A bloke who was sick of his mum pestering him to clean out his daughter's fish tank decided to wind her up by going one step further - by taking the poor creature into the bath with him for a 'wash'. Marc Whiteman says he was fed up with his mum 'moaning' at him to clean his daughter's fish tank before he jetted off on holiday so decided to wash the fish in the bath instead.
The 25-year-old shared a video of him bathing with his daughter's goldfish on social media for mum Jackie Whiteman, 52, to see. The stunt resulted in a hilarious message exchange as she demanded to know why he put the fish in his bath, before he brazenly declared he thought it 'needed a wash'.
Furious, she pointed out it was the tank that needed the wash and warned there would be 'big trouble' if it died. Marc had bought the pet for his four-year-old daughter, Darby, who is constantly asking if she can have a bath with it.
Marc, from Manchester, said: "I was flying out to Turkey on Thursday and my mum was moaning at me all week about the fish tank being dirty. She was moaning all the time asking me to clean the fish tank. I wasn't in the mood so I got the fish out and put it in the bath. I was in the bath with him.
"I put it on Instagram and my mum saw it. She messaged while I was in the bath saying 'why are you washing the fish?' so I put it on Facebook because I found it funny the way my mum text me. My mum was saying 'I didn't want the fish washing. I wanted the tank cleaning'.
"I sent a video to my mates saying my 'mum is mithering me to wash the fish tank so I'm going to wash the fish'. She saw it on Facebook and messaged saying she was going to kill me.
"She finds it funny. I got the idea from Darby because she's always asking if she can have a bath with the fish. The fish is back in his tank, I said bye to him before I left."
Marc, who works in wholesale, bought the fish two months ago, and has only cleaned the tank out once. Marc spent half an hour bathing with the goldfish and after putting it back in its bowl, he flew off to Turkey without cleaning the tank.
Marc said: "I still haven't washed the tank. I just went off to Turkey so it's still dirty. I just thought it would be funny. The fish loved it, it was swimming about, it wouldn't get out.
"We were in there for about half an hour. We didn't have any bubbles. It was just a nice chilled bath but it was quite a warm bath so I don't know how the fish survived. It'll probably be dead by the time I'm home."
The video of Marc bathing with the fish has gone viral, racking up more than 4,000 shares, likes and comments.
Marc said: "I flew out on Thursday and I don't have any internet unless I'm in the hotel. I got to the hotel and I had 3,000 notifications. I checked my phone, I had 3,000 shares, thousands of comments and likes and loads of message requests.
"People were putting laughing faces, asking why I was giving the fish a bath and saying 'oh my god that's so funny'. Everyone's taking it as banter. I'm so shocked at how viral it went. I had 30 emails saying people had followed me. I've got loads of new followers."
