Howard, the Popeyed, Jumpy, Slimy, Mischievous Fish

For the last few days Howard has been looking a little sketchy. You know those nasty toys whose eyes pop out when you squeeze them? Howard looks like one of those toys... while it's being squeezed... So today I did some research and found out that Howard has popeye. How appropriate.

Luckily, according to Betta Fish Facts Blog, "The good news is this new "look" that your betta is displaying isn't fatal and will go away if you do a few things." The first step to recovery is replacing water in Howard's bowl.

Normally, this is Grant's job. Although having a fish is nice and I enjoy looking at him, I'm not big on touching Howard, his food, or his water... gross. However, Grant has been muchos busy studying for his Series 7 exam. So, I decided to buck up and do it myself. BAD IDEA.

First, I put Howard in a cup so that I could work on his bowl. That went pretty well: no fish to finger contact, no messes. I poured all the water in the bowl down the drain and then poured the rocks onto some paper towels. All the gross stuff stays down in the rocks so I wanted to dry them off and get them cleaner. I proceeded to wipe out the inside of the bowl when I look over and...

HOWARD'S ON THE COUNTER! I instantly panicked, and of course, started screaming. I did NOT want to touch Howard, but I knew I'd be in trouble if Grant came home to a dead fish just because I was a weenie. So, I grabbed the cup and whatever was closest- the scrubbing brush for the dishes. I brushed Howard towards the edge of the countertop but instead of landing nicely in the cup, he fell on the floor!!

Again, screaming... I contemplated whether letting him die on the floor was worth it, and then screamed a little more. I gathered all my courage and tried to grab him. He flopped, I screamed, I retreated, he flopped again. I reached forward (screaming), grabbed him and aimed for the cup. Missed! One more try (screaming) and Howard was safely in the cup.

After breathing a giant sigh of relief, I looked down to check out the damage. The following text conversation then ensued:

K: I think I popped Howard's eyeball... but he still lives...

G: What did you do?!

K: He jumped out of the cup! I had to TOUCH him! It was very stressful and lots of screaming was involved. I think his eyes are okay now- the lighting is bad.

K: He's fine- just traumatized. But not as much as me...

Turns out, Howard's eyes are both in tact, although still both very pop-eyed. He lives, and amazingly, after that horrible experience, I live too. I still don't want to ever touch a fish again...

Early Mornings, Fish Disease, and Childhood Glory

It has been an eventful week! On top of Grant starting his new job, which is probably post-worthy on its own, there are three other noteworthy transpirings (and yes, I know that's probably not a word):

1. Today, Grant went to church with just his scriptures and left with all of the seminary manuals... Yep, he's going to be an early morning seminary teacher. And this is not your regular early morning seminary-- this seminary starts at 5:45 AM. Oh snap- that'll be an adjustment. Grant is not exactly an early riser... Luckily he only teaches every third week.

This isn't the Grapevine seminary... but close enough...

2. Howard is diseased. Being the qualified veterinarians that we are, we diagnosed Howard with Ichthyophthirius multifilis. This is also known at the white spot disease, hence the picture. He hasn't been very active lately, mostly sitting around on the bottom or at the top of the tank. In addition he hasn't been eating and when he swims it's always in fast, darting motions. We purchased some "Quick Cure," aquarium salt, and have started heating his water with a candle warmer (sophisticated, I know). He's certainly improving.

3. For various reasons, Grant and I are a little late on our Christmas presents to each other this year. So this week, I got one of my presents. For school last week, I wrote a paper on Doug, one of my favorite television shows growing up. Grant was so clever and bought me the complete series of Doug! It includes over 100 episodes of the show from both Nickelodeon and Disney! You can guess what we've been doing with our spare time lately...

Doug is the best... really

Tragedy Strikes Again!

We Tanners are no strangers to tragedy. You may recall the loss of our first waffle iron, Waring. We are also currently coping with the slow decay of our mango tree, Plantie. Well, today we mourn another loss: the unexpected, though prophesied loss of our ghost shrimp, Telly.

We woke up to find his lifeless body among the gravel. The autopsy results are yet to come back but we can only think of two reasons for his sudden death. First, Howard may have bumped him off when we weren't looking. However, this seems unlikely as Howard and Telly seemed to get along just fine. Second, and probably more likely, Telly expired from overeating (the plague of America!). We have yet to see Howard eat an entire pellet of food. Most of the time Telly would eat the pellets before Howard even showed interest. Perhaps his poor little invisible body just couldn't handle it.

Funeral arrangements are being made. His body will be interred down the flusher probably after Grant gets out of the shower. Virtual condolences, flowers, and money will be appreciated by the mourning family.

Meet Howard!

For our 1.5 year anniversary, we decided we'd had enough time as just a couple and needed an additional member for our family. So, we headed to PetCo! There were lots of cute shelter dogs there, begging us to adopt them. But, as cute as they were, after we passed them I remembered all of the many, many reasons we don't want a dog. We made our way back to the fish and looked all over for Howard (we decided he would be called Howard beforehand). We decided on a zebra danio (see pic) until the PetCo man convinced us otherwise.

He said that they only carried one fish that did not require a filter. Since we'd already bought our fishbowl at goodwill (of course) we weren't down for the filter idea. Thus, Howard became a betta fish.

This is NOT Howard. This fish probably cost a LOT of money.

We spent quite a bit of time debating over which Betta was to be Howard Tanner. PetCo had probably 40 or more Betta for sale and I think we looked at every one at least a few times. Well, we looked at all of the cheaper, male Bettas a few times. Frugality is a necessary trait to be a Tanner. Thus, the $15 fish weren't even in the running. After a pretty intense swimsuit competition, side-by-side color comparison, and swim-off, we found Howard!!

We love how he has a dark face but vibrant blue backside, big fins, and a little red accent underneath.

We also bought him a little buddy. This is Telly!! Telly is a ghost shrimp and my parents were 100% sure he wouldn't last the night (due to Howard's supposedly belligerent nature). We are proud to report that Telly is alive, active, and very hungry. He eats Howard's food... and we can see it inside of him because he's see-through... kinda gross... Oh, you can see Telly at the top of the bowl, just to the left of the plant. He has some kind of black food in him...

Howard loves his new home and the fact that he has lots of space to swim. They were keeping him in about a cup of water at the store so he is very pleased with his new parents for his freedom. His favorite activities so far are: swimming, keeping his eyes open, staring at the light when we shine the flashlight on him, and not eating. We've tried to feed him twice and he's not too interested. Telly's favorite activities are eating Howard's food, hiding in plain sight, (because he's see through), and swimming.