Yes ma'am, I can't afford to order the taylor c kit until the end of the month so I attempted to take a water sample to the pool store today.

Unfortunately the girl testing the water was a friend of my husbands family so as she stood there adding drops and looking at charts so talked on and on about family, etc. She dumped all the water out and picked up two buckets of alkalinity increaser (16.99 a piece) and said "chlorine, pH and stabalizer is all good. Your alkalinity is 40 though and it needs to be 90 for your size pool so you'll need two of these" I got out of it by saying I was just stopping in to get it tested and my husband may come later to pick some up. She said "ok, but you may need to get something for pH too b/c this may lower the pH some"

Sooooo, I know you hate to advise without actual #'s but my FC is still well above 5.0 pH still at about 7.6 but the water is still a tinge cloudy. Since she said alkalinity was 40 would adding some baking soda clear any of the cloudiness.

p.s. My husband thinks the water looks great and I should quit worrying about it but I'd like to get it right and then keep it that way. I can't wait to get my Taylor Kit - I have so much fun with the little 3way kit that I know I'll love the Taylor.