Super Fat Tuesday; Or, "Float the Vote"

So the life of my goldfish, Jude, has ended and I believe the snails I most recently added to my aquarium are to blame.

Poor Jude. I discovered him late last week, still alive but lethargic with brown spots near his gills and his fins tattered and torn as though infected with leprosy.

Most likely some parasite, so I removed him from the aquarium and put him in a bowl with an antibiotic. The brown started to clear away, and I thought he was going to get better... but 36 hours later, and he was dead.

Go ahead and make fun of me, but I felt a little sad watching him lifeless and limp on his side, moving only with the water's flow.

But as is tradition in this calloused world of fish ownership, I cleaned the original aquarium, spent a day of mourning, and then went to the pet store not only for another goldfish (I wound up with two), but also for a beta to put into a tiny, low-maintenance tank I'd finally been given the go-ahead to bring into work (after making my initial request a year ago).

But I quickly resolved to leave the beta at home; in part because I didn't want to open a can of worms at work even if I did have approval; and in part because it's rather amusing to watch Maude have fits observing this new creature, which is out of her reach but not her field of vision.








So, anyway, I haven't named any of the new fish. The goldfish will either be "Dido" and "Aneas"; "Barnum" and "Bailey"; "Lavinia" and "Ophelia"; "Echo" and "Narcissus"; or "Prudence" and "Eleanor" (those snails didn't really live long enough to claim title to their names).

The beta will either be Narcissus (because male betas are notorious for their big egos and brilliant colors); "Milton" (for the bottle-cap glasses guy in Office Space)or "Swingline," for similar reasons.

In honor of Super Tuesday, I thought I'd do the democratic thing and enlist your help in naming the newest members of my ever-growing dysfunctional family. See the upper right column of this page to float your vote.