Sunday, January 18, 2009

There aren't plenty more fish in the sea.

Growing up I think we always had a fish tank. I have many memories of that fish tank including one of the fish trying to kill itself by swimming into the glass, cracking the glass and having all of the water pour onto the living room floor. Another memory is of the coolie-loaches (no idea if I spelled that right). The were worm looking fish and I thought they were just too cool. Then they disappeared. No idea where they went. Years, and I am not exaggerating, later we found them. 10 feet away dried up little sardines behind the piano. Interesting.

Jenn and I have a fish tank. I just spent the last half hour going through our flickr account trying to find a good picture of it. I'm at work or I would have simply taken one. But since I can't find one you are just going to have to picture it in your head.

We got these fishes forever ago. Cute little bright fish. It is a small tank, five gallons I think? Or maybe even just two gallons, I don't remember. Anywho. It started with two frogs, a lazy sucker fish (seriously, I've never seen him out of his cave) and 6 fish who we named Bob, Robert, Bobbie, Roberto, Roberta, and Robbie. (Jenn likes the name Bob).

A few months after we got them one passed away. Jenn called me at work all upset because she had to flush it.

Six months after that another was found floating on the surface, I flushed it before Jenn could see it.

Then a good year of happy healthy fishies.

Until one night a few months ago when I was just watching them swim around I was counting them. Two pink....one orange...one yellow. Hmmm, missing and orange, try again. Two pink...one orange...one yellow. Jenn, how many orange fish do you see. Jenn got nose to glass with the tank. ONE!!! Where is the other one?

We checked the filter, the cave, the plants. No missing orange fish. I told Jenn the story of the coolie-loaches and we had a little giggle and moved on.

A couple of weeks later I was watching the fish swim. One orange...one yellow...one pink. Um...Jenn. How many pink fish do you see?

A phone call was placed to Lyz about our strange disappearing fish. Now yes, we are aware that the frogs are known to be aggressive and eat fishies. But these frogs are half the size of the fish. I would expect some guts to be somewhere. We also can't blame our cat who seems to not even realize that the fish exist. Even when placed nose to glass she acts like they are below her and why should she care that they are there?

Three weeks ago Jenn caught me staring at the fish tank. What are you doing???, she asked. Counting our two fish. NO!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sure enough, we are missing another fish.

Three nights ago...I was again staring at the fish tank. Jenn caught my stare and said "They are both there, I just checked an hour ago." No. There is only one orange fish swimming all alone in the tank.

So...I looked at the frogs. They are no bigger than before. Their bellies would be all huge if they ate a whole fish. We would notice.

Do you want to know where we think the fish are? Are you ready for this? I mean, we have told you that we are odd before...so you are not allowed to laugh if you read this theory.

Carlos's cat ate them.

Who is Carlos? Why he is our ghost of course. He likes to play tricks on us. Nice ones. And he would really like it if we could paint our bedroom a lovely sage green. Please. He also has a pet cat, she likes to sleep in bed with us. It must be her that is eating our fish.

4 comments:

Rachel said...

This has happened to my aquarium at work! My office mate and I have come to the conclusion that it's the creepy little munchkin doll I keep in the candy jar(I got her in a happy meal, they were doing a Wizard of Oz theme).
We are down to 1 hardy betta fish, he's survived about 2 years now.

Anonymous said...

that is so strange!! wtf?! i think the carlos' cat theory is as sound as any. i hope your last orange fish is able to survive the ghost's grasp!

Karen said...

Ummm ... Why don't you just ask the last little orange fishy where his fellow Bobs went..

Anonymous said...

Whoa. that really truly is wacko. A little creepy and very strange...