The Critic

I like frogs and toads. Probably because, growing up in California, we would build elaborate subterranean cities, with tunnels and gunnite-lined toad pits. Like the SIMS but with toads. We'd populate our cities with toads we'd collect from beneath an oleander hedge. And we'd control immigration (but mostly emigration) with a mesh screen lid.

As a writer, it is important to have a window. A good window - that is, a window with a view that inspires -- is a tool of the trade. I'm sure it's tax deductible (especially if it is energy efficient). From my window, as you know, I see cardinals, woodpeckers, jays, squirrels and the occasional hawk. I also see frogs. There are times during the rainy season, where I've seen a "frog fall" -- hundreds of peepers climbing the bricks on the front of my house, diving into my ligustrum, then climbing the wall again, over and over, as the rain falls, peeping and generally kicking up a ruckus. As summer gives way to fall, I have big rubbery tree frogs - beige and gray, but sometimes tiger striped like this guy. They land on my window with a big wet plop at four in the morning, scaring the bejabbers out of me.

I spotted this guy craning his frog neck to watch me from my porch roof, peering from a spot more often populated by squirrels and woodpeckers, but when I went out to take his picture, he hunkered down. I came back inside and began to work, when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him throw himself into the air, arms and legs flailing like a stuntman, landing six feet away, and another six feet down, right outside my window. I grabbed my camera again, and shot this. 

The good stuff:

Homecoming week

last night's fire on yesterday's clothes in the hamper

shoe-shopping success

first pizza pie out of the oven

potato chips off the line

factories

road construction equipment lit like lunar landers

photographs and memories

plans coming together

coffee in plastic cups