On HMS Chrysanthemum they had a little pet, And were it not for seaman Bloggs, I guess they'd have it yet. It lived down on the mess deck, in a tinted-green glass bowl, And though its name was Grouchy, it seemed happy on the whole, Until our hero Bloggsy, with his scientific mind, Decided to experiment, in manner most unkind, To prove his crackpot theory that a goldfish needed not Its natural environment, and slowly drained the pot Of water, with a teaspoon, just one spoonful every day, Until the luckless Grouchy, on the arid bottom lay. Amazingly the fish survived, but, dolorous and sad, It gazed out from it's prison, till Bloggs, resourceful lad, Declared: "I know, to cheer it up, I have the very thing," And fetched out from his locker both a bell and cage-bird swing. And in its bowl, when fitted, Grouch, a fine life soon was leading,, He rocked there on the swing, and he would ring the bell for feeding. "This fish thinks he's a budgie," murmurred Bloggs. "There's just one thing That's needed now: a tot of rum, to make the bugger sing." It gulped it down; the crew on hand, results of this to check; It wobbled, burped and whistled... then it fell and broke its neck. They made a little coffin, draped it in the union flag, And had a funeral service, led by chaplain Reverend Bragg: "He died, men, for his country, in the service of the Queen." Then lowered it o'er the side, into the ocean deep and green. The moral of this story, then: please listen to the master: if you don't shun the demon drink, 'twill lead you to disaster, But let me end, before you heathens utter one harsh growl, It only will prove lethal if you're neither fish nor fowl.
Inspired by a piece in a charming little e-mail news letter, the Monday Silly Digest.
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Wednesday, July 07, 2004