I’m excited. This Friday night there will be a midnight sale/event at a (somewhat) local fish store. This is a big, annual event that I’ve been trying to get to for several years, but haven’t yet gone.  So far, so good for this year.

I have a little cash put aside for this, hoping to buy a fish (if the one I want is still there when I get there), and a frag or two. For the uninitiated, frags are small branches, heads, or polyps of living coral colonies that can be purchased, traded, or gifted to grow in a new tank. Like, my tank

 

 

Equally exciting is the prospect of meeting up with a reefing friend (or 2 or 3) who I’ve known online for several years, but because the stars haven’t aligned, we’ve yet to meet in person.

I need to write a wish list of corals/critters, so I don’t get overexcited and spend all my dollars within the first 10 feet of the store.  Cash only, that’s my rule in order to stick to the budget.  I’d love to push the boundaries, blow the budget, and go crazy coral shopping. But I won’t. Yes, yes, I’ve embraced my not-so-inner nerd. It’s also important to keep in mind which corals will live peacefully next to each other, particularly so in a nano tank, otherwise it’s a set up for yet another tank crash.

Before anything else, I’ve got to do a big water change and some general maintenance beforehand, and have fresh, clean saltwater on hand in case of excessive sliming from new corals.  Many corals, particularly SPS, slime after being rehomed, fragged, or just generally pissed off at being in different water with slightly different parameters.

Time to drag myself out of my underwater fantasy. Flower Child is awake and hungry, the dogs are waiting to be walked, and if I don’t start my workout, it isn’t going to happen.