glub glub

As I stood waiting for Peanut at the airport this morning, I amused myself with a nearby fishtank. I figured watching the nearby fish was as good a way as any to pass the time, considering I’d left my DS at home, but I wasn’t expecting the profound sadness I experienced.

Basically I just could not get over how boring the lives of these tropical fish were. It seems like there were only two things to do in the fishtank: swim aimlessly, or swim really fast in circles. And only one fat yellow bastard had figured out the second thing.

So that was my life for about ten minutes, watching a dozen bored-looking fish drift around listlessly, while the fat dude frantically whipped laps around the mock coral reef. I know, academically speaking, that fish don’t have the higher brain functions required to experience pointlessness or boredom the way humans understand them, but still. My heart went out to the little guys.

I mean, they’re still in there, right this minute, doing the exact same thing they were doing twelve hours ago. Is that not a heartbreaking mental picture?

(It’s a heartbreaking actual picture too, I admit. It’s hard to capture randomly moving objects with a camera phone. I swear the photo I took included Fat Yellow Bastard, but I guess he zipped out of the shot just before I clicked the shutter.)