Have you seen the little fishies?

Hazelblackberry and I have a fish pond.

It's actually a fish rectangle that the previous owner of our house sawed into our back deck. Every alfresco Perth home should, and for all I know does, have one.

I was out feeding the rectangle's inhabitants today. There's 'Transparent Head', 'Jack White' and 'Toadie' - to name a few of our sixteen gilled golds.

Since throwing 'em into the rectangle 18 months ago, only one has died of natural causes. This depite the fact they have to fin through some pretty thick algae at times.

Two or three of their comrades, including the much-missed 'Gut', have fallen to the tooth of 'al dente' - the marmalade puss from two doors down.

But we no complain. We love a marmadale whuss that so reminds us of majestic Ginge, the nemesis and alter-ego of HBB's battle-hardened grandfather, the Fuhrer.

But here's the catch. Despite our popularity throughout the feline kingdom generally, the dog-bait of our street avoids us like the enteritis. No less than five cats use our yard as a public thoroughfare, but not one of the blighters stops to pass the time of day.

So today, as I sprinkled a flourescent circle of food pellets onto the fishies' meniscus, I was grateful for how they moseyed up to meet my gaze. I hoped the expanding circle looked like fireworks to them.

Pez-flavoured fireworks.