Siamese fighting fish

Some information on “Bubbles” — Sienna’s new pet fish.

The Siamese fighting fish (Betta splendens) is one of the most popular species of freshwater aquarium fish, native to the Mekong basin in Southeast Asia and called pla-kad in its native Thailand. It is a member of the gourami family (family Osphronemidae) of order Perciformes, but was formerly classified among the Anabantidae. Although there are nearly 50 other types of bettas, Betta splendes is the most popular species among aquarium hobbyists, particularly in the United States, and is commonly referred to with the imprecise name “betta.”

B. splendens grows to an overall length of approximately 6 cm (~ 2.3″ in). Bettas are notable for their colors and tail shapes. The natural coloration of B. splendens is a dull green and brown, and the fins of wild specimens are relatively short. However, brilliantly-colored and longer-finned varieties have been developed through selective breeding.

And now some photos. First, the little tank they sold us.. then the big Brita filter tank I put him in once I learned the small tanks are cruel.

Click thumbnails for slightly bigger images.

If you like Peter & Dudley, you might like this version of “The end of the world”. I just thought of it while watching an episode of The Simpsons where Homer has everyone gathered on top of a mountain, waiting for the end of the world.

Yesterday, I took Sienna to the Eagle Farm raceway. I got free tickets and they had a family carnival day. Sienna rode on a shetland pony and loved it. I sat and watched a clown being silly then Sienna ran off to a blowup Titanic which they climb up the middle of and stand on the deck and slide down at about 60 degree angle. The top where they come out is probably about 50-60 feet off the ground. Very high up, but Sienna loved it. Then she went on the jumping castle for a while and we went to find food.  Sienna had 1.5 chicken skewered kebabs and I had steak a burger.  We were going to have a drink each but I ran out of cash and nobody took Credit Cards there.  I grabbed a can of lemonade to share and we went back to the stage where the clown had been, to eat.  Humphrey B Bear was there.  I thought he was long gone, but he was dancing around with a woman whom sang kids songs.

After this, Sienna was dying for "coppon candy" (fairy floss.. she watches too much USA tv *grins*).  We got some and I managed to eat about half of it without her knowing too much and she scoffed the rest down.  We headed home after that and Sienna went to sleep while I watched Mr & Mrs Smith on TV.  They don’t look quite how I remember them from Sydney, but are apparently coming to visit at the end of next month.. woohoo!  

I fell asleep for a few minutes on the couch at about 7pm so got Sienna ready and we hopped into bed.  I couldn’t sleep for about an hour but must have been snoring by 8pm. 

I didn’t get out of bed until 8am but was woken about 4 times by Sienna going in and out of the room. Today Sienna and I went out in the car and emptied my PO Box then Sienna wanted to go to a park so we went there for some fun.  Sienna made friends with another girl who came over to play while her family watched her brother playing soccer at a nearby field.  She didn’t stay long but Sienna and I must have been there half an hour or so. We then went to Indooroopilly shopping centre.  I took her to the Pets Paradise shop and she looked at all the animals.  I picked up a Fighter Fish and a small tank for him.  Sienna picked out a nice red one just like the one on the tank packet and named him "Bubbles".  The petshop guy said it was an appropriate name since these fish start blowing bubbles when they are ready to mate.  Lucky that doesn’t happen with humans, hey? heheh We stopped at the cafe for drinks. Sienna had some water and I had a mocha then we headed home.  Sienna went to bed and told me "I don’t need somebody to come to bed with me. I can sleep by myself".  Daddy is very happy with this statement, as you can imagine *grins*. 

While she hopped into bed to sleep I got the fish into his tank with the aged water.  It has a little plastic tree which won’t stick to the bottom but keeps floating, so I pulled it out and left it out of the tank. At the moment, I’m just watching the Simpsons marathon on TV. They have a show on tonight called "Inside the actor’s studio". The Simpsons voice actors are going to be live on TV doing their character voices.  I’ve got my Foxtel IQ box set up to tape it. Can’t wait.  I expect Sienna will sleep to about 5pm or so, then I will drop her off home.

Friday night I’m going to a play as I know someone acting in it. She plays a nun heh Should be a nice night out. Saturday morning I pick up Sienna and we are going to the races! Yay! I’d like to bet $1 on the winning horse, please! Kaching! They have a family day with rides, etc and I scored free tickets

I’ve taken some time off in August as mum and dad are coming to stay for about a week. Should be good to see them again. Will have Sienna for that week. I know she will love to see Nonna and Poppy again. She has so much fun with Poppy heh

In October I’m going to have to take a bit more leave as well. I have a couple of friends from USA coming to stay at my place for a few days and I’d like to show them around Brisbane. Might go to Aussie World and the Koala Sanctuary and the Zoo with Crikey man.

Way to go, 3! Show up Telstra and the others.  Check out this new article.

HUTCHISON’S 3 mobile service has again moved to cut prices for data downloads on its third-generation network.

The company today announced new monthly plans ranging between $29 for 1GB of data per month to $99 for 5GB. Over-cap usage will attract a 10c per megabyte charge.

Telstra has so far resisted any temptation to cut prices on its Next G mobile network, which can run as high as $15 per megabyte. Telstra has instead been touting Next G’s network coverage as its strength in a national television advertising campaign reportedly costing $10 million.

That’s amazing. Just about a year ago 1Gb from 3 was $129.. NOW look at it If you don’t have access to DSL or Cable broadband, 3 is the way to go! Particularly if you are in a metro area.

Not a huge amount been happening since the move.
I bought a new garbage today and a utensils drawer insert for the kitchen. The garbage is a nice plastic one with a foot pedal. Crazy Clark’s only had a nice metallic one which I would have bought but didn’t want to pay $27 or so. I went to Target and they had plastic ones with no pedal for $17. I walked back to CC to get the expensive one and right out the front was a plastic one with a pedal! Sweet. Snapped it up.  While I was out a guy rang. He is the son of the guy whom moved my furniture and other crud.  When I was moving I said I could not get rid of my two CRT monitors even if I wanted to give them away. He remembered and his son doesn’t have a monitor so rang up to see if they could buy mine. I said they could just have both as you can’t sell them so he came and took home a 15″ and 17″ monitor.

Yesterday morning we went to the photo studio and had some photos taken. After we got home, Mil arrived with some chicken and salads for lunch. We ate them and the three of us went out Geocaching.  I looked up the caches on the website and they now have Google Maps linked to the caches.  The first cache was listed as north of where I live but the GPSr said it is south. We went south and after a lot of driving around found a vacant park where the GPSr said it should be. We looked for about 3/4 hour but could not find it so gave up and decided to check out the other one.  We found this park rather quickly by going to where Google Maps said it should be then followed the GPSr.  I found the cache after about 6-5 minutes and we marked it off. Sienna wanted to go home to the loo and Mil had had enough of walking around (the first cache, we parked about 600m away from it and walked to the area).