Critters

After an eternally long day on Monday, I collapsed into my desk chair and found myself staring into a Tupperware container full of wriggling crawfish and snails.

What on earth is our district thinking? I can't keep animals alive! Animals and my family just don't mix too well. There were those two cats who gave up on us and lived at neighbors' houses, or the turtle who escaped, or the four fish who died mysteriously within five minutes of each other, or the hamster even the vet couldn't save, or the dog we had to sell, or the neighbor's fish we killed, or the other neighbor's rabbit we killed, and a whole host of other pet calamities.

If they're gonna give us animals, they should at least give us low-maintenance pets, like bettas or something. I once managed to keep a betta alive for two years. Granted, he was a sickly little guy due to infrequent feedings, but he lived. These crawfish, though, command gentle and observant care. The creatures require aged water. Aged! What animal is too delicate to withstand fresh water? And we shouldn't dream of putting a protein-based food into the aged water. It could kill the darlings. Instead, we transfer the hostile animals to individual bowls filled with aged water and wait patiently for them to individually eat their one piece of cat food. Transferring them is no small feat, either. Any animal that strains itself bending over backward trying to pinch its benefactor is not a good pet, in my opinion.

The snails aren't so difficult, but they are nasty, and they're liable to escape. Last year, a teacher arrived one morning to find them all over her walls. My coworker this year found that hers had pushed the lid off of their cage and had scattered themselves across her table.

Our time with these pets may be short-lived, though. My bad pet karma seems to have followed me into the classroom. Three crawdaddies have died in the four days we've had them, and my students keep asking to take the other ones home for supper. I haven't allowed them to eat their pets yet, but who knows what I'll say when these crayfish become too difficult ...