A few thank-yous before my post:
- Thanks to the F. family for inviting us to the ballet last weekend so Pooks could feed her dancin' soul. Unfortunately it was during naptime on a particularly fusstastic day, so we missed it. :(
- Thanks to BnL, who sent me a giftcard for some design work I did for their anniversary. They didn't have to do that, I would have done it for free just for all the years of great music and laughs we've had. If I could get a plane ticket to Portland for the date, I would totally crash your party.
- Thanks to my awesome boss, who actually included the word "vital" on my performance evaluation. I never wanted to hug a supervisor before when leaving one of those meetings. (Well, certainly none of the asshats I worked for over in athletics.)
- Thanks to Blueridgeblog for my tomato plants. I will try my damndest not to kill them.
- Thanks to L. for the kebabs. (You could be a part-time-modellll)
- Thanks to K. for next week. It hasn't happened yet, but it is going to rule.
- Thanks to S. This story will explain why:
Disney was a huge success. I plan to put up a gallery over there > sometime soon, and TomC, I have a special photo just for you. One of the things Pookie was really into at EPCOT and at Animal Kingdom was Finding Nemo. She was immediately drawn to it, despite never having seen the movie. There was a ride, there was an aquarium (the re-branded "Living Seas," aka "Attraction they added to EPCOT in 1986 because children were literally dying of boredom in the park because all that was there was some damn thing about hydroponic carrot farming"), and there was a live-action puppet show at Animal Kingdom.
The show was great, and kept her full attention despite being almost an hour long, and right at naptime. She now exclaims almost hourly, "I SEE NEMO YESHTURDAY!" (Anything that happened in the past is "yeshturday" to her. Works for me.)
If you ever go to AK and it is ungodly hot (why is it always so hot there?), I highly recommend it.
So when my friend S. was moving and decided to get rid of her aquarium set-up and asked if I'd be interested in it, I jumped at the chance. Yes, I thought, what a great way to incorporate both fun and learning! Pookie already knows and chatters on about clownfish, seahorses, stingrays, sharks, dolphins, octopuses, and a variety of other aquatic beings, so why not get the home game? I'll get the tank (surely it's small) and store it until I have time to set it all up. Perhaps I'll do that in the fall.
Today I went to pick up the tank. Far from being the diminuitive, manageable tank I had in my mind, it was 30 gallons, with a full setup of rocks and plants and filters and bells and snarfblats.
And with fish. 8 scared, freaked-out little fish who were about to do a little off-roading to get to their new home up on the ridgeline. We loaded it into the back of the Pilot and I set off for the homestead, knowing I'd be greeted by 8 tiny white floating bellies when I opened up the liftgate. And Pookie talked to them the whole way. "KEEP SWIMMING!" she commanded. Yes, please. Please keep swimming.*
And shockingly, they all did.
But there was nowhere suitable to put the tank. The cozy little counter-top I'd planned to use (eventually, you know. In the fall. Or sometime not soon) lacked a good 3 inches of clearance. Everywhere I considered was either too accessible to Pooks, not strong enough to hold to 200 pounds of tank/water/fish or otherwise problematic.
Then DJ came home. If I'd imagined a 10-gallon tank, he'd imagined a fishbowl from the fair, sans the goldfish. Words were spoken, hands were wrung, dinner was not eaten on time.
Finally, there was only one place to put the tank that was safe, and sturdy, and viewable by our budding Cousteau. Necessity spawns invention.
Also, it's summer. Not like we're using the fireplace.
Update: It's 1:27 am, and our little octet is still together and swimming. Fingers crossed for no floaters in the morning!
*I fully recognize the irony in getting a fishtank because of the movie Finding Nemo. If you've never seen it, one of the main themes is that fish don't belong in aquariums, but in the sea where they can be free.
Also, I didn't photoshop the fish into that Pookiequarium photo. The Disney people in their infinite ability to tie things in together, understood that the kidlets were there to see Nemo and Dorie, and stocked the tanks accordingly. I was more interested in the moray eel tank. Those guys are badass.
