Jack & Francine

This is Francine. Of course we don't know if she is a she. Maybe she is Frank or Floyd or something. But the thing is we've had her for probably three or four years now and her partner (he was Frank we think) jumped out of the aquarium one night and I was not able to revive him . . . that is to say he did not try to swim around in the toilet bowl.

So we got Jack, a sucker. Excuse me, a pyclostomus___an impossible word to spell by the way, so I'll just use sucker if that's all right with you. Incidentally, have you ever tried to look up a word that you can't spell in the dictionary? How do you do that??

He . . again, we have no idea but he's too ugly to be a girl and anyway it just seems like it should be a couple . . he looks like a small shark except for his mouth.

But his mouth is why we got him. You see this type of fish spends all day inching his way along the sides of the tank eating the algae. We put one in our other (tropical) fish tank for this reason, too.

The goldfish tank is spotless now. Well, I mean as clean as one could expect__I wouldn't drink the water myself. And Francine? Why she helps in her own way, too. Maybe all goldfish do this but she spends her day in a vertical position cleaning the gravel. She'll pick up one piece, mouth it and then spit it out. She goes over the whole bottom this way while Jack is busy vacuuming the sides.

Anyway, they both accept visitors so if you'd like to come witness this miracle of nature just drop by anytime.