~Poop On Jelly~

Our Family's Bitter/Sweet Life



Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Because Fish Need Fresh Breath, Too

Mrs. Nurse Boy here.

So, you have to live in a cave if you haven't heard about all of the famous ones who passed away last week. Somehow, in a really weird way, I am sadden by the loss of the gloved one. Yes, I know he wasn't the same man that danced the night away in the music video, "Thriller." But, who doesn't remember where they were when they watched that magical video? And, you know you had a Beat It jacket. Come on, fess up. Mine was a knock off. HAD to have one. It remained in my closet and collected dust. I mean, let's face it, this white girl couldn't pull off that look. (Honestly, who could?) I think it had something to do with the fact that I lived in the suburbs, didn't make millions of dollars, and didn't have my own entourage following me around. Oh, and I didn't wear one white glove everywhere I went and toss it into a crowd of my fans. My only fans were my parents and my mom always wanted to know where the other glove was...

But, all of this talk of death has me revisiting a tragedy that happened in our home a few years ago. Get your tissues handy...

Dimples has always wanted a pet of his own. We have a cat, but Mocha has never counted in Dimples' book. Mocha is 18 years old now. His idea of fun is a bowl full of food, a little gentle petting, long naps all day long, and a clean cat box (which we may or may not provide on a regular basis). So, my parents came to Dimples' rescue a few years back.

What do you get a boy who wants his own pet and thinks his cat is a bore? Why, a fish, of course! Because THEY live an exciting life of...eating and swimming in circles?

He promptly named him MAC. He loved Mac. Why, I will never know. Mac "hung" out in the kitchen. Dimples spent a lot of time watching him swim around, proud to call Mac his own. Bruiser was also infatuated with Mac. Bruiser was all of 2 years old. Both of the boys wanted to take turns feeding Mac. It always made me nervous because they were certain that Mac needed a 4 course meal. So, under much supervision, they were allowed to feed the fish.

One day, after the boys had been tucked into bed, I found our brilliant fish with a fishbowl FULL of food and he was gorging himself. He was on a mission to eat every last flake. Apparently, Bruiser had climbed up onto the counter and gotten into the cabinet where we had carefully placed Mac's food and dumped the entire container into the fishbowl. Nurse Boy and I went into quick action to save the dumb fish. We were determined to rid the scene of evidence.

This was not about the fish. It was about avoiding the tears of our first born.

It was too late. We awoke to a dead fish. We decided to do what every honest parent would do in this situation. We called my parents and told them to head to the pet store STAT. They were instructed to show up on our doorstep with a healthy, blue beta fish named Mac. Oh, and some fish food, because we were out.

And, they did. And, Dimples bought it hook, line, and sinker. We all breathed a sigh of relief. Why was lying so wrong? Who wants to listen to tears over something that can be flushed down the toilet. No harm, no foul. Right?

Wrong! All was well for a few more weeks. Until Bruiser climbed up onto the counter again. No, we didn't keep the fish food in the same cabinet. We had learned our lesson and hid it well. However, someone had put Tic Tacs in the same exact spot where the fish food had previously been. That's right. We are brilliant like that. That day, I found Bruiser hovering over the fish bowl with an empty container of mints. Mac was swimming, very slowly, in orange sugar water. Bruiser proudly announced, "I feed Mac." Yeah, so I see.

I scooped Mac out of there and promptly cleaned his bowl. Since I was such an honest, open parent, I was prepared to erase any evidence of the breath mints swimming in the bowl with Mac. When Dimples entered the kitchen, I calmly told him I was cleaning the bowl for Mac. After all, we all like to be in a clean home.

Yeah, I was too late, yet again. We decided that we couldn't keep running to the pet store for more Macs. Or, could we? No, that would be too dishonest. We let poor Dimples face the music. However, we never told him why Mac died. We decided we shouldn't let him know that his own brother killed his pet. Twice.

Because we are honest parents like that.

Hopefully, our kids will have better morals than we do...

12 comments:

Lisa @ Boondock Ramblings said...

My mom would not allow me to have a fish. She knew what would happen to it.

However she let me have a dog and one day I let that dog out of the house and she was hit by a car and killed.

She should have let me have the fish, because I swear losing the dog scarred me more than a floating fish would have.

Mr. and Mrs. Nurse Boy said...

Oh, great! Now I have to pay for your therapy, too! YIKES! Didn't mean to stir up old memories!!

Mrs. Nurse Boy

Tiffany said...

When my son was about 2 we had a 20 gallon tank with several fish in there (I've since forgotten their names - crappy mama, I know).

So, anyway - I was working away in my office and kept hearing a "clunk"ing noise coming from elsewhere in the house. Since I had a 2 year old on the loose I went to investigate. What I found was my 2 year old on a stool stirring the fish tank with the fish net. And in the fish tank were 6 blueberry muffins floating on top and almost an entire container of pink lemonade powder. He was stirring to make the lemonade! When asked what he was doing, he smiled and answered: "I feed the fish."

Kari said...

Reminded me of the year all my fish died (about 6 total) but one remained in the 10 gallon tank. The 'crap eater' is what I always called him. The little guy lived for 2 more years on his own. When he died I got choked up and my dad stood next to me while I flushed him down the 'poreceline express'. Sad thing about it all - I wasn't a little kid. I was about 22 years old. Yep. Pathetic, I know! :o)

momstheword said...

We darned near killed our two gerbils after we got them. We totally forgot we had them (out of sight, out of mind) so nobody was feeding them.

We thought the kids were feeding them, they thought we were. And then everybody forgot we had them.

Fortunately we remembered before it was to late and hubby nursed them back to health. With a little food and water they bounced back very fast. But we felt very bad.

Mummy McTavish said...

My friend sat on her sisters bird. She didn't notice until her sister started looking for where the bird had gone. I feel so bad for laughing about it but really, it is kinda funny. Her sister didn't think so. She was a wildlife carer and was worried she would lose her licence because of her sisters wayward butt, oh and she kinda loved that bird.

My kids seem pretty okay with the whole dead fish scenario, it's been played out so often at my parents house... we turn up with the fish tank right in front of the door and a floater on the top to greet us. The dogs have only died of old age so it's been discussed with them before the even has happened... we have been pretty lucky so far.

Sir Nottaguy-Imadad said...

I had a small turtle (about the size as a half dollar). One day I noticed that he needed more water in the Turtle tank. I marched him into the kitchen sink and filled the tank. I didn't know that my brother was in there a few minutes before, rinsing out a milk glass. The water was still hot from the rinse. I didn't check the temperature of the water before I put it in. If you turn on cold water, cold water should come out, right? I cooked that poor turtle.

3 Bay B Chicks said...

You are hilarious. There are too many good one-liners in this post to count, but I will try...

1) the gloved one
2) orange sugar water
3) because we are honest parents like that

Reading your blog is my absolute pleasure.

-Francesca

Boy Mom said...

I agree with Francesca, total pleasure.

I need to borrow Bruiser, my boys bought a red beta for a scout project and the dang thing won't die. That sounds really bad! Sorry! I just want to know why I am the only one who ever cleans and feeds their scout project for a year and a half now.

momstheword said...

You know, I really want to come and help you, I really, really do. Because that's the kind of friend I am.

But well, I have this horribly painful....ummm...umm....hangnail.

Yeah, I have a hangnail and the..um....hangnail-doctor-specialist-guy told me that I need to be off my feet for at least a week, maybe even a year.

Even after I recover he said that, uh, I shouldn't help people with their basements.

So sorry, really wish I could, but doctor's order, you know.

Mother Mayhem said...

That's horrible. I laughed anyway. I'm horrible.

Suz said...

I am pretty sure your kids will be just fine. We used to have a big fish tank. It was our oldest Christmas one year, He was 3yrs old. It was fun but the cleaning of the tank wasn't.

I want to get permission to put listerine freah breath strips in some of my patients mouths. They need fresh breath too, arrghhh.

I love the verse of the day. I told my children they have to do something nice for each other everyday. How is it going? Well...

Love ya!