Tips On How to Care for Your Baby Yellow Belly Turtle

Hello everyone! Having pets can be a great benefit and there are so many different types of pets you can have to help improve your quality of life. Right now I'm going to focus on the yellow bellied turtle. These guys you normally see in a flea market or pet store being sold as tiny babies, usually barely larger than a quarter. We actually found ours on our property (I nearly stepped on him he was so tiny) and through trial and error, advice from experts and lots of research I've managed to give our new little guy a happy new home. This is little Mikey (like the tmnt turtle)

At first I thought he was a red eared slider since I found him in the wild but after research and showing pictures to a couple of store owners it was to my relief (since red ear sliders are an illegal invasive species in Florida) that he is not. He lives in a 10 gallon tank (we will transfer him as he grows bigger) and has gotten so used to us now he will eat out of our hands. Now I am by no means an expert, these tips are what I've learned from experience and much research. So lets get started!

Tip One: Environment Make sure you have your basics before bringing home your turtle. A proper aquarium, food, ramp, rocks (if you choose)and filter. These are the essentials for a turtle. I would recommend a 10 gallon aquarium or larger since your turtle will outgrow a smaller environment. The saying that these turtles will only grow as much as their environment will allow is a myth. I know this from experience of having turtles long before. I had bought a turtle at a flea market and got one of those tiny cute little plastic habitats for it. Within months he was too big for it. So make sure you start off at a reasonable size. Having the right food is also important. We rotate between the pellets and dried insects. No more than 2-3 per day. Turtles are opportunistic eaters and will keep eating if you keep feeding them. This can cause them to outgrow their shell which can cause severe complications or even death. So make sure you don't over feed it. Turtles are semi-aquatic creatures so makes sure he has a place he can dry off at. Being in the water at all times can cause problems for their skin and shell. A ramp or island of sorts is ideal along with a heat lamp. Mine loves to bask in his heat lamp and I often catch him stretched out on his little ramp.

If you want to layer the bottom of your aquarium with something, DO NOT USE GRAVEL! Like mentioned previously, they are opportunistic eaters and may try to eat bits of the gravel which can get lodged in their intestines and kill them. Use large rocks, marbles or stones if you want to add a bottom layer to your tank.

A filter is a must. Without a filter, you'll need to change the water almost daily in order to keep a clean and healthy environment for your turtle. Filters will help reduce the amount of water changes you'll need to do.There are alot of filter options out there too. For ours,I use cascade 300 and I only change the water once a month, the same time I replace the filter cartridge. I use a siphon to get up all the excess waste that get caught between the rocks and will only do a 50% water change.

Tip Two: Sanitation After handling your turtle or doing water changes make sure you thoroughly clean your hands. Turtles can carry salmonella and they create a lot of waste in their water so keeping yourself clean afterwards is a must!

Tip Three: Tank Mates Now from what I've read and heard from others this is more or less a hit or miss. Given the fact that turtles create alot of waste in the water it can make the water not an ideal place for most other fish to live in plus, again, turtles are opportunistic eaters so they may try to take a bite out of anything you put into the tank. But there are a few that can work with your turtle if you are careful and keep an eye on it well enough. One for example is the common Pleco fish (algae eater). These guys have a tougher exterior than most fish and are surprisingly fast if they need to swim away from a bite. We've had ours as long as we've had Little Mikey and they've done great together. Plus our Pleco (Specs)seems to be outgrowing Little Mikey so he may be a bit too intimidated to try. Another good tank mate are Ghost shrimp. These guys are very cheap (I get mine 10/$1) and since they are harder to see the turtle generally ignores them. Plus having these two species help keep the tank clean of algae! Bonus. Another one I've tried was the cory catfish. These are another type of bottom feeder that don't get very big and are fast swimmers. I had them in with Little Mikey for about a month and they did great with him before we decided to move them to our 55gal tank. We also had a rainbow shark with the turtle and other fish. Even though he also did well, rainbow sharks are semi aggressive and territorial and being in such a small tank with other fish we decided to also move him with the catfish to the larger tank. Now fish we tried that didn't work out so well - Fancy guppies. They were a nice snack for Little Mikey. I would not recommend adding guppies with a turtle or any slower swimming fish with bright colors.

Tip Four: Live Plants You can add live plants to your turtle aquarium but I will tell you now: They won't last. Turtles love to eat plants and will munch on any live plants you add to your tank. Little Mikey's aquarium had live plants for only a couple of weeks before he devoured or killed them off. Also depending on the plants, they can clog your filter if they get loosened. You will also need to be careful with artificial plants as well given your turtle may not be able to tell the difference and may try to eat those as well. We have some plastic grass as well as a tougher artificial plant but not too much. These are just some of the basics we've learned on how to make a happy little home for our new friend. I hope this helps you in the future and in deciding on your new friend as well. Cheers!

Facebook Drama, Oh Joy...

I've seen this link going around on facebook about wonderwoman being queer and didn't think much of it. One of my friends got excited and was one of the posters. My boyfriend makes a simple, silly comment and shit blows up over it... I screen shoted everything and even though I stayed respectful on my friends post for her sake (unlike most others on there)I will not be so kind on my own website. Even though it is my own rant, I atleast respected the privacy of everyone there but the ignorance, disrespect and immaturity of these people is now public for all to see! Go here(don't forget your popcorn) http://www.ljpengu.com/my-blog to read the nonsense. Enjoy!

Chain mail Dice Bag/Coin purse

Look at this on eBay http://www.ebay.com/itm/122112016908

Since my fiance plays Dungeons and dragons every week I've found myself in the habit of making more and more Chain mail items. I have a couple extras up for sale! This one is a basic design with a neat arrow head pull string. It doesn't have to be for dice either. It would be a great accessory for larping or just holding some change. Grab it while you can!

World of Warcraft Legion: Making the World Safe for Profit (Can't find the Queen?) Location

This is a video that shows the location of Queen Kraklaa incase anyone is having trouble finding her.

Legion: Warlock Leveling Guide

Legion will be here in less than 24 hours and I bet you're as excited as I am! And just like previous expansions, we will have some leveling to do in order to get caught back up. For some reason I've always found leveling easier than the rest of the game play and even though Warlock was never my first choice, for me, it is the easiest to level. So lets get to it... The fastest way I've ever leveled has been with affliction. Dotting several enemies at once while letting your Voidwalker do the tanking drops the enemies fairly fast while never being touched. *Here are my specs for my talent tree thus far: 15: Haunt - deals extra damage 30: Contagion - Unstable affliction gets 15% extra damage 45: Demon Skin - Soul leech recharges and can absorb 20% max health. 60: Siphon Life - Siphons targets life essence, dealing damage and healing you for 100% of damage. 75: Dark Pact - Sacrifices 20% of your demon's health to shield you for 400% of sacrificed health for 20 sec. (can be useful when being attacked by multiple targets your demon does not have aggro on). 90: Grimoire of Service - Summons a second demon for 25 seconds for extra damage (who wouldn't want more help?) 100: Phantom of Singularity - places a dot above the target consuming life of all enemies within 25 yards dealing extra damage while healing you. (very helpful when in a bind. Soul conduit would be my second choice considering how many soul shards I use.) Now for the rotation: As you pick your targets begin dotting them up with ... 1.Unstable affliction - Haunt (try to cast these two as close together as possible) 2. Corruption - Siphon Life - Agony 3. Use Drain Life on individual targets while waiting until dots are up or target is dead. Continue the 3 steps until targets are dead. *Seed of corruption is good when you have multiple targets grouped together. Use only on one target at a time. *If your health is at max or pretty good and your demon may be taking on too much to handle and is close to death use Health Funnel to heal it, sacrificing some of your own health. ~TIPS~ *Remember to keep fear on hand in case your demon dies and/or you become overrun but too many targets or too strong an opponent. *ALWAYS keep a soul stone and health stones on hand. *When in a group (such as a dungeon or raid) your fell hunter will be a better companion. Voidwalkers can get in the way of tanks.) *Remember you can life tap if you run low on mana. With all the extra healing your spells should be doing you should have plenty of health to sacrifice. This is just a basic run down to help people who struggle understanding concepts of the game. I've tried to simplify it for those who may have trouble absorbing the mechanics all at once. With this, once you get the hang of it, the rest begins to become easier to understand. I hope it helped for some, if not most of you. Happy leveling in the new expansion!

World of Warcraft: Legion Draenor Quest line Bug Fix

I spent a good half hour trying to figure out why I wasnt seeing Khadgar. Was he on a platform? Flew up and saw none. Was he underground? Given Draenor is a flying Island, no. Finally I did some reading seeing if anyone else was having the same issue. They were. Though most didn't have a solution I saw one comment on a remedy that worked. Simply log out and log back in. So I tried it and it definitely did work! I also recorded it on my OBS system and uploaded it to youtube to show other players that it should work for them as well so if you're stuck on this as I was just give it a try. If you need proof or want to make sure its the same spot as what I'm talking about then check out my video below. When Legion is finally released (I pre-ordered it)I will hopefully have more videos up on what to expect so please like and subscribe to my channel! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8gtFZeoVcM

Fist Day of School a Disaster?

After only a week's break my first day didn't go as planned. I showed up for my 3d Design class five minutes early and met my only classmate. That was a bad sign. Eight students are required to make a course. I asked her if she had gotten her supplies from the book store yet and she tells me they werent going to get them in for six weeks. This is normal for our college. Every art class ive taken the book store always screws up with the orders, putting us in a bad spot. Still it irritated me to hear this. About 20 minutes of waiting the head of the art department showed up instead of the instructor. Bad sign number two. He then looks at me and says jokingly "I must be the angel of death to you." This was the third time an art class I've signed up for has been cancelled.

Not quite knowing what to do next I head over to registration to see what classes are available. It's the first day of school and I only see 3 countless working when I know there's at least 5 for our campus. One hour after signing in I talk to a counter who kept confusing my ID number and didn't understand the program I'm in...great. I tried to keep in mind her day is very busy and probably just as rough as mine was turning out to be. She eventually manages to help me find an available class that I (now late) have registered for and I head to the bookstore. I partially expected the line to be out the door. I decided to try again later in the week before my next class.

Heading home I'm both disappointed and stressed so I swing by a fast food joint (which I am not suppose to eat) who's drive through takes 20 minutes with only 4 cars ahead of me. It's lunch time so go figure right? I make it him to find a roommates parent parked directly across the driveway to which I begin honking vigorously. I'm not in the mood for this shit, they should know better.
Once I get inside I sit and scarf down my food, a clear sign I'm in a bad mood and am heavily avoided by everyone. First smart move I've seen anyone make today.

I am now lying in bed loaded with medicine to prevent sickness and anxiety attacks and venting to whomever will read this.

Going back to my origional motto: expect the worst and hope for the best. Taking this on sooner would have left me only slightly annoyed.

Hope everyone else is having better luck today.
/rant over