Fish

Not long ago we attended a nephew of mine's first birthday party. It was a fishing party and Liam got to go fishing for the first time. He didn't catch anything though...which was disappointing because even his 20 month old cousin caught a fish... and a turtle...

My sister in law had decorated the table with real goldfish on the table tops. She gave us the little goldfish (3 of them) to take home. My brother Connor took them in his car because I had a bad experience once transporting a fish (it died on me). The fish were still alive when he got home but I didn't want to move them in new water until I read up on it. Connor moved them though because he figured keeping them in the old water wasn't good for lack of oxygen. He filled the bowls with tap water. And tap water is bad for fish unless it's been treated to remove crap from it. We also didn't have a pump or filter. Nor did we have food for them. So by morning two fish were dead. One barely alive. David is such a softy he wanted to save the last fish. It looked so sick I thought it was past saving but David couldn't let it die without trying so I went and bought fish supplies...

David wants a crazy awesome tank that we haven't yet budgeted for. So we got 5 gallon tank that is acrylic, that will someday be in one of the kids rooms. We didn't know at the time that smaller tanks are harder to take care of. Also very few fish can thrive in a 5 gallon tank. Most fish need a big tank, so those little fish bowls are way too small and cruel to keep fish in. Anyhow, on my way home David called and said "get another fish, this one died". But it was too late, I was too far away and the store was closing in 15 minutes. We went ahead and set up this tank and even put live plants in it, so by the time we get our new fish it will be easier to transport it to it's new home...more quickly and safely.

Hopefully our next fish will live more than a day.