So pretend for a sec that you have a friend named Jim.
You and Jim have been pals for a few months. You get food together, you go play pool on the weekends, and you wingman for each other at bars (which may or may not be weird, depending on “your” gender). Jim’s a pretty chill guy.
You start to notice strange things about Jim you hadn’t picked up on before; he “accidentally” uses the ladies’ room, you’ve seen cosmetics around his place, and other strange female oddities. After confronting him, Jim tells you: he’s really a woman.
What.
This is what I went through with Steve today. When my friend picked him out from Petco, she used her own coloration knowledge to determine his gender, so I took her word for it. Steve was just a baby when she got him anyway, so there was no real way of knowing the precise gender.
I’ve had Steve for going on four months, and he still hadn’t developed long flowing fins even though he’s grown a bit. So I decided to look up how to tell the gender of a betta fish. I found this helpful picture online:
Suddenly things began to make sense. Steve did have that egg spot, which I thought was just a mark. And his (her?) fins are much smaller than a male’s.
Steve is a girl.
I feel a little deceived. Maybe I should have just picked a more gender-neutral name? Although, I suppose it’s not too late to change the name to Stevie.
Funny stuff. I guess it’s time to change from pink coral to blue.
One thing that should make you feel better is that Steve is becoming a gender-neutral name… if Steven Tyler has anything to say about it. No really, check out the dude’s outfits on American Idol. He looks more feminine than J-Lo.
BTW, if you photoshopped that “visible beard” onto Steve, you are officially hilarious. If he already had it and you’re just calling it that, you’re still hilarious.