Last week, I wondered if anyone out there had insight on how we could encourage people to comment on our posts. Maria from the Park District of Franklin Park told me that her readers can be spurred to comment if they have an opportunity to talk about A. kids or B. pets.
So true. Pet owners love talking about their pets.
Except for maybe goldfish owners.
Wait a minute. That’s not true. I owned a goldfish once. In fact, I’d love to tell you about my goldfish-related experience. It’s hot and humid today, and I’m having a hard time focusing on tasks at hand. Maybe you need a minute away from the ol’ e-mail inbox too.
So, here’s a story for you:
I misspent the summer weekends of my youth at festivals, gorging myself on Sno-Cones and roasted corn, riding the Scrambler, and playing carnival games along the midway. This last pursuit brought me into the possession of a small goldfish.
But how?
By launching dented ping-pong balls at pyramids of clear plastic fishbowls filled with water. If you landed a ping-pong ball in a bowl with a fish swimming in it, you could win your very own fish.
Lo and behold, I miraculously floated a ping-pong ball into container with a fish in it.
The sixteen-year-old working the game handed me a small orange fish in a plastic bag. I clutched it in my sweaty palms, at some cotton candy, and ran home with him. I named him Frankie, and I kept him in a Tupperware bowl.
Now, most stories like this end a few weeks later with the untimely but not unpredictable death of the goldfish.
But Frankie was a beast of a different sort.
He soon outgrew his original Tupperware bowl, and had to be moved up to the next size. Years later, I had to give him away to my youngest cousins when I moved away for college. He passed away in their home after an unintentional overfeeding.
Frankie lived to be almost seven years old.
Unreal, huh?
As I wrote this, two things occurred to me:
1. Baer Performance Marketing could encourage comments by encouraging readers to stop by the office and pick up goldfish.
2. The length of the goldfish lifespan far exceeded my initial expectations.
Now that I’ve got that off my mind, I’m going back to work. That being said, if you’ve ever owned a fish, I’m curious to hear your story.