I Can Be Your Hero Baby

I am a hero.

Yeah, I'm saying it. No sense in being bashful about it. You don't ever see Batman going "No, actually...I'm not him. People make that mistake all the time. I just wear this latex suit because it breaths well when I jog."

I saved a life this week, y'all.

Here's the back story...

At my current dwelling there resides no less than 7 beta fish. 5 of which are located in the kitchen. As you probably know, beta fish really like to call themselves Siamese Fighting Fish and much like the Offspring song, you gotta keep 'em seperated. I bring this up because there are fish tanks everywhere, and I think it's hilarious.

Anywho...Archimedes is a small white/albino beta who tanks in a window sill above the kitchen sink.

Earlier this week, my roommate/co-worker/homie Shayla and I were stumbling around the kitchen trying to get our lives together to go to work. Since neither of us had had coffee or breakfast yet, we were basically bumping around the kitchen trying not to fall over while packing Greek yogurt and cheese sticks. If you've ever seen someone run a Dizzy Bat Race at a baseball game...that's how we look in the morning.

I had just manuevered around Shayla to dump an old glass of water in the sink when I noticed that the pink rose in the green glass vase on the window sill had dried up and died. I don't know, it's still kind of pretty that way, I thought as my eyes slid down to the bottom of the vase.

Then I saw it.

I double-blinked. Stared. Double blinked again.

There, lying on the other side of the vase, was a very still, very dried up Archimedes.

"Oh, no!" I gasped.

He looked like this little pink plastic fish I got from the dentist when I was a kid: his little beedy black eyes staring straight at me, his mouth gaping open, laying completely motionless on his side. I vainly searched the fish tank to make sure that he wasn't still in there and that the fish toy from my childhood hadn't pulled some kind of Toy Story trick to put itself back in my life. Unfortunately, the tank was empty.

"What is it?" Shayla asked. She was in the laundry room, which connected to the kitchen, moving clothes into the dryer.

"Um..." I started. Archimedes is Shayla's fish, and I really didn't want to break the news to her that her fish was dead so early in the morning. Especially since he was bought to replace her last fish that died.

"Do I even want to know?" She asked, reading the look of dismay on my face. I could tell from her tone that she already knew what was wrong.

"No. You don't."

"I can't handle it. I can't see it. I have problems...the texture.."

"I know, I know. I'll take care of it."

I sighed and ripped a paper towel from the holder and then scooped poor Archimedes up inside it. Fish deserve a water buriel, so I headed for the bathroom to flush him. As I stepped into the bathroom, I felt a small tap-tap in my palm. I figured it was probably just his little fish body settling in the paper towel, but I decided to check just to be sure. I peaked inside the wadded up paper towel. Archimedes lay still. Then suddenly his tail fin swished back and forth.

"Wait a minute! There's still hope!" I remembered from my beta research that betas actually breath by filtering water through their gills and by gulping the air.

Shayla was my best good friend. She loved her fish dearly, as one would love a dog or a small child. This fish could be saved. I knew what I had to do.

I dumped Archimedes from the paper towel into my hand. He made no other movements than a weak swish of his tail fin. Beta lungs are tiny, be careful.  I lifted his body up to my face, put his little open mouth up to mine and I breathed a small bit of air into his little lifeless body.


Not really. Don't worry, I didn't perform fish CPR. And I wouldn't put my lips on a fish unless it were fried and battered first.

Here's what actually happened...

"He's alive!" I cried.

"Are you serious?!"

I ran back to the kitchen sink and dumped Archimedes into his tank.  Please don't go belly up, I thought. I had no idea how long he'd been out of water. But as dry and still as he looked I assumed it had been a while.

Well sure enough, the little dude starts swimming all over the place.

"He's totally swimming. He's alive." I said in disbelief.

We watched in stunned silence as little Archimedes swam all around his tank, clearly relieved to be back in his natural habitat. He appeared to be fine, other than the fact that because he'd been laying in the direct sun for who knows how long, his little white body had gotten completely sunburned. No joke. The dude was bright pink.

So yeah, I was 30 minutes late for work. And yeah, betas only cost 3 dollars. But I saved his life. He could have been flushed to smithereens. I saved him. He lives to swim another day.

We don't actually know why he was out of his tank. Betas are known jumpers, so he must have jumped out, but we don't know why and I don't know how he ended up like 7 inches away from his tank. He's still doing fine, although his skin is peeling.

How many lives have YOU saved today?
(question not open to doctors, certified life savers or professional rescuers)

Thanks for reading! =)

Excuse me, do you have any Bettas?

I have a problem.

I have far too many hobbies.

I have steampunk, I have photography, I have writing (which is actually more of a lifestyle choice), I have painting, I have reading and now... I have Betta Fish collecting (commonly pronounced bay-ta but actually spelled b-e-t-t-a).

It all started a couple months ago.

A co-worker friend and I decided that we needed to bring life into our sad little cubicles, but babies were too high maintenance. That's when she suggested getting a Betta fish. They're easy to take care of and hard to kill. Perfect for our atmosphere.

So she got a fish and I got a fish and everyone thought it was funny, but a great idea. People love coming into our cubes and gazing at our Siamese fighting fish. And no, we do not put them in a bowl together and have after-hours mail room bare-knuckle fish fighting. We keep them in their own tanks and we love them. We love them a whole lot. So much, it might be unhealthy.

Anywho, the both of us being nerds we scoured the internet and every fish dealer in the DFW area to learn every single fact and opinion about Betta fish care. We are very close to becoming Betta fish experts. So I can add that to my list of accomplishments.

Well a week passed and we went to another pet store that happened to have an amazing selection of Bettas and she caved and bought another one. I decided that I would get things together to make a steampunk tank for my apartment and get another Betta once it was done.

Cut to last Friday. Another co-worker decided she was ready for a Betta at her desk so we all went to the aforementioned pet store with her. While she looked for the scariest fish she could find, I wandered around to the back of the store where a few more Betta's were being stored.

And then I saw her.

A tiny little female crowntail Betta. She looked at me and gazed into my soul. And as I stood there staring back into her beady little fish eyes, I knew that we were meant to be together.

So what did I do? I bought her. I bought her and another tank and more decorations and I set up another aquarium at my desk.

I'm crazy. Just straight up, certifiably crazy. So crazy that I will probably buy the new Coldplay album coming out this week despite it's pretentious title and the fact that I swore to never support Coldplay.

WTF is happening to me?

Thanks for reading! =)