Postcards From the Edge of Sanity: The Fish Tanks

This is the first in a multi-part series, in an effort to remind myself that my job, while 200% more tolerable than it was just a few weeks ago, is still crap.

Wish you were here (so I wouldn't have to be)!

When I was told that I would be working the pet department at my store, I was originally thrilled. Firstly, and most importantly, I wasn't going to be a cashier anymore, and somehow, I felt that the idiots would magically disappear once I was out on the wide open space of the floor; alas, that was far from the truth, and the aforementioned idiots will doubtless be the subject of several of these little postcards, but that is not the topic for tonight. Secondly, I thought that it would be fun to fiddle around with dog and cat stuff, gain some muscles by schlepping the large bags of food everywhere, and basically have an all-around good time.

That was when I met the fish tank. I hate those damned things.



They're smelly, they're ludicrously high-maintenance, and they're the closest Wal-Mart comes to having abattoirs on their premises: they're fish tanks. For as many fish as we sell every day, the amount of time and energy we spend on these pieces of crap is ludicrous -- and for as many people that interrupt me throughout the day to ask about the fish, you'd think we sell a lot more fish than we do. Come to think of it, more probably die at our hands (or, rather, the hands of the distributor who then gives the ailing creatures to us, like we're some sort of damned underwater hospice) than go out the door, not that it's entirely our fault. People will come to you, point at a goldfish tank with over a hundred $0.12 feeder fish inside, and instruct you to net the three specific $0.12 goldfish that they want in their tank for the week before they overfeed them and kill them. The point I'm trying to make is this: the fish are a nightmare, and Wal-Mart has no right selling live animals to unsuspecting nimrods.

But the worst -- and the most time-consuming -- bit about the whole thing is the cleaning, especially if you need to use the siphon vacuum. First off, this thing looks silly:

Every single time I use it, I think of this:

Different kind of siphon, I guess.

I mean, I'm not a physics major, but surely it shouldn't take a herculean effort to get every single air bubble out of the tube in order to get enough suction to ensure that it won't take three hours to clean out a single tank. Or am I completely wrong about that? Actually, what really galls me is when I'm mid-suck, sitting on a step-stool, up to my elbow in fish water, and someone walks up to me and does their impression of a passive-aggressive moron by asking me if I work there. Did they honestly think that I didn't, that I'm some sort of good Samaritan who goes to all the pet departments in all the stores in all of creation to suck out unwanted algae and scrub off baby snails? Idiots. 

There are a few more little problems that arise, too -- not the least of which being that I can't go home and whinge because both my roommates work with fish at the University. Never mind that, though, the whole thing's twice as much trouble as it's worth, and Wal-Mart would do everyone a favor by stopping this charade, that we can be competent fish-sellers. A pox on fish everywhere.

On the plus side: Working on the household cleaners aisle a few weeks ago, a kid a few aisles over gave me the sound-bite of the year while he was apparently testing out air fresheners with his mom: "Eww! I don't want that one -- it smells like Grandma!" It wasn't even cute-funny, which is how most people categorize those kids-say-the-darndest-things moments that usually make me want to gag -- it was just hilarious. I almost want to make a granny-scented Glade plug-in right now, and see how it sells with the pensioners and old-folk's homes.