Walkerville book sale
Well, yes… the most expensive book I bought was $2… I bought 10 books. For $11. I felt a bit guilty, but hey; good books, and cheap! There were stacks of people there… if I’d had time I think I probably could have picked up even more (I would have had to grab a bag in order to do so, though). As it was, I am glad they didn’t weigh my bag at the airport since I was just a little over the limit.
So what did I get? Good question, so glad you asked:
A Short History of the World, by none other than HG Wells
The Last Plantagenet, by Tyler White (that’s about Richard III, in case you’re wondering)
The Borgias, by Michael Mallett (which I started reading at the airport, and got a fair bit read because the plane was late in leaving; more readable than I had expected)
Journey among Warriors, by Eve Curie (yes, the daughter; no idea what this is going to be like)
The Idea of History, by Collingwood (hurrah! for $1, no less!)
Firebird, by Muchael Asher (some conspiracy novel)
Empyrion Omnibus, by Stephen Lawhead (confused me no end when I saw the title and it not by Simmonds; looks good)
The Chosen, by Ricardo Pinto (some fantasty schlock, I expect; interesting to try)
and Running with the Demon, by Terry Brooks (I’m feeling a bit guilty about not having read the entirety of the Shannara series).
Some Edith Pargeter (aka Ellis Peters) novel, which I actually left in Adelaide so as to save room in the bag
So that’s the lot. Very exciting. I also came home with one of Mum’s books, which she has donated to the cause (of teaching, that is): Queen Bees and Wannabes, by Rosaling Wiseman, which she says is excellent and well worth reading as a teacher. So that should be good.
Houseboat on the Styx
This was one of the books Mum got at the Walkerville Libarary/Council book sale – more about that later. She bought it on Saturday; it’s a little book, and only 170 or so pages on that lovely thick paper they used to use, so I read it all that day. It is one of the funniest little books I’ve read in a long time… and that edition was published in 1925! And it said it was the 28th impression! It’s by a guy called John Kendrick Bangs, which is hilarious in and of itself. The premise of the book is conversations between people in the ‘good’ part of Hades. Think Shakespeare, Napoleon, Nero (?!), Dryden… it was actually laugh-out-loud funny, which is fairly rare for me; Mum got a bit sick of me reading out the great one-liners before she got a chance to read it. I think the funniest bit I remember is Nero saying that the only thing he hadn’t murdered was the English language – and that directed to Dr Johnson. HA HA HA. I thought it was funny.
Water change
J came home; he was almost as distraught as me about the fish. We did a water change right there and then. J isn’t convinced that the ammonia is a result of lack of water changes… thinks the filter is working all right and all, so it shouldn’t be a problem… we wonder whether the tests might be past their use-by, since we’ve had them forever. Must check that.
Also did a water change on the main tank. Looks better with water to the top.
The reason for water changes
I have been at J for a number of weeks to do water changes in both the tanks. I really wanted to do it two weekends ago; I really, really wanted to do it last weekend. I didn’t push enough. A couple of days ago the water in the qt started looking a bit cloudy, and J agreed we would do one this weekend. I looked in on them when I came home and gave them some food. Two hours later, I looked in the qt again and two of the half-grown fry are dead – just lying on their sides in the tank. I have done tests; ammonia is up, and the pH test reads about 6 or so but I don’t trust it, and I can’t find the tube for the other test we have.
So I should have pushed harder and done water changes when they were needed. We are way too slack about doing it, particularly in the qt; the main tank gets away with it because it has two filters and lots of plants. The qt does not have this luxury.
Randomly Yours, Alex 