Near Death Experience

Yesterday was worrying. For the fish in the work. Yes, the fish. They almost died. Like, actually almost died. The pump stopped working. No more air was going into the tank. Sometimes people forget that fish need to breathe oxygen. And when the pump stops sending it into the water, that spells trouble.

First thing to do? Check the fusebox. The electrician's-brother in me did that first. The switch was down, and it wasn't staying up. (No innuendos, please.)

Next step? Check to see what's wrong. The fuse might have blown, or something else stopped working. It wasn't the lights, anyway. They would have just gone off. So we got an extension lead from the centre security guards, plugged the pump in and... nothing.

That gave us a new problem. It wasn't just a fusebox problem. It was a pump problem. An expensive pump. The natural reaction was to call the local (very local) pet shop for help, but they could only help us with the fish. So a fish-tank company were called. They arrived right before closing time, meaning someone had to stay behind (thankfully it wasn't me, because I wasn't in the shop at that stage!)

The new pump was installed, with the little note that if we'd waited a single day... well, the fish would have asphyxiated. You know what that means, right? We saved their lives! Super booksellers to the rescue! And we had our pet shop, security and pump-installer friends to help us! Hip-hip hurray!

The madness of the fish's near death experience was surrounded on all sides by screaming children, pouting adults and books being put in the wrong place... none of which were connected to the fish, of course, but they didn't help. It was an eventful weekend, to say the least! But it wasn't all bad. The fish were alive and well when we got into the shop (and when we left!), various assorted problems were sorted out and now my co-worker gets to enjoy a trip to Japan. I got almost everything ready for my website, so it won't be long before I'm ready to launch it! I'm hoping for a September 11th launch (I may have already said that a dozen times...).

In the meantime, I've secured my wordpress.com username for my X-Men story. I figured it was best to do that now, rather than wait and risk it being taken. Now I just need to actually write the story. I still think it's going to be amazing. Probably less disturbing than the fish almost dying, too. At least I'm in control of who lives and dies!