Freddy The Wonder Fish

Freddy the Wonder Fish performed another amazing feat on the weekend. He's a goldfish who lives in a big bowl near our front door. A while ago he leaped out of his bowl (I didn't even know goldfish could do that!) and we found him lying on his side in a shallow pool of water. I thought he was dead, but when I looked closer, his little gills and mouth were moving – he was saying “get me the hell back in the bowl!” So I put him back in and he was right as rain.

We should have put some kind of barrier in place, but I thought it was a completely freakish occurrence which would never be repeated. Well, on the weekend he jumped out again. But this time he wasn't so clever, and he landed on some dirt. By the time we found him he was looking dead and gone. The flies were starting to come and have a look. I put him back in the bowl just in case. He had dirt all over him. It was pretty sad. He lay on his side in the bowl, rather than topside up. He gave a weak flap of his fins every few seconds but I thought that it would be all over within an hour. But as we kept checking back on him, he got stronger and stronger. After an hour he was weakly swimming around his bowl, especially after my missus gave him a gentle nudge of the tail (his, not hers) to get him properly underwater again. He was still covered in dirt and looking like a zombie goldfish from one of those zombie goldfish movies. You know the ones.

I wished he was a cat, or another animal you could pick up and wipe down! We gave him a bit of food and crossed our fingers that he'd survive the night.

Well, not only was he still going in the morning, he had somehow managed to clean himself up. He was looking pretty fit actually. In fact, he seemed to be already planning his next “extreme goldfish sports” stunt. I hope he gives it up – I can't take the stress. Next weekend we'll be putting up some netting, spotlights and a goldfish guard tower. It's for his own good.