problems Archives - Homemade Ocean

You know how I always say I need a reality show?

Oh you don’t…..well I do.

Sometimes, things happen to me and I just can’t even fathom the serendipity of it all.

We bought Dori a solid week ago. Let her get adjusted, beefed her up a little, treated her with garlic to keep her healthy. Waited to write our “new fish” post until we were absolutely-positivly sure that she would live a long and healthy life.

We even kept put her in a tank with only a shrimp and hermit so that she would be safe.

Today I wrote this post.

Today I came home to a hermit crab eating the remains of my Dori.

We did everything right. The water is perfect. No one is picking on her. She’s been eating like a champ. Looked healthy as an ox-fish. Got more attention than all of our other fish combined and believe me they are jealous.

She was our baby fish….and now she is gone.

I couldn’t make this up if I tried, nor would I want to. Tonight I will be drowning in ice cream yelping WHY.

I cursed my baby fish, and although I considered not letting you all in on our little tragedy. You have to take the good with the bad, and in this hobby, death is a part of life.

I just wish it wasn’t.

And why today.

And why that fish.

Ok that is all.

RIP little Dori….I’ll miss you.

Tim and I are not very superstitious…except the whole black cat thing, we totally believe that’s bad luck.

We did however, take receiving the water bill on the day I registered this domain name as a “sign” that it was a great idea that we record our tank tales for ~~all of the world~~ our parents to read.

I mean, there were more signs that we ~~found~~ made up. Like me bringing home the latest edition of Coral Magazine and our water quality being as perfect as it has ever been. This was obviously a great idea.

And then it happened….our worst fear….the one that we kept talking about preparing for but never did.

A power outage.

I would have taken pictures, but I wasn’t sure that putting a big black box of darkness would be a hit. The thing about a power outage is you never know how long it is going to last. Could be ten minutes, could be ten days (which is not unusual in these parts).

So we started preparing, not by buying a generator like we had been talking about, but by closing blinds and grabbing flashlights. Oh, did I mention it was 108 degrees that day…ummm yea heatwave.

Then it hit us, our tank! We did NOT want to end up like Elaine Benes in the Parking Garage so we made sure that the temperature of the water was ok and started to stir the tank periodically so that we could get some oxygen back in the water. No water movement makes for some unhappy homies down there.

Then we started to panic, this was a much bigger sign than a bill and magazine. Maybe some bigger fish force was letting us in on the fact that we might fall on our faces here. Or worse, fall in the jelly I spilled on our cream rug in the power outage.

After being discouraged/worrying about our homemade ocean/cringing at the thought of all the ribs we bought for a family BBQ withering in the fridge/dying of heat stroke we decided that we didn’t care if we failed. This blog is about much more than people reading it. It’s about documenting what we learn, how our tank changes, and most importantly…how our lives change.

And so we begin…signs or no signs we are pursuing our dreams up in here.

And for those of you wondering, the power came back on before the BBQ, the meat and the tank survived, and we did indeed do a victory dance on the bed while we praised the air conditioning gods. All in all….life was good again.

Tag Archives: problems

I couldn't script this if I tried.....

Is this a sign....