o/t - boiled goldfish, advice needed

Yesterday afternoon I came home from work to find my 7 year old daughter's usually very active pet goldfish looking uncharacteristically listless. I tapped on the aquarium several times, but the listlessness persisted. Further investigation required, I put my finger in the water and was rather perturbed to find that it was the approximate temperature of freshly brewed tea. It was immediately apparent that the listlessness was due to the goldfish being very dead, presumably due to an extreme case of heat stroke. It was a particularly sunny day in St Petersburg yesterday, and as I was rushing out to work early in the morning, I had completely forgotten to open the window and close the blinds in my daughter's room, and thus there had been a localised version of the runaway greenhouse effect, leading to Goldie's untimely demise. My wife usually deals with the blinds, but she's away right now with my daughter, so I am very clearly 100% responsible for the mishap.

The obvious solution would be to buy a new fish, but having been to the pet shop today, it was obvious that all the fish on sale were probably quite young and therefore considerably smaller than the animal they would be replacing. Like most seven year old children, my daughter is extremely observant, especially with regards to anything concerning her own possessions, and I am reasonably sure she would notice immediately that something was not quite right. Therefore, I am left with the choice of either attempting to con her into believing that nothing ever happened with the risk of being rumbled, or coming clean and admitting that her pet suffered a probably quite unpleasant death due to my own complete incompetence. Any advice would be gratefully received.

PS - Just for a little bit of background information, her other fish passed away three months ago after somehow managing to get its lateral fin completely mangled by trapping it in the mechanical filter. This was obviously due to the fish's stupidity rather than mine, but anyway it's fair to say that she did not react well. Fish are really not very good at swimming with missing / severely deformed fins, in case you were wondering.

 

There's only one solution....
... Buy her a puppy before she finds out

 

No suggestions, or advice, just good luck as it’s going to be emotional, and erm, expensive

 

That's definitely not an option. I am really not a dog person to put it mildly. The goldfish were bought to stop her sh@gging my head every three days about wanting a sodding dog!

 

Put a slice of carrot in the tank and tell her the fish is resting because it's been so warm while she's been away

 

Pets aren't really for you are they

Do her a fish finger sandwich and explain that times are hard and it's what the fish would have wanted

 

That's actually brilliant. I'll just have to make sure the eyes I draw on are both the same size. Three months from now, the third week in November with snow falling all around. "No, definitely still resting. Still too warm for her to move."

 

Believe it or not I went to a pet shop this aft and asked if I could buy a goldfish. The man asked "Would you like an aquarium?". "I don't mind what star sign it is" I replied.

 

I tried that once, but the puppy drowned in the fish bowl.

Sad times.

 

Is that joke directly translated from German?

 

No. It's even worse than that.

 

Be honest with her. Simply omit the bit where her Dad is an irresponsible, piscine murderer, as that may become somewhat problematic for you!

 

I'm not mentioning any names, but there's a poster on here who would probably prefer grilled goldfish. I wonder if he/she will own up.......?

 

Anyway, this thread is nowt to do with Bradshaw. Take this kind of talk somewhere else ;-)

 

Man up and buy her a doggo ( said only because I have had to give in and get Cerys one though not yet).

 

Damage its fin, take a photo and pretend it was as stupid as the last one.

 

I could claim natural causes. After all, the sun is natural. Just it was the double magnification of the bedroom window plus the glass of the aquarium that caused the water to heat up to the temperature of the average volcano. Science lesson?

 

So what you mean is don't be honest with her then?

 

Brilliant! Ten out of ten, old mate.
Err, I mean, how can you possibly come up with such an idea?

 

If you're volunteering to come and walk it when she inevitably gets bored with it after three weeks, because I'm certainly not doing it!