Last Sunday John and I were doing our bi-monthly water change on our saltwater tank. Even though we thought it was empty we're still trying to get the nitrates down to 0 so we can buy fish again.
So there we were, La De Da, John emptying the water and me standing around, like usual. He had pulled off our filtration sock (I don't want to go into a long winded explanation of this, if you want to know what it is, do what every other American does and google it) and had set it on top of our filtration system.
It has been sitting out of the water for a good 20 minutes while I helped point out that he had drained enough water and instruct on how to get the new water in. I then decided to make myself more useful than I usually am and went to wash the sock.
The filtration sock can be washed in the washing machine, but should be turned inside out to get it to its cleanest possible state. So I stick my hand in to turn it and I touch something. Of course I immediately pull my hand out because one of my biggest fears is touching things I don't want to touch, that and Pillsbury's dough tubes that pop when you open them.
After I peered inside I noticed our shrimp, but instead of red he was clear. I made an "EEEK!" sound, dropped the sock and ran back over to John while wringing my hand in my shirt, around my neck and in my hair while I wailed, "I TOUCHED IT! I TOUCHED IT! I TOUCHED IT!"
Of course this is normal behavior for me so it didn't even throw John off his groove. Without even looking at me he calmly asked, "What did you touch?"
"THE SHRIMP! I TOUCHED THE SHRIMP!!!!" I cried, while doing the "I touched the gross thing" dance.
"You did not touch the shrimp, the shrimp is dead" John said, still not taking his eyes off the fish tank.
"But I did and it's alive, it moved when I touched it!!!" I screamed back at him.
After much arguing about whether the shrimp was even in the sock, John went over to investigate. He decided that it was dead, dropped the sock back on the floor and told me to continue what I was doing before I, as he put it, "became psycho".
There was no way in Hell that I was going to continue what I was doing! Didn't he hear me?!?! I touched the thing!!! He then told me to "grow a pair" and dump him in the toilet, turn the sock inside out and wash it!!! Nope, no, uh uh, that wasn't going to happen. I had touched the shrimp.
We again argued about this for about 5 minutes because he said I had to do it, but I knew if I pretended like the sock didn't exist anymore that he'd just do it for me. This is how I handle anything I don't want to do, just ignore it.
Finally after we got the new water back into the tank and I was cleaning up the buckets John went to take care of the sock. I smiled because I knew I had won. Marriage isn't a competition, but I still won.
I then heard a "plop" from the toilet and then a, "oh....huh..." from John. As causally as he addressed my "becoming psycho" I said, "what?"
"He's not dead...." came the reply from the bathroom.
"Then scoop him up!!!" I yelled, while running a fish net to the bathroom.
Mr. Shrimp was hoping around like crazy, probably a big shock to go from 78° saltwater to 20° fresh toilet water.
John had a hard time scooping him out, but about 5 minutes later he got him and I ran as fast as I could away from the fish net because I had already touched that shrimp and I didn't want him to remember and jump on me.
John dropped him into the tank and he swam down to a rock, stuck himself to it and didn't move for the rest of the evening.
I had the highest hopes for Mr. Shrimp. He lived in a filtration sock for 2 weeks with nothing to eat, he could survive a dip in the toilet, I was sure of this.
But alas I was wrong and the next morning I found Mr. shrimp dead and being eaten by critters of the sea. Good news though, his color had come back. I'm glad I talked John out of the $40 shrimp and into the $9 shrimp.
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