# Paws, Claws and Fins, OH MY!



## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Hey guys! I'm back from a long hiatus and I decided to start over on this whole journal thing.
_But Cross, don't you have 2 rotting away somewhere in necrothread land?_
Yes. Yes I do. They don't count. Shhhhh. ;-)

First of all I'm going to reintroduce myself properly.

My name is Brittney, and I am the keeper otherwise known as Cross or Crossroads. I am 22 years old and have kept animals all my life. My first pet was a dog and I have always had a dog since. Cats were also a common part of my life. When I was 5 I got my first betta. He was a veiltail an was kept in a bowl. You know the kind. When he died, my mom flushed him. I didn't own fish again for 15 years.

I started college with the intent to get my bachelor's of fine arts. Halfway through my degree, I dropped out and started working full time. Now that I have had time to reevaluate my career plan, I've decided to pursue mechanics.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

My first introduced back into keeping fish was a Walmart purchase in March of 2014.









Mako came home in orange water and was promptly placed in a clean 1.5 gallon. I, myself got a prompt slap on the hand for not having a heated 5 gallon. So back to the store I went on payday. I ended up walking out with two tanks but shhh we'll get to that.







and in he went.
In proper conditions he grew into a goofy, fantastic little fish.








A year after I got him, Mako passed away.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Somehow, while I was buying Mako's tank...








This guy ended up in my basket too.
Thanatos went into a 5 gallon bowfront where he spent most of his days.








He passed shortly before Mako after struggling with chronic finrot.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

The addiction continued when I found Natal and "Red Fish" wasting away in... you guessed it. Walmart cups. Red Fish died a week after coming home, and Natal several months later of dropsy. Unfortunately I have lost my pictures of the two. 
So I'll move on to Nereus.

Nereus was purchased after Red Fish died.








He gave me a week of gorgeous fins before he became a chronic tail biter. My first experience with it.








He bit every time his water was disturbed, changed or the temperature changed even a degree and then strutted his ragged fins.








He was a silly fish. He passed away in a power outage.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Agrius was my next guy.








Agrius taught me a hard lesson. He was an active healthy fellow with a huge appetite when I brought him home. However, in a few short months he all but stopped eating, became lethargic and soon...euthanasia was the only answer. I had exhausted every type of food I could find and still he wouldn't eat. He was becoming emaciated when I euthanized with clove oil.
What I failed to realize is that what claimed Agrius was left behind in that tank, despite what I thought was a thorough cleaning(hot water and salt scrub).


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Loukianos and Kyprinos were the next two to come home.
Louk was a blue marble and Kyprinos was a white, copper and red marble.








Kyprinos passed later in the year from the same disease that claimed Agrius, though at the time, I didn't realize it.








Louk remained with me until last November when I had a massive equipment failure event that claimed 3 heaters and 4 fish. During that time he changed his look several times. First from his white face stripes, to eyebrows, tor butterfly, to solid blue and then to blue red bicolor.








He got torn up in a divider slip








But it didn't bother him one bit


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Vincentius was something of an impulse buy. A salamander EE with a deformed dorsal. Like Natal and Red Fish, I have lost my pictures of him. He taught me a hard lesson in how not to treat velvet, and despite my best and inexperienced efforts, I lost him to it.

Aristodemos was my next guy and one of my favorites.








From his half and half body to his face markings, I loved him.
When I got him home, I realized how impressive his fins were.








I lost him last year when my cat sat on the glass lid and shattered it, sending glass shards crashing down into the tank. 
Around the same time I got Demos, I found Abbadon.
Abbadon was my dream fish.








A blue yellow bicolor DTPK carrying the Armaggedon gene. I was smitten.








I was also entertained by his reaction to my finger.








He wasn't perfect, but he was beautiful and mine. I lost him when my cat knocked his hood into his tank, effectively electrocuting him to death.


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## Aetherius (Sep 5, 2015)

Even though we've never spoken before, welcome back! I look forward to following your journal.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Aetherius said:


> Even though we've never spoken before, welcome back! I look forward to following your journal.


Thanks! Nice to meet you!


The Saga Continues...
At some point, I decided that a sorority was a splendid idea. Spoiler: it wasn't. My sorority survived for 2 months before I learned that you should not, ever, in a million years use algaefix on a planted tank. A half dose turned a jungle of a tank into a barren nothingness.








Angelos was my next boy.








He was the absolute most grumpy little fish.








He, along with Louk, passed away in my massive equipment failure.
When Sirekan came home, I wasn't sure he'd make it. Bent on his side and floating, his outlook looked grim.








But I stuck him in my newly rebuilt community tank.








And he perked right up.








He also got mad at me when the cat fell into the tank and broke the heater.








When I got my new phone, he was happy to let me use him in every photo op.








He passed away this past January after a power outage caused a heater short that boiled my community with 100 degree temperatures. While he survived the initial temperatures, it later took its toll.
Sometime after Sirekan I got Merida, Malarkey and Lillian, my three remaining girls to this day.
















Malarkey got named for her knack for nonsense.








Merida is a divider hopping ninja and used to hate having her picture taken.








Lillian was the tiniest little fish when I got her
















But that little speck of a fish turned into my biggest fattest female.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Sometime after that, I got Candy Cain. Cain was the grumpiest fish I had ever owned.








Ever.
















Cain was one of my first to be rehomed.


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## OUOhYeah2016 (Dec 9, 2015)

All of your fish have been gorgeous. I have a HM biter similar to one of yours so i relate lol. I don't think we've encountered each other on here before so Hi! Looking forward to continuing to read your journal


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Faust was a lucky find. For him, more than me. It's February 2015. El Nino and Arctic fronts have been dumping rain and cold miserableness on us all winter. I go into Walmart for dog food. As I'm running out, I kick something plastic off the curb.
It's a betta cup. 
With a betta in it. 








I'm in pain from my bad ankle but still scoop him up to save him from 35° freezing cold and rain and brought him home.








Faust ended up passing away from Dropsy this past November.

You know how you go into a store for one thing...and come out with something else?
Yeah...that was Prospero. I went into petco for prime and walked out with a fish...and no prime.








Pros was a total diva.








And really








Really








Loved








To








Show Me








His








Butt.








But even so, he also took gorgeous pictures








When he wasn't glaring at me balefully








Prospero was rehomed along with Cain.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

OUOhYeah2016 said:


> All of your fish have been gorgeous. I have a HM biter similar to one of yours so i relate lol. I don't think we've encountered each other on here before so Hi! Looking forward to continuing to read your journal


Hi there! Thanks for the sub!
I gave up on scolding my tailbiters or trying to fix it if it was random. Like Cain shredding his tail because his plants got too thick.


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## OUOhYeah2016 (Dec 9, 2015)

My VT did it once randomly because I moved a single plant in his tank and he didnt like what I'd replaced it with.... he never bit before and hasnt done it since. My HM doesn't like the filter output but I've also found that some of his damage came from getting too close to the intake.

All I can say about Prospero is wow... how does a betta end up on the curb? poor thing


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

I have no clue how Faust ended up on the curb. I personally assumed unwatched little kid but could have been a teen that thought it would be cool to see if they _could_ steal the fish and then left him because they didn't actually want him. Could have been set down when someone tied their shoe and forgotten. There's no telling. 

Prospero was easily a favorite. He had such an attitude problem.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Santiago, Rex and Red all came home around the same time and with the exception of Rex, passed around the same time as well. 

Santiago was a mislabeled find








Labeled as a deltatail, it didn't take me long to snatch him up.








He decided to chew on one fin but not the other








He passed away when a heater shorted, and I've stopped using that brand.
Rex was in the same tank when the heater shorted, but the divider prevented the 120° water that Santiago was hit with from getting to him. Regardless, his section still rose to 95 and he had to be treated for dropsy due to it, but he did survive it and go on to live several more months.








Red passed from trouble in... Agrius' old tank, which also claimed another boy, Sherbet, at DT male named Orion and an unnamed HM female before I tore it down and realized that the last 3 had matching symptoms. Lethargy for a couple days and then sudden dropsy in otherwise clean water. My own stupidity combined with stress from work didn't put two and two together until they were gone, dropped dead, each with dropsy. This isn't to say I didn't try to clean the tank. After Kyprinos died, I bleached it and sundried it before adding prime when I refilled it. I did it again after Red. Thinking it might be residual bleach, I tried peroxide after Sherbet. Then back to salt. Whatever it was was in the silicone obviously and I wasn't getting it.









The aforementioned Sherbet was the most interesting colored fish I have ever encountered.








Orange, white and sky blue in person.

Orion was a HMDT piebald and extremely skittish. I don't really have any pictures of him.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

After so many deaths, I started tearing down tanks. I dropped from 8 to 6 when Cain and Prospero were rehomed, but kept the equipment for fear that whatever was in Agrius' old tank would claim someone else's.
I had bought some fish, though I'm not entirely sure why.
One of those that was bought and rehomed was Kronos.

Kronos was a fantastic Petsmart find.
















He also didn't much like cameras.
So instead of pictures, watch the doofus flare....









Poor Ares, the chocolate in the cup was so confused and also rehomed shortly after I got him to a local friend who apparently lost him in a breeding attempt :c









R2D2 was my last boy to be rehomed.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

I went a while just keeping up with my 10 and 20 gallon until the heated in my 20 shorted after a power outage. _Guess what brand it was? :,D_
My community boiled, and I moved everyone to the fourth to try to stop more losses from what I assumed would be an insane ammonia spike. I cleaned out it and my other 20 and my roommate and I moved our leopard geckos in. 

















Hence the scales bit of the title. I also own a cornsnake but...shh I'm getting off track.
I was back down to two tanks and intended to keep it that way.

And then this happened








Kydoimos had been calling to me for a month with his color and nearly perfect dorsal.








Did I ever mention I was a sucker for good fins and form? Cause yeah. I am.

Well when Kydoimos got home, he got himself trapped on the intake and now several days later, is starting to act like himself again.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Now that we're all caught up... I can smother....I mean show you the many pictures I take. Daily. 8D sorry for all the thumbnails lol, most of these aren't uploaded to tumblr like the rest.













But this is me. I used to have waistlength hair but I cut it off because I work outside and my hair was damaged from previous stylists. The braid was not donated because of that.













Best thing about Texas? We get fantastic sunsets.







This is one of the paws. Pandora is my roommate's mantle Great Dane.







Toni is my little rescue Mutt. She's a blue heeler mix.







Harley Quinn is my roommate's shepherd mix.
And now for the influx of a bazillion flower pictures because I work at a garden center.


































































































Bug Warning!
Silvana was a wild caught mantis I kept for a couple months.




















Next up, mandatory Gecko appreciation post starring my female, Ba'al!


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

*Ba'alBa'alBa'alBa'al*

Ba'al Ba'al...Ba'al

































































































Ba'al


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Today has been *the* single most boring day in the history of all days at work. Spring is our busy season and a typical weekday fetches 6 to 10 thousand in sales. Today we will barely break 2 thousand.

I thank heavens that we are 15 minutes to close and I can go home and rest and mess with my tanks. Hopefully Kydoimos will do even better once I change his water one last time to get the Methylene blue out and replace his plants. I may need to get my hands on some Myrio or maybe a sword or something for the girls in the 10 gallon. When I dropped his plants in there they were ecstatic to weave in and out through the plants. I'll feel bad removing them but they have tubes and plants and Ky, has nothing right now.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

You know what the worst thing about being an early bird is? Waiting several hours to talk to people.
But I digress...
Last night, I came home to wiggling tails and a perky Kydoimos. I am happy to announce he is going to be fine. I dumped the methylene and salt from his tank, rinsed it out real well and replaced it. I may have to try to find like a plastic clip so I can baffle that intake and then some fishing line for the output. The heat isn't circulating as well as I'd like. Might rig a sponge filter into the filter system there. That way I can use the existing filter media as well as the sponge filter for a lighter flow. This one is too hard on him.
I want to get some more for that tank. Some rocks or driftwood or something. Just to make it a proper looking little tank. Same with my 10. I want to tear out the gravel, replace with black moon sand and redo the scape.

So far, today appears to be a repeat of yesterday. The difference? Today I don't have webcomic pages to read, but one of my friends on another forum came back from her trip to Iceland (I was totally jealous) so I have threads to reply to over there. For those that don't know, I'm a writer/ digital artist, so her and I have been writing back and forth.

I need to put my 40 back on its timer. I'm starting to get dust algae. But with the infrared part of my Aquasky out, I cant switch it to night mode so I may need a new timer all together. I have the Fluval ramp timer. Hopefully I can get into mechanics soon and get a CO2 set up for it but until then, Excel will have to suffice. I also want a new light, but justifying that drop of easily $200 to get a really nice one is hard right now. I really want a Euroquatics Angel Pro but its $500 and a reef light, not a freshwater light. Still nice though. 
I'm going to log right here how much I've dropped into this tank and then never speak of it again xD

Tank:
45 lbs of sand- $48
Driftwood- roughly $150- 200
Cories- $57
Pencilfish - $200
Cherry Barbs- $21-28
Odessa Barbs- Free
Betta- $3
Apisto- $3
Plants- ..... :,D
Somewhere in the range of $200
Shrimp that were eaten- $60
Gold Ram- $3
Guppies- $24
Total Damage Thus Far- $769 - $826
I couldn't imagine this being a salt tank. I'd die.
Edit:
I forgot the filter. That was another $40 or so?
So
$810-870- ish?


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

I'm a lazy dumb and haven't updated in like a week so here's a pretty big update.

So I finally got all the plants I think I'm going to get for now. I got the 10 and 40 looking presentable and I'm happy with them for now, I just need to wait for the plants to grow in. I finished stocking the 40, so no newbies for a while. Unfortunately I have ended up with 4 males odessas and 2 females so I'm watching them, just in case I need to return the sub males.
Quick progression of the 40:








..."quick"
This is the 10 and 40 all cleared up.









Lavache is doing well








Albeit, slightly appalled that I don't take more pictures of him. I caught him screaming at me over in the corner there and had a good laugh.








So here's some Lavache.

And now we return to your regularly scheduled bettas.

Lillian:









Merida:









Larkey









And a flood of Ky pictures because I got him flaring and he spent the rest of the day strutting.








He's my little war god.
















Look at this angry boy.









And his flare Gifs because he's a doof








Strutstrut


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## OUOhYeah2016 (Dec 9, 2015)

Crossroads said:


> You know what the worst thing about being an early bird is? Waiting several hours to talk to people.
> But I digress...


^^^ That describes my life lol. My boyfriend moved in with me and my roommate for the summer before we move into a 4 bedroom next year with 4th friend and both of them sleep so much later than me! I'm just left hanging out in the living room reading because I have no one to talk to.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

I'm up every morning around 5 or 6 for work. Most of my friends don't get up til like 10 and we're usually slow in the morning so there is nothing to do. :,D


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Ugh. Work rant ahead.
So today has been slow. Between a cloudy day and sudden (if you live in texas, you know the kind) torrential downpours, we're pretty slow. CEO visited today and brought a list for me. Now when I say for me, I mean it's for me. Not for cashiers. For me, because I am the only one who will do what he wants, how he wants. His list means drop everything and do it. Which means I can't be a cashier until I'm done. Everyone else knows this cause he's jumped a few tails for me having to stop.
Well the new girl doesn't know this and we can't explain it because she only barely speaks English. So she walks away to go talk on her phone while I'm at the back doing the list.
And a customer comes up to me with a rude HEEELLLLOOO?! I'VE BEEN WAITING UP FRONT FOR 10 MINUTES (exaggeration, I had been up there to grab my gatorade a few moments prior) AND YOU HAVE BEEN IGNORING ME!
Now I don't do well with rude or stupid customers. Ever. If it weren't for the fact that I knew my favorite manager would have to deal with her, I would have gone off.
So instead she got a sickly sweet, "I'm sorry ma'am. I was up there just a few minutes ago to get my gatorade, I must have missed you." She didn't like that but I...don't really care? The fact that she felt the need to be rude makes me not care. That and being irritated that the other girl disappeared without telling me.

Then I get these dumb kids that are obviously stoned who come in and bug me about every single plant they can find. While I'm trying to get my list done.

I'm so glad there's only 3 hours left in the day and then I'm off.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Guess who is once again unhappy with her 40 gallon tank's aquascape?
If you guessed me, you'd be correct. 
Unfortunately my petco won't restock plants until this Thursday sooo I either need to go by Fish Gallery tomorrow or wait until next payday.
Now that the initial setup is done, the impatient I WANT IT NOW has set in. :roll:
Maybe if I move some stuff around. It's mostly the back that's bothering me.
Maybe if I put pennywort behind the cichlid cave and in the left side driftwood and used the 10 and Ky's 3.7 as grow tanks I could trade plants into the 40. I don't know, it's probably my stress talking. I stress spend.
A lot.

//goes and sips tea while grumbling


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Guess who messed with her scape again?
If you guessed me well...you'd be correct. Again.:lol:

While I was picking up filter carbon pads for my Penguin 200 because my last carbon pad was really bad (since it had to take the brunt of the exploding Top Fin internals mess) I saw that the Petsmart, which I only go to for medicines or equipment parts because it's closer and petco doesn't carry stuff like Tetracycline or Erythromycin, had S. repens and Lobelia cardinalis. So I bought some to see if the staurogyne would carpet for me. I prefer stem plants to grassy ones anyway. My two big chain swords are chaining though so maybe I can have both. 

Ky is fully back to the fish I spent hours whining to myself and my roommate about. From now on I will keeping a growing list of things Ky hates that I have photo evidence of.

So far
Mountain Dew Code Red








Mountain Dew Baja Blast








NLS (he won't eat them, spoiled brat only eats frozen)








My finger









Also








For a Petco boy, he's got pretty decent fins and form.
Personal critique:
Split ventrals
"First" ventral ray too long. 
Uneven ray splitting in tail
Short first dorsal rays
Dorsal short
Rounded caudal edges
Peduncle curves up a tad.
Anal could come to a finer point


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

And so it begins. It hit 97°(36.1° for you lovelies outside the States) today. Caught me off guard and sent my head into a pounding fit because I planned for an 80° day, not a 97° one.
Yay.
In other news, three cashiers at my job, including myself, came up short in excess of $10. Three cashiers who have never been short. Ever.
I do head math easy so I know I didn't make a $17 cash mistake. Plus, I triple count the change I hand out. I have been a cashier for almost 5 years and never been short once. I don't just "lose" 17 dollars.
One guy is a retired IT guy that meticulously counts his register every hour. The likelihood of him being short cash is about as likely as me winning the lotto.
The other guy is older, but he's never been short either.
Problem is, I now don't have the cash to pay by tomorrow so my roommate has to pay them or I lose my job.
Which, no big loss, I'm so sick of this place and it's backwards logic that when my boss told me that main office said I needed the money by tomorrow or they were sending a termination form, I literally told him I guess they're sending that paper then.
I'm tired of chasing lazy laborers over an acre lot cause none of them want to load dirt or grass, having 'kids' come in stoned and waste my time, and being told a million different contradictory statements in the course of an hour on how to do my job or better yet, not do it because it might inconvenience customers. I'm tired of being told that customer service doesn't matter, but get yelled at if I get a little snippy with a customer. I'm also tired of being the only one that knows anything about the plants, so I get dragged all over the store and interrupted on my lunch break to answer questions. It's all very old.

In fish news
My tank cleared up after me messing with it








"Big Daddy", my dominant Odessa male decided to be friendly








Very friendly 








Lillian refused to take pictures so uhhhh here's the other 3.

I swear Merida never takes anything but profile shots, the brat.









Meanwhile, Malarkey was over on her side doing this number.









And Ky was being a relaxed little goof. I caught him sleeping twice.









And update on Ky's tank


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

Yesterday was a short day, but I had errands to run so there was little tank time for me. I made up for it this morning. My roommate had to be at work at 6 so once I got home, I worked on my 40 a little. Did a quick 25% water change to top it off, replanted some snuffled staurogyne, dosed excel and envy and wiped down the front glass. When I get paid, I think I'm going to try the painted foil background. Trying to decide if I want to do black, dark blue, brown or green. My 100 PC order of IAL should be here within the next week or two. Can't wait to get it in the right side of my tank where there's only a little light and see what happens. My tank is going to get DARK soon. I'm so excited. I'm hoping it will bring my pencilfish out more. They tend to hide in the plants and driftwood right now. I also want to see if Ky goes bubble nest happy. He seems like a boy to cover the entirety of his tank in bubbles. 

In other news, I'm quitting my garden center job to get a job with easier hours and more reliable pay so Co2 system, here I come!
I did snap some photos yesterday morning though.

Merida overheard that I was talking smack about her profile only shots








Somehow, she managed to look like she broke her tail, I think she was trying too hard to prove me wrong
















And before he left, I think Prospero taught her to show me her butt








Cause she did it. A lot.

Of course Malarkey couldn't be outdone








Like really refused to be outdone. I couldn't stop snapping pictures of her to get more of Merida because she just








Wouldn't








Stop
















Being








Silly


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

*So this also happened today*






























We got some Oprah nonsense going on in here.


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## Crossroads (Jun 28, 2014)

As I sit here and watch the rain fall I also can't help but to be happy that after today, my hours will no longer depend on the insane random weather Texas has (extreme weather aside). I have an hour left at this job before I take a week off to recoup and get ready for my new job. I'm glad it's raining. Its cooled us back off and keeps the customers out.

Though I can't help to wish I was home, watching my fish swim and taking pictures. Rain is nice, but only so entertaining for so long.


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