This TIFU happened many years ago and a recent pet post brought up the memory.

My wife and I had planned an overseas trip which meant we would be away for a week. I’m a keen amateur ichthyologist and at the time I had a rare and expensive Oscar fish. I’m also a bit of a tech geek so I bought a new automatic fish feeder that had just hit the market so I felt confident all would be right with the world “Oscar” while we were away.

Strangely the week before we left I noticed the temperature of the tank was dropping so I turned up the heater several times to get the temp correct. I wasn’t particularly worried as winter was starting so I just thought the ambient temperature was dropping.

Fast forward to our return a week later. We were tanned, relaxed and life was perfect…….until we opened the door to our apartment and the stench of rotting flesh hit us. It didn’t take long to find the source of the stench. There was Oscar, belly up rotting away. On investigation it wasn’t the temperature nor the heater that was faulty. It was the thermometer. It took weeks before the wet cremated fish smell left the apartment.

TLDR: Went away on holiday and left our prized fish to a long, slow agonising death by heat because I didn’t realise the thermometer in the tank wasn’t working.