Doug vs. the interweb

October 8th, 2009 10:52 PM

Version 2

Since I'm going to be staying here a while longer (or so I would hope by this point), I needed to start up the aquarium again. The problem is that by the time I knew I'm gonna be staying, summer has faded into fall, and we're quite a ways into it now. There's still a warm day occasionally, so I figured everything shouldn't be hibernating quite yet. I grabbed a bucket and my shoes, figured my net was in the car, and tromped on over to the door before realizing I have no car, as Margot is using it to visit folks. Foiled!

Except.. I didn't have to be. I didn't have a car and I didn't have a net, but I had my hands and a bike and dangit I'm gonna go catch some frogs the old fashioned way!

It took a lot longer to get there than I expected, which usually is the case with places you've only ever gone to with a car, but it was mostly pleasant, with only a few murder hills, but they most likely felt as such because I am hopelessly out of shape. I got to the pond and shuffled around it, finally startling in a couple frogs, so though I was too terribly slow to even notice them before it was too late, at least there was evidence they still were out. Eventually, I managed to catch a small toad, but that seemed like it might've been all I could handle. I put him in one of my containers and saw that I had to bring myself back to even older times and just wander the woods, flipping rocks and logs.

That didn't go so well, as I found nothing but bugs and worms. I kept feeling like I should just go a little further, because I'll just go that little bit further and that's where I'd find something. Nope! Luck usually seems to work like that, but this time it just didn't work. I found my way back.

Just as I was almost back to the pond, something small jumped about my feet, though I assumed it was just another cricket or something. It was a dang pickerel frog, and though I almost managed to completely fail, in the end my eyes saw through his perversely good camouflage and caught him.

Triumphant, I rode back. On the way, I saw some pond in the woods, and had to go take a look. To get to it, I followed a tiny stream, and though the pond's bank was too flat and therefore squishy beyond belief near the edges, backtracking along the stream I found three more frogdudes. I had to stick my hands through leaves and muck and root around under rocks to catch them, but catch them I did. Their amphibian ways are no match for my years of frog hunting skills. Or something.

Then I spent like a bajillion years fixing the tank back up again; arranging the rocks, filling the water, cutting holes in the lid so I could affix screen as I've planned to do, fixing the bubbler I broke the last time I took it apart (I want to get some fish in there next), flipping out and starting to take all the rocks out again because I couldn't find one of the frogs, finding him hiding instead of having mystery apartment frog again (thankfully), and other things.

I should rename this site to BORING AMPHIBIAN THEATER. It's exciting to me at least!