First...calm the fuck down. NOTHING good happens in an aquarium quickly.
Cycling an aquarium usually takes 4-6 weeks if done correctly, but can be done in 2-3 weeks if you're diligent and do everything just right..
The tank won't even start to cycle without some source of ammonia. Some people use ammonia from a bottle, others use live fish...I prefer to toss in a small piece of shrimp and let it rot...yes, it will stink for a while, but that goes away.
Every time you take out the rocks and "wash" them, you basically end the cycle...and it will have to start all over again.
Patience, young jedi...patience.
Here's a decent site for basic aquarium knowledge:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/
One of the best in the biz...Robert Fenner offers this:
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/fwsubwebindex/fwestcycling.htm
You might not understand what cycling a tank is. You actually need to have fish in there to cycle. If you put just plain water there and expected things to stabilize that would be your main problem.
The idea is to throw fish you dont care about into the tank, and feed and care for them normally and not have to worry about if the fish die from poor water quality. Usually you would use a hardy species so they probably wont die even with poor water quality. Eventually the tank will accumulate all the necessary bacteria and then it will be ready for the fish that you do care about.
If you just have goldfish then you probably dont need to cycle the tank at all since they are usually quite hardy unless you have some fancy super inbred goldfish...
Or you can cheat and use starter bacteria in a bottle. Definitely a wide range of opinions on this but it worked fine for my tank.
http://www.tetra-fish.com/sites/tetrafish/catalog/Detail.aspx?id=4224
You might not understand what cycling a tank is. You actually need to have fish in there to cycle. If you put just plain water there and expected things to stabilize that would be your main problem.
The idea is to throw fish you dont care about into the tank, and feed and care for them normally and not have to worry about if the fish die from poor water quality. Usually you would use a hardy species so they probably wont die even with poor water quality. Eventually the tank will accumulate all the necessary bacteria and then it will be ready for the fish that you do care about.
If you just have goldfish then you probably dont need to cycle the tank at all since they are usually quite hardy unless you have some fancy super inbred goldfish...