The fish is dead. Long live the fish!

A couple of weeks ago it was Biscuit's Birthday. She desperately wanted goldfish and we were happy to buy her some. She spent ages choosing their names and getting ready for them.

On the day of her Birthday Mr Husband, Wiggles and I collected Biscuit from school and took her to the local garden centre to choose her gift. We bought the tank, the filter, the pebbles and all the expensive water treatments. Not to mention the two little goldfish themselves; Nuzzle and Scratch.  Now I don't begrudge paying for them one iota, but I was slack jawed in amazement when the youth behind the counter announced that our little lot would cost us the princely sum of £52.  Fifty two quid?!!! I was expecting something closer to £15!!!  Still, as long as our girl was happy.  And she was, she loved those fish!

She was desperately worried that they wouldn't survive the journey home. Probably my fault, because I couldn't see them through the bag they were in I'd said something along the lines of "I hope they're ok in there...." She was so happy when we opened them up when we got home, declaring "They're alive!" in a way that made me think of Brian Blessed in Flash Gordon.

Sadly when I returned home from work the other day Mr Husband informed me that Scratch appeared to have gone to the great big goldfish bowl in the sky.  Thankfully he wasn't floating on his side at the top of the tank he was stock still at the bottom. He'd definitely gone though, he'd not moved for ages and his gills had stopped flapping.

We'd decided to keep their tank on the landing right at the top of the stairs so we had to distract Biscuit past on her way to bed. And we did pretty well I must say, she didn't notice a thing....

I began to worry that the dead goldfish would poison the remaining goldfish like some sort of deadly goldfish teabag so we had to get it out as soon as possible. We solemnly made the necessary arrangements, scooped out poor old Scratch, gawd rest him. I belted out a quick verse of "All Things Bright and Beautiful" and we bid the little fella farewell.

In the morning we once again distracted Biscuit as she passed the tank so she wouldn't be upset by the distinct lack of fishy action. She is ridiculously easy to distract. After dropping her off at school I made dash back to the garden centre.

You'd think it would be easy to buy a simple goldfish, but the old codger on the desk was in a bad mood so sent me on a merry dance around the shop. Cantankerous swine. Eventually I managed to buy a very similar fish, get him home and slosh him into the tank as if nothing had happened.

Until Biscuit returned home from school, fed her fish and announced "Scratch has grown AND he's got a suntan, he's got brown blobs on his tail. And Nuzzle looks poorly to me"  A quick butchers at Nuzzle confirmed that the poor fishy Mr had what looked like the fish version of internal bleeding. I got my google on and discovered that this was likely to be down to the water. I plopped in a couple of the ridiculously expensive water treatment beads that set me back so much and hoped for the best.

Thankfully a few days later he seems to have fully recovered. Phew! I don't want to go through that again any time soon!

Any one else ever performed a pet switch? How did you get on? Has anyone ever switched your pet under your nose? Did you notice? I'd love to hear your tales/tails!!!

Love, love,

Edit: Tuesday 14th May 2013 - 1600 hrs. 

This morning the new fish was swimming around happy as Larry (whoever Larry may be) this afternoon we returned home from a Baby Shower (really nice, thanks) and the sodding replacement fish has kicked the bucket!!!! I can't believe it!!! Why today? It's just too bizarre, I feel like I've jinxed the second fish, doomed it to a watery grave. 

We've decided to come clean. Perhaps it's Scratch (the surviving fish), maybe he's a lean mean fish killing machine? Maybe the bloody gills were a sign of his murderous conquests? So cue many, many death related questions from Biscuit and much wailing and tooth gnashing....