Sad, but true, our littlest fish Pat Finn passed away today. He had been looking ill since he arrived. I’ve done so much research on fish health, stress and proper living conditions over the past few weeks. I find them so calming and graceful, so I want to do all I can to keep ’em around.

Here’s a lesson I’ve learned: don’t name pets after people you know. Especially if they work in the same office as you. Even more especially if the naming was done out of spite because the person criticized the original name. (mind you, I was not the fish namer and the rejected name was Sticky.) You never know if the human namesake will come down with shingles. Luckily, he was back in the office today. Unluckily, the smaller scaleier one died.

As the person who is most emotionally invested in our finned friends, I had the duty of flushing Pat Finn into the great beyond (of the San Francisco sewers). I happy to report I only choked up a little. No external tears.

The two other residents Mr. Pickles and Heidi appear to be thriving. Perhaps I just don’t know how to read their various moods. Their active swimming looks happy to me. After their stint on their webby lifestream, they are going to go home with the fish-namer to her two little boys. I hope they grow big and old.

On a final note, I felt a twinge of irony as I enjoyed my fish burrito for dinner. Nonetheless, it was delicious.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010 at 10:33 pm and is filed under life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.