Tuesday, June 23, 2009

I've been shopping for a pool. Not the kind that's already in my yard, but a lap pool that I can really get down to swimmin' in. There are three in Shawnee.

1. YMCA
2. OBU - my Alma Mater
3. St. Gregory's University

Yesterday morning I got up at 6:00am, fed Ella and took off to try out St. Greg's pool. It's membership is the cheapest of the three. And I'm cheap. So I figured if it had water in it, I'd probably join and that would be that.

But I got there and the pump was broken and the maintenance guys wouldn't be in until after 8am.

Dangit.

So I hung my head and left.

On the way home, I passed by OBU. They recently converted their pool to a salt water system (which is the new thing apparently, no chemicals/chlorine) and their membership fees are the most expensive, even for an alum. It's in an awesome new wellness facility and you have to buy in to the whole package. But with a newborn, I really only have time to jump in the pool, swim like crazy and go back home. I just want a pool membership, but they won't do it.

I did figure, however, that they would give me a free "trial" swim if I walked in as a new resident of Shawnee wanting to try out a new salt water pool. I was right.

And it was great. And now I'm trying to figure out how to afford a membership. More on that some other time.

While I was swimming in the pool, I remembered my college experiences with it. I took lifeguard training there with my friend George. I then got a job life guarding there the 6am-9am shift on Friday mornings. And there was this one day my freshman year when my roommate, Sonja, and I decided to go for a random swim. Our fish had just died and we needed to get out I guess. While in the pool that day, we wrote a little diddy about that fish. We laughed our heads off and performed it at his funeral that night in our hall bathroom. All resisdents of 2nd North in WMU were present.

I garnered a bit of fame around campus for that silly song. People I did not know would ask me to sing it. I even took my guitar to English 101 and sang it on creative writing day (holy cow, I'm so totally embarrassed about that fact).

Anyway, if you know the theme song from the Beverly Hillbillies, start humming it in your head now.

That's the tune.

And here are the lyrics.

Ode to Posieden Martin

Once there was a story 'bout a blue beta fish
He lived downtown in a little bitty dish
And then one day I was walkin' through the store
And he said "help me lady, I can't live here anymore!"

So, Britton bought him for me and I took him to my room
But I thought that I was gonna send him to his early doom
There was chlorine in the water, so we went back to the guy
And I said "please help me mister or my fish is gonna die!"

Well, we fixed up the water and he was doin' fine
I showed him to Sonja, and told her he was mine
I let Britton name him, 'cause he bought him for me
He named him Poseidon, the greek god of the sea.

But then one day he was floatin' at the top
So I changed his name to Martin thinkin' maybe he would stop
We thought that he felt he couldn't live up to his name
But when the morning came, he floated just the same.

So I took him to the third stall, 'cause it's my favorite one
My fishy wasn't swimmin' and I thought his time was done
When I reached into the bowl, to get him with the net
Poseidon started swimmin', he wasn't finished yet!

There are two more verses in this Poseidon Martin song...but I can't find my copy of the song at the moment and I can't remember them. Yes, folks, that means I whipped out the 5 verses above off the top of my head. It's been 11 years. I'm a freak of nature.

After the near flushing incident, I took him back to the pet store because they had a 30 day policy or something like that. I told the store owner, who looked like he should've been working for West Coast Choppers - chains, tats, black leather vest, that I thought the fish was sick and I wanted another one. He took the fish bowl out of my hands, walked around the store and plucked various ornaments out of all the fish tanks along the back wall. Basically, he decorated the bowl up like a Vegas Casino - glittery rocks and signs. When he sat it back down on the front counter, we all watched as the fish began to swim in circles again. He looked me dead in the face and said "that fish was depressed".

Good grief. Who knew?

So Poseidon lived on. At least another month. That poor, dramatic little fish.

Speaking of fish, Miles sure does enjoy the pool.

This one's not-so-much a fish yet. But her bathing suit sure is cute...