A Church Fish fry for Dem

Although he's been to a "fancy" fish fry at the Packing House, Dem had yet to experience the heart and soul of the practice - a Milwaukee church fish fry. So I took him to St. Augustine's for their very popular event. 

We both got fried fish (I normally order baked), fries (instead of round potatoes) and he had a few shrimp added to the plate, along with mandatory green beans that - gasp! - he did not eat. I had coffee, he had milk. 

I asked him if he's willingly eaten a single vegetable, any vegetable, since his arrival in September. .

 "Isn't there any vegetable you like? 

"Bok choy" he said. 

"Ok, that's great. I'll make sure we get some next week."

"Yes,I like it fried in oyster sauce. With chili all over it."

Pause. 

"So, basically, completely destroying any record that it was a vegetable?"

Laughs. "Sort of."

The church basement was packed, and loud. Father Philip said hello to us, and families were everywhere. Very young babies (I heard one said to be five weeks old) were on display by their parents, a sort of coming out party to the community. Along the wall, for the length of the rom, ran a narrow bench/shelf on the wall, ending right at our table.  

These two little girls, four or five at the oldest, and dressed in their Sunday best, would run down the bench and stop right by us.  I would nod and say "Hello Ladies." and they would run back down to their parents, then begin the journey back to us, again and again. 

Dem was confused, but I found the whole sense of community wonderful. 

Dessert was homemade, donated chocolate bundt cake.  The woman who served it to us? The mother of that five week old lol

Dem ate everything save for the green beans, and pronounced it good fish. I, personally, think it lost a little something after the break for Covid. But that might be nostalgia talking. I hope we'll be back again before Dem returns to Thailand!

(btw, that is Father Philip in the background, with the gray vest) 

Disaster!

Disaster. GusGus knocked something into our 40 gallon fishtank, fouling the water and leading to multiple casualties. Lisa, Smiley, Junie and I are waging an all out effort to capture the survivors, empty the tank, clean it all, and hopefully avoid an extinction event. Why am I on FB then? Cuz my hip started to give way, so I was sent to the bench for a minute. I'll be back in action in a minute

So far the remaining fish are alive and presumably well. Lu and Smiley cut the lawn. Junie and I visited my family and dropped off a turtle necklace the girls bought my Mom at Bay View Bash. YaYa wrote a story for a contest, good voice and setting, initially a smidge weak on plot, but easily corrected. Watched a Law and Order: Criminal Intent marathon. So, not an unproductive day.

 The gift that keeps on giving! Dale C. one of the most recent inductees, Sapphire. A pretty blue Betta, freed from his solitude (so happens Bettas are not happiest alone), who'd have known! - Lisa

The gift that keeps on giving

Dale C. - here's one of the most recent inductees, Sapphire. A pretty blue Betta, freed from his solitude (so happens Bettas are not happiest alone), who'd have known! - Lisa

St Auggie's Fish Fry

 I'm having trouble expressing how happy - how Milwaukee - I feel as I enjoy a great fish fry in a church basement. I opted for the baked fish, as you can see. The basement filled up within minutes of us sitting down.

GusGus and the Fishtank

 This is GusGus, heir to Billy, who in turn was heir to Lucky. Behind him is our 40 gallon fish tank. 

Whenever you press the button atop the tank to turn on the light, and/or open the curio cabinet to retrieve the fish food, this is what will happen:

GusGus will come running, from wherever he may be, and jump atop the table next to the fishtank. 

You must - and I stress MUST - shake a bit of the fish food into the cap of the bottle and hold it out for his dining pleasure. He will respond only for fish food, no mere "cat treat."

Once he has partaken, you are then allowed to feed the fish. He will then stare at the fish from his perch at he table, taunting them and forcing them to live every moment of their waking life with a predator a breath away from them. 

He's a charmer. LOL

Unacceptable

We got fish from Culver's for lunch, and when we opened it up at home the potatoes were covered in chicken gravy that leaked all over the fish. It's a Friday. It's Lent. I'm Catholic. I called and complained and got nowhere. But hey, I'm sure they'd put pork all over a matzo ball and stonewall the complaints too. #YouLostMyBusiness #Culvers

 At the St. Augustine Fish Fry with Lisa and Junie 

The Start of Lent

 This morning we kept the kids home from school long enough to attend Ash Wednesday Mass as a family.

I took #TeamSlap back to our church for an all-you can eat Ash Wednesday fish fry, which also featured yummy baked cod.

It cost an arm and a leg, but that's what I get for breeding so often and besides, I assume the money went to help the church.

Note that Princess YaYa seems annoyed and dismissive of the camera, because at least one of them needs to play that role at all times. Off camera however, they were all good.

The bottom pictures feature Junie playing a game called "Is it broken?". In the game either Lisa or one of the kids holds up a French fry and you have to guess if it's one long one or two pieces deviously masked by their sleight of hand.

Gulp

Just finished cleaning the fish tank, and got more than a few mouthfuls of fishy poop water when siphoning it out. Yum. Now, in a touch of irony, I'm watching Catfish the TV show.

Lisa: "I don't want to hear about you and the fish water. You probably have a flesh-eating virus now."

Me: "God willing"

Lisa: "Yeah, the problem with that, Slappy, is that it's never your stomach the virus eats. It's always an arm, or a leg."

Me: {shrugs} "Still be down 70 pounds."

Kermit, Chillin' in our Fishtank

RIP Quasi

Quasi, our deformed pleco, died overnight. He's been sick for over a week. Not 'ich' sick, but "lets move from the old folks home to the hospice" sick. RIP sir, and may you swim straight forever in whatever pseudo-heaven your soulless self has gone to in the sky.

I've Seen It All

I've seen it all. Hubby rearranged fish tank plants/skull to make pathways wider for our handicapped fish. He loves all creatures, big and small...lol....except mice. - Lisa

My Boy Quasi

Quasi the Pleco

A (Giant) New Pleco!

A productive day. I waterproofed the back porch - and the handprints of the kids we made in the cement back in '07 - then fixed the latch on the back door. Meanwhile Lisa went grocery shopping and made a great chicken dinner. And to top it off, confident that the Ich was gone, Smiley and I went shopping for a new pleco. 

We found one. But instead of the 1" version we had, we went home with a giant 8" beast that looks like an aquatic dinosaur found its way into our tank. Heck I was scared to even hold the bag when we left the store. 

The best part is, we paid only $4.99 for him. His spine is permanently bent, and so he's gone unsold and unwanted for weeks. It was his disfigurement that sealed the deal, just as GusGus's glaucoma ridden eye made me snatch him up. Yes, I felt sorry for a pleco :)

But, there was more to the adventure. On the way home Parker and I stopped at a store, and when we came back out I noticed the car was leaking onto the pavement. My first thought the radiator went, but no: the giant pleco bag had broken, flooding the backseat and pouring out the door! We managed to save just enough water to cover the pleco and hightailed it back to the pet store, with Parker holding onto him and talking him through the ordeal. 

We made it, and this time when we left the bag was securely sealed in a box for transport!

Phone Problems and the Ick

My phone is acting screwy: text one contact, and another contact replies. I'm sure it's a fluke that can be fixed if I remove the battery, but as a testament to my laziness I'm not about to trouble myself with removing the case just yet. IOW don't count on a text conversation this evening.

Meanwhile, the outbreak of Ick seems to have been arrested in our aquarium, in no small part to my Awesomeness, even in the realm of fish doctoring. We've lost no one in 3 days, and all appear well except the goldfish, who no longer exhibits signs of the disease but never bounced back properly. If there's no further losses before Sunday, I'll start rebuilding the population.

RIP Fish

It is with deep regret that I must report that our goldfish succumbed to his wounds mere minutes ago. I have removed him to a temporary morgue (the fridge) until the kids come home; he's been with us long enough to warrant a full Team Slap funeral in the Hallowed Ground (outside the shed) that holds the mortal remains of Billy and Gizmo. RIP fish - against our wishes, we came to love you.

Fish Armageddon!

A tragedy here today: one of the two feeder goldfish that have survived year after year was violently attacked by a rogue Molly overnight. A side fin was ripped clean off and there's a gash along its side. I removed the Molly, and tempering my anger, gave him to Smiley in a bowl of his own. 

Meanwhile the goldfish survives, obviously in pain, and much weakened. *fingers crossed* In addition, for three days in a row we've lost fish. A Black Moor died overnight on day 1 (but I had seen the ba*tard Molly attacking it the previous evening). A Beta followed on Day 2, and on Day 3 a red tigershark and a small feeder fish died. Grace is begging me to call Dale Czech for help, but I think that's just because she thinks he's cute. It's fish Armageddon around here!

A Tense Peace

GusGus examines the new aquarium