Do Not Try This at Home

Goldfish are really messy; they eat a lot, produce a lot of waste, and tear the heck out of aquarium plants. You have to change their water very frequently. Goldfish are not a low-maintenance pet! Well, emotionally they are. They don't climb on your neck while you're sleeping and jab their curved sickles of death into you the way cats do...
But they're not for the lazy, the forgetful, the procrastinators.

My goldfish has been alive and well in my care for over two years! Yes, I'm a bit smug and self-congratulatory about it. These plants are really cool; when you first buy them, they're like moss, and you tie them to a rock. In time, they affix themselves to the rock and grow onto it. It's a really beautiful effect. I also use plain ole' elodea. The fish destroys it and then I replace it. He seems to like to hide in it (and eat it), and it's like a miniature kelp forest.