Fish-haps (Fish and Mishaps)

Look closely at the top left...I promise they are there

   Bleary eyed I rolled out of bed and stumbled toward my computer. The clock said 9am, far too early for me on a Saturday morning. I sat down in my chair and popped open my laptop, and I decided to look over at my fish tank. Rubbing my eyes I yawned and greeted Captain and Tennille, and then I saw speck darting quickly around the tank. Blinking my eyes in disbelief I looked closely and saw a very tiny pair of eyes hovering above the neon rocks at the bottom of the tank. Upon further investigation I found four more pairs of tiny eyes, they were baby guppies. This put me in a moral dilemma, I knew that these babies were as good as dead if I left them in their tank, but I also didn't want to take the time to try and catch these minuscule fish. In the end the good angel won out and I began scooping around the tank, rescuing one stupid baby guppy at a time.
    When I was little I used to have goldfish all the time, it was the only indoor pet we were allowed to have. I had the coolest tank, it was blue with a filter and everything. At any given time I had at least two goldfish, if not three. The goldfish I remember the most was One-Eyed Jack, who was named by my sister. In case you didn't catch this, One-Eyed Jack had a disability, he was missing one eye. Where his little beady fish eye should have been, there was an empty socket. Sadly, there are no eye patches for fish so he had to swim around with his eye socket all bare and exposed. I won't lie, it kind of creeped me out, but as time went on I grew to love him. He was a great fish I guess, and he lived to be 2 years old so he was a tough cookie.

Looks exactly like him

   Eventually, I grew sick of having fish, and cleaning their tank became absolutely disgusting. So after a while when my fish died I stop buying new ones, which was a good thing because I've been known to have a few mishaps with fish. The first one wasn't my fault, it just scarred me for life. I was cleaning out my sister's fishbowl for her (cause I'm a good person like that), and one of her guppies had been missing for a few days. How can a fish go missing? I had no idea, but I found out quickly. I discovered it had died inside one of the seashells in the tank. This was brought to my attention as I was rinsing out the shell and a dead fish fell into my hand, and it was one of the grossest things I have ever had happen to me. The next incident was my fault and I still feel bad for the poor guy. I was cleaning out my fish tank so I had to put my fish in a little cup while I cleaned. As I was scooping up one fish, I ended up dropping him and he fell down the sink. No more was he to swim happily around my tank, he was dead and I was a fish murderer.

I'm getting a bad reputation

    Alas, that was not the last fish murder I committed. Last year when I was a bright eyed and eager freshman, I decided to buy some goldfish from Wal-Mart. Happily I picked out four goldfish to live in the little plastic tank I had purchased, complete with a neon cave and neon rocks. I brought them back to my dorm room, got the tank ready, and left the plastic bag in the tank water to allow them time to adjust to the new temperature. Eventually I let them out of the bag and they began to swim around. The next morning I woke up to greet them, and all of them were dead. Four dead fish bodies were staring up at me, declaring me a murderer. I invited a few close friends over to stand watch as I placed the lifeless fish into the toilet. We all said a few words and I softly whistled "Taps" as I flushed them to the great beyond. But this did not stop me from wanting to buy new fish, oh no it did not. The very next day I went to the pet store and decided to buy a beta. I had heard that betas were good, sturdy fish and probably wouldn't die on me. So I brought John-Boy home and gave him plenty of time to adjust to his new tank. He lasted two weeks, and then another funeral procession was held.

Ebb in all his glory

   I was worried that no fish could live in my presence, maybe I had committed some sort of sin against fish and all fish that I owned were automatically doomed to die. With my last ray of hope I went back to the pet store and bought two guppies. I carefully placed them in the tank, willing them to live. Hoping it would help I decided to give them very strong names: Ebb and Flo. Ebb was a bright orange color with a white belly and Flo was a rather translucent white. They appeared to be very happy in their home and frolicked all around the tank in their own fish way. Nervously I kept an eye on them, and soon I had owned them for over a month. They were going to make it! Then one evening as I came back from dinner I looked into their tank, and 5 black specks were at the top. Confused, I looked closely and I discovered that my fish had not only lived, they had reproduced! In a fit of joy I let out a shriek and quickly moved the babies into their own separate tank, because I knew from my online research that guppies had a tendency to eat their babies. Yeah, guppies are messed up.
    My roommate and I decided to name the babies the 5 Davids after our acting professor. Two of the Davids went on a treacherous journey with me to Omaha. They were placed in a coolwhip container and I buckled them into the passenger seat. To my great joy they lived and made it to the daycare center my sister worked at, they were renamed Milo and Otis. Another one of the Davids went to live with a friend of mine who named him Finn. The last two Davids stayed with me and were rechristened Laverne and Shirley. Not long after the birth of her children, Flo passed away. It was a difficult time for Ebb, but with the help of his ridiculously short memory he forgot she had ever been there. When I would go home for long vacations my fish traveled with me, and it was a trying time for all of us. The babies would fit very nicely in the cupholder because I kept them in a small plastic container, but Ebb was another story. I had to empty his tank of most of the water and carefully place him on the floor of my car, making sure the neon cave was secure enough not to fall over and squish him. Somehow we all made it through these trips without anyone falling out of their tank.

Shirley

    As the months went by Laverne and Shirley grew, and Ebb stayed exactly the same. Then, one fateful July day Ebb went on to join Flo. With my head hung low I led the funeral procession to the bathroom. My eulogy for him was heartfelt and passionate. He had been my fish, and we had truly bonded when he lived behind my laptop. He would always follow my finger as I moved it around the outside of his tank. It took all the strength I had to lift my arm and flush him away. Later that summer Shirley went on to join her parents in the great fishbowl in the sky. It was just me and Laverne.

Captain and Tennille

    Went I got back to college in the Fall I decided it would be a good idea to get a friend for Laverne, so I went to the pet store and picked out a very pretty half black guppy. His name was Squiggy, and he got along pretty well with Laverne. In my mind I planned out their happy lives, filled with lots of baby guppies and maybe even move them to a bigger tank. But this was not to be, as Laverne soon passed away. In case you've lost track, at this point I have killed 9 fish in  little over a year. If I wasn't careful I would soon be into the double digits...I wasn't careful. My euphoria for Christmas break was so great, that as I was shopping I forgot the Squiggy was still in my car in the back seat. I happily spent two hours finding amazing deals at the Albertville outlet mall. When I got to my sister's house I found Squiggy dead in the cold backseat. As I walked into the house my three year old niece shouted out her greetings, and I decided she was old enough to learn about death. Together we took Squiggy into the bathroom and I let her have the honors of flushing him down the toilet. It seemed as though my fish days were over.

Sturdy and no mess!

    You might think that the death of 10 fish would  dissuade me from buying anymore, you should know by know that I'm not that smart. A few weeks ago I went into the pet store and I picked out Captain and Tennille. They looked like sturdy fish, in fact, they resembled Ebb and Flo. We are about a month into it and I'm happy to say that they are still going strong, and they are the proud parents of: Anni-Frid, Benny, Bjorn, and Agnetha (in case you don't know those are the singers of ABBA). I like to think that the birth of these guppies makes up for the death of my other fish, and that someday I can own a fish for over a year. Or maybe I should just give up on fish and get a sturdier pet...like a rock.