Wednesday, September 20, 2006

little mildew eaters for your shower and tub

Yesterday we got our last fish for the tank, a little bottom-feeder who I think will be Dwight K. Schrute. Out of all the fish, he shares some key qualities with Dwight: he's hard-working, twitchy, and a little pesky to the other fish. In fact, he's too small and quick to really photograph, so you can go ahead and imagine this star-quality Chinese Gold Algae Eater on the left is mine.

Bottom-feeders are apparently pretty smart for aquariums because they do the job of eradicating algae much more thoroughly than you ever could with a scrub pad. They've got plenty to eat, you've got a clean tank, and everyone's happy. Normally, unless they happen to be name Dwight K. Schrute, they lay low (literally) and keep to themselves.

So I was thinking, wouldn't it be fantastic if we were able to keep little creatures in say, our bathtubs, to keep it all sparkling fresh? Little mildew eaters. I'm thinking they could be cute and charming but keep to themselves in the manner of the House Elves. Not to insult Hermione and stomp all over House Elf Rights. But it would be the most beautiful of symbiotic relationships: free food, employ, and room and board for the little creatures, and a shower cleaner than a bottle of Tilex and a lazy scrubbing arm could ever get it.

And then if we could have creatures whose sole love and purpose in life was to eradicate Hair of the Bender and similar, that would be great too.

2 comments:

~sarah said...

i've been pondering that "automatic" shower cleaner gizmo from scrubbing bubbles. it's $20 @ target... but it isn't cute or elvish in anyway, which is sad. now the roomba! that's kinda cute...

mendacious said...

what about one of those robotic vacuum things?