OK, so we told you Tuesday that something was up with Aoife McCarthy’s missing-in-action status at Fishbowl DC. And, surprise, we were right. No, Patrick Gavin didn’t eat her, but she did bid the blog farewell today, just a few short days after being hired to be Gavin’s co-fish:

FishbowlDC Readers: 

You may have noticed that, following the announcement that I was the new FishbowlDC contributing editor, my posting trailed off, followed by the removal of my name from the site’s masthead.

Unfortunately, a recent career change has created unforeseen conflicts with my professional responsibilities and it is with great disappointment that I announce I will no longer be able to be a part of this wonderful website (sic). I greatly enjoyed my brief time here and am enormously envious of whomever lands the gig next.

Thanks for the warm–albeit brief–welcome and for all of your support.

Best,
Aoife McCarthy

How the F could anyone have sent her support when her Fishbowl e-mail address never worked in the first place?! Also, why can’t we find a phone number or e-mail address for her at Financial Dynamics — “one of the world’s leading specialist communications consultancies” — that she apparently worked for after leaving the National Journal? (Not a very good communication strategy, if you ask us.) Finally, why did lots of the stories she reported on for the National Journal’s Hotline contain polling information from Financial Dynamics? (We’d have asked her ourselves, but all the communication strategies we could think of failed.)

Gavin chimed in after her enigmatic adios:

So where does this leave us, FishbowlDC readers? Well, back to the drawing board to some extent. We’ll be reaching out to some of you and hope that some of you will reach out to us if you’re interested in being a contributing editor. 

Note to Patrick Gavin: We scoop your blog regularly and we’ve got one hand tied behind our backs when we type. You insisted that the new hire wouldn’t lead to a big surprise, contrary to what our sources were telling us. And Garrett Graff has a love hate relationship with us.

Bejeezes, why not let us try blogging at Fishbowl for a day or two? Are you afraid?