Pavlov's Fish

For Y's 4th b-day, my sister-in-law bought him a fish. We had fully expected this pet store Beta to last no more than 6 months, but it hung out for 3 years, and kind of grew on us. He passed away a few weeks ago.

This morning I walked into the Psych lab to find a bunch of Beta's in small tanks on the instructor's desk, with a sign saying that they were free to a good home. I inquired as to what kind of experimentation had been done on them (ie-these aren't going to turn into Frankenstein fish - right?) Apparently the learning lab students were using them for some kind of behavioral/conditioning experiment.

How does one condition a fish should have been my next question, but I just took one and said, "wow - my kids will be so excited."

So I shlepped my new pet around campus. I brought him to my next class, and told the teacher he was a good luck charm for today's test. I took him to the library (the one with the scientific journals, and all the serious students), and talked to him ("I'm going to leave you right here. Be back in a minute.") You get the picture. At one point some guy chased me down to tell me that his girlfriend brought one of these home yesterday, and to ask if I knew how to take care of it. It was all definitely comical.

Then I got to my car -- and I had a fish -- and I had NO idea how I was going to get him home without spilling fish water all over. I put the tank on my passenger seat, put some things under the tank to even it out, and put my purse on one side of it, and my bookbag on the other, and hoped for the best. Keep in mind that Detroit is not known for its smooth roads.

It was a bumpy ride home, and my car smells like fish, but Pavlov survived and now he is happily swimming around in his tank on my kitchen window sill!