Finding Balance (Not terribly HAM related)

Right now it can still be a struggle to find some work/life/hobby/family balance.

I'm a problem solver. I hate not being able to fix something.. or worse.. having to wait. 

I have so many things I want to do, so many things I need (well.. want because I need them to do something I want to do). In the middle of it all, other things come up.... Christmas, kids, new antennas, more radios and the insane amount of money I spent on lab testing of the water in my reef aquarium that came back and told me that I still have high levels of tin.. much like the last batch that told me the same thing, right before I wound up replacing the entire water volume over a period of weeks. 

I use a thing called the Triton method - a method that doesn't rely heavily upon water changes, but has other supplements to help make up for it. They also do their own lab testing which is great - especially now that they've opened a lab in Cairns. 

Unfortunately they only do one kind of testing, and only on salt water. 

I can't find any sources of tin in this tank - last time it seemed plausible that some new glass baffles may have caused it (fresh glass is usually on a tin float when manufactured). This time around, no. Everything in the tank is near new given I've replaced nearly everything in the past couple of years, and there isn't any obvious signs of metals anywhere. 

Looking closer at the test results, I notice some other metals creeping up compared to the last result too.

I make my own water, using RO/DI, mixed in an IBC and pumped in via hose for the rare times I need it. The same RO/DI is also used constantly to deal with evaporation (this is automated). 

One starts to wonder if the tin being detected is present in the mains water. The levels are low by human standards, but they're accumlating in the tank quite simply because it's something that won't be absorbed, and because there are no frequent water changes, there is no export. 

Unlike a lot of common parameters, you can't just go and buy a tin test kit with a resolution of micrograms per litre. Alas, one of Triton's competitors, ATI does similar tests, but will also analyse RO/DI samples for free at the same time. There's another $70~ test - one that I'll probably have to ship to Germany at my expense, just to see if they detect tin in the RO/DI. If it does, then I need to replace the filters.  Then there's the $150 worth of salt, 1800L+ of water it will take to make 600L of salt water (at least the lawn will stay green).

I also have an algae problem that I'm trying to get on top of. I'm waiting for a different set of test results to come back for that. Those ones focus on nutrients so I can see if there is anything there that can be done to help that out, because absolutely nothing else is working.

Reef keeping is a bloody expensive hobby; one I got into the morning after the night before where the liquor consumption was measured in bottles rather than shots. I'd always been curious. I'd just never been crazy enough to try it. Until I did. I also wound up aquaculturing live coral for a few years, so I did endevour to do my bit for sustainability. I was also into custom made LED lighting at the time when the old schoolers insisted they'd be useless. 

I can't bring myself to part with it; I still have some of my original fish, in my first "big" aquarium. I've long since moved to commercially built lights (XYL acceptable aesthetic you see), and most of the moving parts have long since been replaced once or twice. I haven't been able to smell it in years. 

Finding balance is challenging at times. Finding the right balance in water chemistry.. well that's just expensive!