and a fish tank update :)

A very close friend of mine is a member of the BC Exotic Bird Society, a group that caters to the special birds of the world. they bring everything in from Finches to Budgies, Love birds to parrots. it's a program that does such good work within the community, what with fostering & Adopting out birds in need of a good home. a lot of people don't realize that there's a lot more to having a bird than a cage & the animal. and they usually end up getting in over their head when they learn the needs & requirements of these beautiful creatures. I was inspired to write about this because my birds, 2 lovebirds Kiwi & Mango, and a cockatiel - Big Bird.. My friend had a HUGE amount of birds and i offered to take a pair of lovebirds & the cockatiel, and fell in love with them. There the most loving companions anyone could get.




We decided to have another good friend in for tea today and Big bird was wolf whistling at her.(he was really friendly today, and i think really liked Vicki :D) Big bird was singing, whistling, and just making sure he's exceptionally loud :) He must be heard lol




And sadly, We lost another Cichlid(petsmart) and another guppy(Petsmart) And a Frog(Petsmart)...




I've come to the realization that petsmart fish aren't the greatest. I'll still buy my Shrimp from petsmart, and MOST if not ALL of my decorations, since like i've been told, they are the cheapest place for ALL DECORATIONS. even their plants. there all under 4.00$, i did Laura's tank for under 10. what i liked about the plants from petsmart , i got 3 corkscrew plants, and 1 thingy? is that a new word? it's a thingy in the tank. haha i can't remember what it's called but it's big. the corkscrews are popping up around the tank. every day i see a little bit of green coming up somewhere new. it's fantastic.




This was suppost to be a post about birds and i still managed to throw in fantastic neighbors, and fish. well i hope everyone is having a great weekend, 




B

Animals & Candles DON'T MIX!!! and my discovery of Scentsy

Well a few years ago, i decided to make my mom a room for her to relax in our rental in abbotsford. The room was pretty small so i just used it as a "SPA" room. it was very relaxing :D i was so proud of myself, had candles everywhere, had a very zen oasis for mom to relax. she was being stubborn, and decided to sit upstairs and not come down. so as i was fighting with her, one of my cats, Charlie decided to check out the room. he said "Screw the flames" and walked with confidence through each and every candle. making sure to singe his tail. by the time i got downstairs, his tail was SMOKING!!!. now these weren't good candles, they were cheap dollar store candles. lead filled crap. I assumed Charlie was just staging a protest against the crap candles. after moving to surrey tho, he decided to surprise me again, and singed himself on my nice partylite candles. even dumped a few onto the floor.(evil kitty didn't know how expensive they were).


So we've learn't that it doesn't matter how cheap or expensive the candle is, charlie is just a pyromaniac!!!. well last october i was surfing through facebook, not sure what i was looking at, but thanks to Facebook Pay/per/click ads, and a wonderful woman named Liz, i was introduced to Scentsy Wickless Candles!!!

The basics are this.

You start with HIGHLY Scented wax,  a ceramic warmer, and a 15-25 watt lightbulb. The wax is melted by the heat from the lightbulb, and scent wafts through the house for HOURS & HOURS... I don't mind admitting I'm the biggest sceptic. but HONESTLY & TRUTHFULLY, The wax lasts FOREVER!!!(not forever, but 1 bar i have got over 300 Hours out of it !!! thats INSANE for a 6$ bar of wax..


I'm guessing a lot of you have a love of scented candles. and with pets, scentsy is the way to go. it's cheap, economical, and pet friendly. your family won't be breathing in harmful soot or lead, and you won't have to worry about a wick or flame !!!


My favorite part about scentsy is that This year, in january, we launched a PAWS warmer. a warmer devoted  to all us pet lovers. It has paw prints on it, and says I Love Pets. It's stunning.


Anyways, now that i've spent the past 20 minutes rambling about Charlie's obsession with flames, and my love of scentsy wickless candles, I'll say my goodbyes :D  I've gotta get ready for camping :D (hopefully it doesn't rain haha)


And before i forget, a link to my website - Http://brm1985.Scentsy.Ca Be sure to check out the Paws warmer. I LOVE it :D

Fish tank hairs?!?!? & Picky eaters

As i walk into my room to feed my fish in my hexagon tank, I've started to notice these little clear hairs all over the glass(Inside?) i have no clue what they are but the tank looks like it's waving at me(i should post a video) Trust me to come across something i don't know in the first 2 months of having my first cichlid tank set up PFFT!!!!

The pleco & catfish do their job wonderfully, they never stop sucking things.(oh how bad that sounded) but seriously, there cleaning like CRAZY!!!. Does anyone know what these little waving Clear hairs are? my first thought was snails, but i don't have any in my tank. I'm at a total loss. the funny thing is that tank is in a room with NO natural light. Hmm.


I'M STUMPED!!!!


Well on to bigger & better things. like trying to find a dog food my puppy WILL eat. this month i've tried him on Iams, Bentiful(did i spell that right?), Ceasers, Orijin, Even Authority(petsmart). Most of which were wet foods, the little bugger won't eat anything i give him. i've locked him in the bathroom to finish his food and it sits there, eventually to be dumped in the garbage. If i knew how difficult it would be to feed a dog i would have stuck with fish. i'd have better luck with a picky Discus than this adorable puppy.

Misadventures in pet-keeping

I'm not new in the world of pets, but I'm not an expert either. I'm a human being. I learn from trial & error just like every one else. I'll admit to having my first fish tank all die from doing a total water change. I sometimes forget to clean out the litter box every day. I'll even cover up the birds if they get too loud. I'm no angel. I decided to share my misadventures with the world, maybe throw in some product reviews, and explore my love of fish keeping with all of you wonderful folks on the net.

In the future, you can expect to see reviews of such things like Aquarium Filters, gadgets, cat&dog toys, Pet foods, Kitty litter, You name it, i'll probably give it a shot. I'll also be sharing my exploration into the more advanced world of fish keeping. Cichlids, Discus & eventually salt water. maybe even explore some aquatic reptiles with you guys&gals. sounds like fun eh? I'm excited!!!

Well hope to cya all soon,

B