Thoughts of the Week

Posted on July 24, 2021 by timlyg

On recalling CCCNY, I hadn't written this down because I felt it was too minor to mention. But with a comparison between Michael Young and Michael Liu, yes, if it was anyone seriously of being a heretic and thus more damaging to the church, I would put Michael Young on the list. The one that claimed to be the founder of the church, who appeared to tolerate multiple heretic views, especially universalism, and practiced white lies like Rev. Lin. If anyone should go, I would say Young 10 times over than Liu. The fact that Rev. Lin chose Liu over someone like Young to kick out is an obvious example of how bad she's taking the direction of the church. Or, she was. I don't know what they do now. I don't really take Young's case a big deal, he's just a minor character, despite his claim of being the founder. Only can pray for her and them.

For some reason, the more I observe GRII's servants, the more I feel Rev. Lin's support is rather superficial, if not fake. Why? Only one I could think of: For some perverted humility of fame seeking. When when she found out about my online journal, her response was, verbatim, in her email to me in 2017: "...I've nothing to do with your personal life or what so ever [proof: irresponsible, revealing of fake care]...I appreciate that not to put my name and our church [proof: narcissistic and reputation hungry, despite fake humility in hiding it in practice, not truly seeking the truth] in your personal devotion for your own means [proof: fame seeking, self-profit business minded, non-sacrificial, as if everyone in the world is as selfish as her]...I seek no further conversation on these matters [proof: dictatorial, must have the last words, pride, power hungry]". This shows that even when a person's gone through proper theological training in seminary and have connections with the right people, she can still fail. If she does not repent, I am hoping the conversation we can have with whoever inherited her role if the church still exists, would be "Wow, we know Rev. Laura Lin was a failure, but how did God pull you through all these!!!"

I have asked this question, why I find in reformed/Presbyterian churches in America, many Fundamentalists? Because fundamentalists are usually Baptists. I think I have my answer: That though their conversion was heavily fundamentalism influenced, the ones that end up going to Presbyterian churches used to be Roman Catholics, and most likely gone through infant baptism. Thus, the unwillingness to participate in anabaptism nor accepting the strong argument of a Baptist fundamentalist.

Posted in Theologization | Leave a comment

Aquarium Update (7/16/2021) - a few things have changed in the past days

Posted on July 17, 2021 by timlyg

The Ultra Mini Carpet re-appeared! with green tops, though the rest are pretty bleached out, probably due to the 81+ F high temperature.

Caulerpa Prolifera, still surviving in tank.

Chaeto, looks good in Refugium. Although I am replacing the feeder net container with a smaller one, this one is too big to fit properly.

Caulerpa Mexicana died after a week or so. Right now, I am attributing all dead stuff are due to high temperature and possibly high Nitrate.

The other plant I bought online, but didn't do so well so I just threw it all in the Refugium all together hoping I'll see some miracle. They were:
Red Grape Caulerpa / Kelp (Botryocladia sp.) Macro Algae

I bought another chocolate chip starfish, died the next day, along with the 2 x $2 snails I got from Petco (the turbo and Astraea snails). According the forums, the high temperature (was 82-83+ F at the time at peak of day) was the most likely cause, the next is Nitrate. Now with the fans dropping my tank's temp. to 74F (let's see if it will still work without AC on a hot day), I could get some snails to test this out again. I guess, in some basic sense, the snails are a way to tell if my tank is reef ready, as all my corals apparently died, the zoas? I'll just count them dead, with 3-4 microscopic glow under blue light don't really count, it would take some miracle for them to come back.

I added also a Lawnmower Blenny from Petco.

Roll call, So far the tank now has:
2 x Clarkii clowns
2 x 3-spot domino Damselfish
2 x Lightning Blue Damsels
2 x yellow clown gobies
2 x feather dusters
1 x Lawnmower Blenny
1 x Ultra Mini Carpet Anemone
1 x Purple Corkscrew Long Tentacle Anemone
1 x Green Long Tentacle Anemone
2 x peppermint shrimps
3-5 x emerald crabs

Plant:
Chaeto in Refugium

Water test:
Time: 11pm

Hanna Alkalinity checker (Diluted due to out of range reading: 5ml distilled water + 5 ml tank water as C1 sample): 161 ppm * 2 = 322 ppm.

pH level = 7.57 (Seneye), 8.14 (digital yellow stick), 8.2 (RedSea test), 8.0+ (strip test)

Temperature = around 73.4 (Seneye), 74.4 (in-tank digital thermometer, apparently still dropping), 76-74 (strip), the AC was just turned off, was hot today at 95 the highest outside.

The temperature has been dropping happily from 83F as I added the $30 ebay 4-fan I finally received today. There really is no need for expensive chiller.

Nitrate = 40+ ppm (strip test)

Nitrite = 0 ppm (strip test)

Salinity = 1.024 ish Specific Gravity = 32 ppt, I've just dosed a bit of salt just now so I'll need to monitor the salinity tomorrow. I'm hoping for 1.025-1.026.

It seems that Seneye monitor is only good for reading PAR. If that is ever accurate. Therefore I've recalibrated the Seneye to match in-tank digital thermometer and the RedSea pH test.

Been reading up on how to raise pH without raising Alkalinity too much. It is said that CO2 (associated with carbonic acid) is also a main pH dropping cause, in which case, pumping air is the solution. But since I now rely on the RedSea pH test, 8.2 is quite good. So I'm not going to worry about pH for now.

I need to test the Alkalinity with Hanna again after a few days, to see if it's going to drop on its own. The alternative would be to do water changes, which I do not prefer as the goal is to create a tank that is self-maintained.

It is now crucial to find ways to lower that nitrate. I've already ordered some solution such as Seachem De-Nitrate filter (porous substrate I'm going to bag them and put in the sump), Chemi-Pure Blue, they say you can make your own from Youtube, so I'll see how well this Chemi-Pure works first.

Posted in Biology, Projects | 1 Comment

Update this Week

Posted on July 14, 2021 by timlyg

I'll try to keep all my aquarium updates separate from these weekly thought entries.

After looking and reading about Zoas (Zoanthids), since I started the marine aquarium again, I am remembering that when I was young, at the sea, I sometimes found these bubbles on the rocks that I would poke and wonder what they are, and they would retract and gush out water. Now I think they are Zoas. Expensive for aquarists but free everywhere in Penang (or any tropical beaches), and I did not treasure them back then, because they were everywhere and I had always wondered what they were.

Texas housing, luxury enough for average person is around $500,000 (around 4 bed, 3 bath) with a pool, grandeur entrance. Thanks the Mr.You of NY who maybe one of the Chinese opportunists who's thinking of moving to Texas, wonder how the white folks would react to this if it's getting too obvious:

Mr.You visited Katy, East Houston, very new town, unlike old NY, and it's getting populated with Chinese. Perhaps I should ask my manager Al about Texas.

Read some pastor's kid on Facebook regarding meeting his best friends in heaven. First of all, The "after life" for believers is on Earth, the new Earth, not some fantasy spiritual realm, and the idea of such heaven or paradise is to meet with God. The notion of meeting with God should be so overwhelming that if seeing friends (or even dead pets!? seriously?) in heaven is so important that it's rather them than God, then one does not know what Christianity is all about. If meeting God is the ultimate goal, the rest is given for those who love the Lord. There's no need to even convince oneself who is saved who is not.

Just checked out YMCA in South Amboy today (7/16) regarding their membership. $34/yr. $15 per day if not member. Gym is upstairs and has good wide window view of the railroad and fountain, motivating though it may still not be enough to seduce me to use it, I'm a pool person, so heated pool, despite their Summer schedule reservation deal. Still good over all, but could be cheaper as LA Fitness is around the same price or less. Y would have been much closer for me than LA Fitness, which is a 6-10 min drive. Speaking of swimming, I am focusing on Butterfly style. Watching samples from Youtube helps a lot. Butterfly is tough in breathing. I hope that my arms would eventually be able to handle the strokes as easily as I had improved my freestyle strokes from heavy to light.

Church fellowship is a very crucial thing. I've over the years observed and experienced various forms of fellowship in a church. It's basically coming down to: the right kind, traditionalism and sociality. For the traditionalists, church fellowship is just the sake of preserving what was passed down before. Therefore, personal relationship between members could be absent, as that's not their emphasis. For the gregarious type, they really don't care about Christianity, it's a name that put on to make friends, get connections with people. Though they claim they do it for God and words of praising God may come out of their lips, they party amongst themselves. The right kind of fellowship, is the kind that couldn't get enough of God, getting close to God and as a result of that right relationship with Christ, they couldn't wait to share it with those of the same mind and heart. The Traditionalist examples are Westfield Grace OPC, Rev. Laura Lin's church, etc. The Sociality examples are Redeemer PCA, and just about every other churches I've been. The Chinese American Church in Monmouth is an exception, for now. I do not know enough about that one.

Posted in Geography, Theologization | Leave a comment

Sunday Sermon

Posted on July 11, 2021 by timlyg

Grace Community Church, Pastor Christopher Basile

Habakkuk 3:1-13

Chapter 1: accusation against Israelites. God's way to get even more wicked ones (Chaldeans/Babylonians) to deal with them. God is always right: Look up the fall of Babylon.

Chapter 2: God's answer.

Posted in Theologization | Leave a comment

Updates this week

Posted on July 10, 2021 by timlyg

Must be knock on the neighborhood doors day. Power Home Remodeling stopped by to schedule for estimate on sidings. Saying that our Aluminum sidings are better replaced with vinyl. I later realized that they had come before but we cancelled the estimate schedule because they would want to come in. This time I did not let the estimate guy in and refused to let him talk to both me and my wife which was what they insisted. After measuring the house at 7pm, he tried again to want to speak with Nadia but I refused, Dom then tried to leave without giving estimates but when I asked, he kindly threw a number: for roof it's around $27k, and for sidings it's around $40k, and that the warranty is lifetime, for broken parts, leaks, etc. Not sure if the price is right as at that kind of price, you can just look for a new house. I explained to my wife that this is a learning opportunity since the reviews on PHR are not bad, meaning it's probably legit, and that these two guys are very respectful. Plus I had promised Nick the first guy that I won't cancel on him. I've used to despise marketing sales people, until I started working for SPG as well as gotten to know Brian better. These people are trying to make it in life and they are treating potential customers with respect. It is only the sales people who don't show others respect, like saying "How could you not have TV, etc." and making condescending remarks that I despise.

The second one stopped by was Altice (AKA Optimum) stopped by to give their rates. Trying to claim that they have better quality now (used to be infamously known for their bad connection service) with fiber optics and lower rates than Verizon, i.e. $25 for 300mbps. I told the guy I'll check the review.

Posted in Technical, Theologization | Leave a comment

Aquarium Update (7/5/2021)

Posted on July 5, 2021 by timlyg

About 10 days ago, I got the Seneye Monitor to work with pH and Nh3. Current readings:

I am satisfied with the Fluval 2.0 light for now, not really focusing on reefs or corals for now, though the par looks good with this light (50 - 150).

Not sure why the pH keeps dropping, I kept having to apply Seachem's Marine Buffer (500g) which is quite effective in raising the pH, I think not much side effect either, i.e. Alkalinity, etc. Since this product contains calcium, magnesium, strontium and many more. So far, Aquaridise has the best deal $16.99 for 500g. Though, $13.99 at TheFishRoom.Net with free shipping on all orders over $79, so I'll have to get like a live coral from them or something.

As for the reefs, only 2 anemones left: Green (tip) long tentacle & purple corkscrew long tentacle. I noticed that the ultra mini carpet has disappeared today (melted or eaten by crabs?), thought it was surviving. But the temperature was probably too high (81+ degrees), still waiting for my cooler to arrive. The leather finger's gone. Green Pipe Organ's basically gone. Free frags are either gone or bleached dead looking, I kind of give up hope on them, nothing I know to do anyway.

There are 3 feather dusters. I don't know if I already had the 3rd one all along or they reproduced the third one in my tank. One independent, the other two next to each other. But the "roots" are 3 with one of them appear to be extending with new growth.

One emerald crab seems to grow rather large pinchers.

In 3 more days, my tank would have cycled about a full month, which is what conventionally considered as a stable reef tank. That's when I consider snails that cleans up possible algae on the glass, rocks, etc. And maybe slowly considering corals again, which I started too early in the game.

Waiting for the refugium kit (already got the ACKE LED Full Spectrum light) & plants to arrive also.

Current water test states:
- Hanna Checker Alkalinity: 300+ (too high)
- Ammonia Alert Monitor looks zero (yellowish) to me.
- Strip Test: Nitrate quite high at around 40 (waiting for my reef plants to arrive to eat up all these), Nitrite rather low (0-0.5), Alkalinity over 300, pH around 8.

So the challenges are:
- maintain a good high pH (8.3) - hard to do this without raising the Alkalinity too high.
- maintain a good low temperature in summer (<78F) - should be resolved when cooler arrives.

Posted in Biology | Leave a comment

What's happening until now

Posted on July 4, 2021 by timlyg

Met up with the Caldwells 6/26/21. Disappointed by the Fogo de Chao restaurant - Waiter was like "The Market Table is just salad!!! There's no meat!" I pointed at some meat on the table...he went "That's Salami!" But true, other than some other meat and salmon sashimi, there's no bacon, and not like before. This restaurant has always been on top of my list of bringing guests to in NYC, but now with the pandemic inflation and waiter attitude (I wasn't the only one commented this way, check out Yelp), no more. Not going back to Fogo, at least not for a while. The Full Experience deal is probably still good, but if I found a competition, I'll rather go there first.

July 4th fireworks at Bradford Park in Milltown, parking behind Karma Cat and Zen Dog Rescue Society on S. Main Street, 9:30pm on Saturday 7/3. Since South Amboy, Perth Amboy and Woodbridge all cancelled theirs, for the 2nd year now due to the pandemic.

Posted in General | Leave a comment

Sermon - Stephen Tong Sunday Service 06/27/2021 Rev. 3:19-22

Posted on June 27, 2021 by timlyg

Indonesian version:

v. 20, BEHOLD = lihat....how to see the door without glass? We must have a very clear vision when we hear God's word! Your vision determines what you hear.

Beethoven wrote the percussion strokes intro to his Violin Concerto based on when people knocked on his door due to loud music.

BCN 21 reached 9 year old in Lebanon, touched Tong.

Chinese Version:

For revival a church must:
- pure faith
- sacred lifestyle
- clear vision

John Song of China focused on sacred lifestyle. Martin Luther, Calvin, etc. focused on pure faith.

Lukewarm, worst than cold or hot. For if cold, one would know to repent.

Lots of first inventions from China:
- Glass, before Song Dynasty (around 1000 AD), while the West only started 13-14th century.
- Paper, Han Dynasty
- Gun powder
- Compass
- printing press
- clock, Song Dynasty, water clock, only seen in Japan now. Invented by Su Song 苏颂.

You don't need to be fluent in English to teach/preach in English. An old pastor, Pan, 79, encouraged Tong (29 then), in Singapore, to not be afraid to preach in English. John Song was bad in English grammar, but people loved and needed his message in English. Not the language, but the message. Tong had the experience in the Berkeley University The Wheeler Auditorium preaching. An old pastor (David Beckony?) also took and accompany Tong to tour the university, eating meals, etc. to encourage Tong before his preaching. 主的同在比任何是都要紧。

v.20 Why Christ, the head of the church, standing outside knocking? Because the church has chased Him out.

Ephesus - Lost the first love, barbaric, uncontrollable, inexperienced, but with true heart, precious. (First rebuke)
Smyrrna - You must endure hardship
Pergamun - You abide in Satan's throne (second rebuke)
Nicolas sect, Balaam, Jezebel. (third rebuke)
Thyatira - idol, sexual immorality (4th rebuke)
Sardis - 按名你是活的，其实是死的 (5th rebuke), lots of church members look alive but actually are dead, same with the elders.
Laodicea - Lukewarm (6th rebuke), he doesn't recognize the Lord and His glory, God will also abandon him.
You put your Lord outside (7th rebuke), knocking on the door outside.

After this sermon series. Tong will preach on the 8 judgments of the Bible, starting the next week)

Posted in Theologization | Leave a comment

What's Happening Until Now

Posted on June 25, 2021 by timlyg

I think perhaps this pandemic lockdown is God's way of revealing human hypocrisy after some longsuffering. That when we everyday dressed up with our suits and ties to work, we are not representing the decency and nobility of our dress codes.

On government overseeing how businesses run via licenses and permits: I think it's too much control. The best government could do is to police ratings, reviews and rankings, not how businesses should run. There should be free market on this. This will avoid bribes, unfair bureaucracy, etc. Now there's probably concern that if these licenses are not in place, then there will be too many lawsuits for the court to handle from grievances of one problem company. In that case, I think it's should be a case by case matter, not over generalizing the rule for everybody.

I 3D printed the adapter for my Seneye Monitor so that I can hold the device face up in the reef tank. This is the first useful print I made. Before it, I printed a very small pyramid from a sample file out of curiosity. I need to learn how to model these things myself rather than downloading others' works.

Posted in Biology | Leave a comment

Aquarium Update (6/22/2021): The group of stocks that died...I think

Posted on June 22, 2021 by timlyg

I think the Fluval light helped a bit. PAR is around 50-150 depending on depth. Before the Fluval, the Aqueon light was doing virtually zero, 30 tops and that is out of water very close to the light. The frags and anemones certainly didn't glow in Aqueon light the way they do now in Fluval light.

Fluval Marine & Reef 2.0 LED tested for PAR at direct closest range:
Pink: 200
Cyan: 100
Blue: 350
Purple: 150
Cold White: 950

From Petco:
The chocolate chip starfish died, around 3-5 days ago. It was perusing around the tank, as if look for where the water flow is and dwells there. But when I installed the return pipe outlet (duckbill nozzle) so that I could redirect the water a bit away from the corner of the tank (not sure if it's doing anything bad the the seal of the tank), the starfish left the spot where the flow's the strongest on the top side and perused elsewhere, mostly near the water surface, and then one day, it was laying flat upside down on the substrates with some tiny tentacles out, so I thought it was still alive and turned it around and confirmed that it should be alive when the legs retracted after touching it. But then it didn't move and it's top skin started to turn light color at some spots and I checked. I'm leaving it in the tank for now since it's small, until I've done my research about this. Maybe this will help promote bacteria that I need to cure the tank (I think it's bad idea, but I am totally clueless at this point).

The Kenya Tree (from a further Petco) has completely melted away after I placed it on the purple rock. Not sure if it was the light, the flow or the NH, NO levels.

From CoralsAnonymous:
The CA Ruby Red Pulsing Xenia didn't do anything much since day one, and now it's just probably gone, don't see much. I can't tell if I got cheated on this, although there were very small xenia but not pulsing for sure. Now's like all gone.

The Purple-Tip Hydra Bubble Tip Anemone appears to have melted...there's still some remnant but I don't think they are alive. Some tips do glow in blue light but seems to be in the melting process. This was not looking good even on the first day, appeared to be folding in two, and I tried to sit it on the white rock but it moved a bit and then had the strength to attach itself to the side of the white rock, but was already deteriorating. Not sure if I got cheated out of this one. Unless I misidentified this one, it was either too small to tell or that I just couldn't tell if it's like the one in the photos as if it was too dying to be recognized. I just checked their website and they are out of stock, so I am not sure if I got the last bad one.

The Green Long Tentacle Anemone's doing well so far and the Clarkiis are loving it. Took a while to find a few spots but I think it's settled now at the base of the purple rock, I did manually place it there.

Purple Corkscrew Long Tentacle Anemone seems to be doing well as well, I think it's not as purple as it's shown in the photos. More like brownish, unless I misidentified it with the Green Long Tentacle. It's functioning just like the Green Long Tentacle Anemone and settled itself under the white rock before the Green Long Tentacle.

The Ultra Mini Carpet Anemone has magnificent colors but it had me worry, I still do. It kept moving around on the white rocks, I then placed it on the purple rock and then it moved again couple nights later. Looks like it's settled at the back of the white rock for now. Sometimes I couldn't tell if it was melting.

The Green Pipe Organ doesn't seem to do well. Only a few pulps (like 2-3 pulps) opened up and very small, I don't really see much appendixes. With the blue light, the few, 2-3 tips do glow green, but just tips. I would need to learn more about these.

The free frags, about 4 polyps appear to be doing well, but not showing too healthy. My other frags from FirstChoice is bigger with more pulps and looks better.

From Aquaridise:
The Leather Finger doesn't look so good. The dark polyps are still coming out but may not be as extended as before and the coral is softer than before, can't really stand up.

Everything else appear to be doing well. I think one emerald crab molted as I saw its empty shell near the feather duster about a week ago and nothing's in the shell. I left the shell in the tank for the cycles to take over.

And this is the tank's condition as of now:
After calibrating the BHP03 Portable digital pH meter (hopefully I don't have to calibrate anytime soon as I would need to buy those powders again for calibration), the tank water is measured at 8.02.

Using the Seachem Laboratories Ammonia Alert 1 Year Monitor for the first time, I think it dropped from around 0.05 ppm to now 0.3 ppm-ish. Between alert and safe. I am going to verify this with the other tests just to make sure. But right now, I'm not going to worry much about Ammonia. I still have Seneye monitor to test this that I haven't done yet.

First time using Hanna Calcium Checker: 376 ppm (google says normal range should be: 380-450ppm) so I'll add some calcium again.

The pH meter calibration and rinsing and the Hanna Calcium checker were done using Walmart bought (82 cent per gallon) distilled water. My TDS meter tested the water at 1-2 ppm which I guess is good. So no need to use RO or deionized water.

I'll probably test Alkalinity and Phosphate tomorrow with the Hanna Checkers for the first time.

Posted in Botany, Questions | 1 Comment