(I know, beware when someone begins a story by declaring it a 'funny story.' But this one is more funny as in "wow, that is kinda whacky", although it certainly has some "wow, that is hilarious!" parts.)
Two Christmases ago, the Husband's sister sent us a thoughtful gift of a hummingbird water fountain. It was a graceful bit of copper sculpture that requires only a body of water and electricity. The hummingbird gracefully hovers over the open petals of a tulip, from which flows a charming cascade of water, hitting one of three leaves....Can you tell I thought it was a bizarre gift?
It sat in a box for a few months, until the Husband decided that we ought to get something to put the fountain in, so we could enjoy it. Running water makes me have to pee (as does laughing, yelling, coughing, having sex, and peeing), but I thought, why not? Running water is also supposed to be soothing, right?
He came back from the hardware supercenter with... a red flowerpot.
I liked the flowerpot. It was red. I like red. But it was not exactly appropriate for the 18 inch tall Hummingbird Water Fountain... Notice that the sculpture now has capital letters. That is when it began to assume a life of its own.
It distressed me, but we returned the beautiful flowerpot. I would rather have kept the flowerpot and returned the Hummingbird Water Fountain, but alas, it was a gift, and we didn't know where to go to return it, whereas we knew where we bought the flowerpot. Byebye, little flowerpot.
Hello 35 gallon pond.
We put the Hummingbird Water Fountain in the pond. We had to experiment with bricks and cement blocks to get the height right, but soon, we had a lovely pond on our back deck, with a copper fountain splashing prettily.
One day, that summer, I was having my zen moment, kneeling before the Hummingbird Water Fountain, enjoying the tinkle of water before the run for the bathroom... when I saw something...something in the water... something moving. A bug? The Hummingbird Water Fountain kept the surface too busy for mosquitoes... or did it?
Tadpoles! We had done a good job, and created a viable ecosystem for wildlife! Amazing! Frogs had come into our backyard, and hopped up onto our desk, and laid eggs! Except...they weren't tadpoles. Unbeknownst to us... one of our three water plants had carried a bonus. A cluster of fish eggs.
Koi! We soon had tiny fish all over the place! Cool! This led to frantic research, visits to the pet superstore, the purchase of additional water plants for the fish to eat, koi food, and endless speculation on what variety of koi we had.
Look carefully at the picture. You see that the pond is on a deck. A deck. As September turned cooler, we began to recognize the implications of a 35 gallon pond with fish and water plants on a deck.
We set up the fish tank that the Husband had used back in his youth, which had until this point in our marriage held only a tennis racquet and collected dust. This necessitated the purchase of a new filtration system, of course. And modern chemicals, new water plants, and indoor gravel.
We successfully transitioned the 16 fish inside and figured out how to store the plants for the winter (5 gallon buckets of water in the garage). At this point, we discovered that we didn't have true koi, but shubunkins, a different variety of goldfish, but lovely and thankfully not as large as koi.
Fast forward a little. Spring arrived, we scrubbed the gravel from last year, and set up the pond again. It was lovely, and the fish were so happy to be back, and they grew. How they grew. They also had fishy sex, apparently, because part-way through the summer, I noticed there were some tiny little fish as well.
Shit. We bought more food, and new plants, and continue scrubbing away, and taking care of the damn pond... the damn pond that we only had because of the Hummingbird Water Fountain, which was no longer as happy as it once was, what with all the fish shit and algae filtering through the water. Plus, the Hummingbird Water Fountain lost one of the three leaves, and was not shiny and pretty anymore. Oh, and it made noise.
Summer ended, and we captured the fish again, and set up the plants, and all was well. Except we now had well over twenty shebunkins, and the biggest guy was attacking the other fish, and we had to fucking clean the tank every three weeks to avoid the stinky aquarium smell. The algae was awe-inspiring, and we briefly debated adding an algae eating fish. Error check, and I instead sent out a plea over the Borg to see if anyone wanted some fish.
One of my girlfriends has a proper outdoor pond, and was happy to take some lovely shubunkins. I let her pick out the prettiest ones, and encouraged her to get the big ones. We were left with a more manageable 15 (or so, have you EVER tried to fucking COUNT fish? Really?) and the fish society seemed happier.
Two weeks ago, I was drinking with Wine Friend and the Husband. I was tipsy, admittedly, so the guys can be excused for laughing at me when I suddenly exclaimed, "Is that a fucking snail?"
Funny jokes ensued. But, the truth of the matter cannot be denied. We have a snail somehow.
I threw away the Hummingbird Water Fountain.
