A video I made of my dive partner and I, diving with Aquarium of The Bay's resident monster Sevengill shark, Shirley, who at the time was the largest Sevengill in captivity. I'm the diver with split fins, black mask, and incredible musculature.
MyGen Profile Generator
I'm down with dihydrogen monoxide. This profile was originally meant to just be a supplement to resumes for aquarium related jobs. Now, it's more a chronicling of my aquatic adventures. Check out my band, Giant Squid, below to see what else I'm up to.
I've owned two separate aquarium maintenance companies, American River Aquarium and Umbrella Aquarium Sciences, as well as a tropical fish store, O St. Aquarium, in the Sacramento, CA area. While living in Texas, I ran the entire Austin and San Antonio aquarium maintenance routes for the what is most likely the largest aquarium service company in the nation, Aquarium Environments , a very high end company based out of Houston, that would also manufacture insane custom aquariums. Currently, I'm a profesional SCUBA diver at the Aquarium of the Bay in San Francisco, down by Fisherman's Wharf at Pier 39. You can see me feeding sharks and scrubbing the tank glass while blowing bubbles on any Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.
You will find pictures of my old store and just a few of my previous maintenance accounts, as well as some of the Texas tanks I serviced for Aquarium Environments, under the pic section to the left. I really wish I had taken more photos back in the day!
O St. Aquarium is still there (I think, it's been a long while since I drove by), being run again by previous owners, Peggy and Jack Chan, who had originally bought the failing, 25 year old shop when it was known as The Fish Company (Where I actually worked at for almost a year as kid!) and then changed the name. The store sits on the corner of O St. and 30th, five blocks away from Capitol Aquarium (Where I also worked for a couple of years!) in downtown Sacramento. Little piece of Sacto history: The building used to be the very first bar opened in 1969 by Sacramento restaurant mogul, Randy Paragary, and was called the Parapow Palace. According to my Aunt who had gone there a couple times, It was a rowdy biker bar with saw dust on the floor and Harleys lined up out on the street!
People will always ask, "Well what happened to your shop?" I bought the shop from Peggy and took over officially, September 3rd, 2001. We all know what happened just over one week later. It took a little while, but eventually after 9-11, the world stopped spending cash on frivolous things (such as money eating reef tanks and high end aquarium epuipment). Tropical fish stores all over California (and I'm sure everywhere else), as well as hundreds of other specialty hobby stores both old and new, went under in the next couple years, including mine. We lasted a couple years though, met an incredible amount of interesting people and new friends, gained a ton of experience and some incredible memories.
My hugest thanks to all my amazing employees who helped me through those rough yet fun times - my sister Mandi, Josh "assistant manager" Field, Ying, Amanda, Arthur, Kevin, Richard, and my brilliant manager, Dennis Blanco, who kept all the corals smiling, pumps pumping, and the fish fed. Also, thanks to Johnny Cowan for helping with the American River Aquarium while I ran the shop, and then handing it back to me in such a time of need (I owe you the world for that my friend)! Most importantly though, my business partner and brilliant and creative Aunt, and my unshakable Mother. With out those two, it would have never have happened.
Best Aquarium shops in Sacramento, CA: O St. Aquarium and Capitol Aquarium
The company I worked for in Texas: Aquarium Environments
Aquarium Of The Bay - where I get paid to dive with enormous sharks!!!