X-Entertainment's Christmas Season & Advent Calendar, 2008.

07/07/2008: X-E’s ‘08 Summer Megaparty: Frog Blog.

Had a long day at work, so all you’re getting tonight is a short story about frogs.

Growing up near the woods and several sewer drains meant that frogs were a big part of the summers of my youth. My friends and I were blessed, as the ecological balance in our neighborhood seemed to forge only the stupidest of frogs, which were incredibly easy to catch no matter how ridiculous our attempts may have been. (I do recall at least one instance of trying to scoop frogs out of a pond with a Mets baseball cap. That was the only time we didn’t go home with frogs.)

I’m sure boredom and a general love of frogs had something to do with our obsession, but beyond that, these frogs always seemed to be taunting us. There was a sewer drain right across the street from my house, and whenever my friends and I were outside doing whatever it was we did, these spiteful frogs would hang out and make noises right on the grate, seeming to dare us to try to catch them.

We could never resist. Oh, the frustrated screams we’d bellow whenever we were this close to snagging one with our bare hands, only to watch the frog effortlessly dart into the dark muck. Recalling those awful feelings, I now know how people must feel when I play against them in Brawl as Pikachu.

Still, if we really wanted a frog, it wasn’t hard to get one. They were everywhere. Before the city I live in became overstuffed with housing developments, forestal areas were pretty much at every turn. And they were filled with frogs.

That brings me to the point of this small, frog-centric entry. Whenever we caught a frog, we were happy, but we weren’t exactly sure what we were supposed to do with it. It wasn’t as if any of us had the foresight to pre-construct a special frog tank for such an occasion, so we’d usually puppet them like action figures for a minute or two before setting ‘em free. I may be blocking out one or two memories of unjust harm done to frogs over the course of our many adventures, but I hope we played on the straight and narrow.

I know I did. Except for that one time.

See, I had gotten this hermit crab at the Jersey shore one summer. You usually don’t buy hermit crabs at the Jersey shore without buying some kind of cage to go with it, and mine was this coffee can-sized meshy thing with a pop-off plastic top. After the hermit crab died and I settled its estate, it occurred to me that its former abode would’ve made for an absolutely perfect Frog Containment Unit.

On my next frog capture, I gleefully returned home, frog in palm, and introduced my earthy friend to his happy little hermit crab cage. He looked so awesome in there. Seemingly cognizant to the fact that he couldn’t escape, the frog just sat right in the middle of the cage, puffing out its throat and being obscenely cute. I placed the cage on a little nightstand by my bed and drifted off into a slumber filled with froggy dreams and toad thoughts.

When I woke up, the frog was as dead as a doornail and dried to a crisp.

The moral of this blog entry is…frogs need water.

Hermit crabs purchased on the Jersey Shore boardwalk were definitely not the healthiest bunch. I can recall buying one on two separate occasions and despite my best efforts to care for them they never lived longer than a couple of weeks. They’re also the most useless pets ever. I mean, you can’t even see them, they’re in a shell.

I remember when I was little I found a nest full of baby birds that fell from a tree. I put them in a shoe box, placed it in the garage and went to bed, dreaming about training my own pet attack birds. When I woke up the next morning they had all died. This is the first time I have ever told that story. It doesn’t sound any better 24 years later. Please don’t judge me.

Well, at least now that little frog got his story told. The outside world now knows what was probably his highest and most exciting point in life, which ironically also was his lowest.

I can recall a time when I was out in the woods near a lake and I found a turtle…I decided to put this turtle in the lake so he could swim away.

I wasn’t aware that tortoises didn’t particularly enjoy being in water. I just remember seeing little bubbles as my “turtle” sank like a rock.

Recalling those awful feelings, I now know how people must feel when I play against them in Brawl as Pikachu.

I seem to remember catching a toad one time and keeping him holed up in a cardboard box. This was at my Grandmother’s house so I was bored and needed something to do…

On that note, I really miss those summers in my youth spent with my Grandmother. She’s been gone now for a number of years. I haven’t been back to that town in almost 5 years. Friona, TX, on the off chance that someone knows where that is…. I used to spend at least 2 weeks up there, just me and my Grandmother…

I’ve had several pet frogs and turtles. Each turtle always got named Gamera. Always.

Th frogs were the kind that can’ function out of water. my sister’s weird albino frog found its way out of his tank and downstairs one night, and when we found him and returned him the next morning he was not fit to recover, and died in about an hour.

The other frogs got really big so we put them in a little man made pond in the yard. We couldn’t find them to catch them and bring them in before winter, so the next summer we had half thawed out frogcicles. Needless to say this was not the kind of frog that freezes itself for the winter on purpose.

The only frog I’ve ever had to deal with was the one I disected in middle school and the tiny one that used to live outside our house. The living one was only about the size of a quarter and disappeared from the garden fairly quickly.

I definately dissected frogs in class. I remember it being a big deal to get a female frog because you didn’t know what kind of frog you got until you opened them up. Getting a female frog meant an extra organ to go through (the ovaries). I was one of the people who got one.

Never went frog/turtle hunting, but we went through a small phase where we were into fish of all kinds, but they all seemed to die within a week.

I had a small frog that my mom from a carnival about 6 years ago that finally died a few months ago. I think it died about a month after my cat discovered its existence. It didn’t attack it or try to eat it or anything, it probably put it into a shock that killed it.

And on Hermit Crabs, I don’t think the ones you buy from Lake George are any better. I don’t think Hermit Crabs are designed to live long, anyway.

I once had a pet fiddler crab. I named him after the crab boss in Super Mario Bros. 2. He didn’t last long enough to live out his FULL lifespan, but he actually came pretty close. I really loved the little guy. He was the only crustacean friend I ever had. =) I also found a turtle in the yard next door to where I grew up one day. I picked it up and kept it with me for the night, then the next day I took it to (elementary)school with me and gave it to my science teacher and he put it in the class tank. He said he would find somewhere to release it , and very soon after he said that he did. I also had another turtle that was mine way befor that one. I named him Frankie. I remember he would CONSTANTLY scratch on the box I kept him in( when he wasn’t roamin around the house explorin) ALL NIGHT LONG ! My momma and dad would get so ANNOYED at his scratchin ! LOL! His fav foods were tomatoes,lettuce and carrots. I had him till the day he died naturally. Yes, he actually managed to live out his FULL lifspan ! I love critters!

Never had a pet frog or turtle. I just didn’t see the appeal. They just sit there and hardly do anything. And if I wanted to see them, I’d just go down to the pond we lived near. Maybe the commonality of them made them boring for me.

There is a pond around here with the dubious title of “Frog Pond”, not one frog in the sucker.
If only I could tell you how many wasted summer nights I spent at “Frog” pond trying to catch my own awesome amphibian.

I had a goldfish that I won at the state fair. I put it in a bowl on top of my dresser the night I won it and went to sleep.

In the middle of the night I woke up and knew it was dead before looking at it, and when I turned on my light to check, sure enough it was dead. My only ESP moment.

I once played (and won) one of those carnival games where you throw ping pong balls at fish. I didn’t think much of it at the time but that must really suck for the fish.

Maybe we can make up for it by taking care of our five cats and two dogs…Then again, one of our cats kills baby bunnies (among other things). *Sigh…*

I always stumbled upon box turtles in my yard as a kid. And when I found them, I always put em in a cardboard box with some lettuce and some sticks and leaves and grass. Cause, you know. A 2×2 lettuce box was an 8 year olds reincarnation of the wild.

Brian I did the same thing with my pet turtle. He really seemed to like his little house I made for him . Mine was a banana box though. Like the kind you find in grocery stores. I would let him roam around the house and yard to get plenty of fresh air and exercise, then at the end of the day I would pick him up and palce him in his little banana box house for the night.I evend made a little bed for him. Wow, I didn’t expect to take a trip down memory lane tonight. =)

Same thing happened to me with some turtles. The poor things looked straight out of “The Terminator 2″ nuclear blast sequence .

I grew up right next to a river, so there was no need to capture such critters as they were always around. A few examples: a group of ducks, sea gull-like birds that came every spring and would swarm around to eat bread (cool but scary), a tree frog that was there every summer named Kermit, a few deer that would eat food you left out and now -I kid you not- my stepmom has raised pet catfish.

My only other odd pet was a pet squirrel I nursed back to heath when he was found after his nest was attacked by something and was hurt. Unfortunately he died one year on Christmas day.

It seems that our favorite Lego Man has interviewed Hellboy in an Inside The Actor’s Studio-style ad for his movie.

I may have had a hand in the frog extinction.
My neighborhood had hundreds of tiny frogs and one day I caught some and put them in a Pringles can. When my family returned home from dinner that night, the frogs had tipped over the can and tried to escape but most of them dried up. The ones that hadn’t dried up used the last 4 bullets in their gun to take themselves out. Little did they know, the frog militia was only minutes away…
I can’t remember if that last part actually happened or not, it’s been a while.

that’s odd.. the only crabs i got at the Jersey Shore boardwalk weren’t hermit..

and if we’re admitting childhood guilt.. i guess i’ll fess up.. - i once took a plastic baggie, filled it mostly with lighting bugs, and then partially with those things we always referred to as “poppers” (little white papered bombs with i assume gun powder of some sort inside), shook it up, and threw it at the cement.. - it made a large pop and then i had a bag of bright, glowing, dead bugs.. - wow.. hopefully my future kids aren’t as bizarre as i was..

Ha! this is funny because i put a pond in my backyard a few years back, it turned into a frog (or probably more accurately) orgy, now my yard has hundreds of these damn things EVERYWHERE. So if they are going extinct please come to my house and get some!

Although the sound is nice to fall asleep to, it makes mowing the lawn a very tedious process (i dont have the guts to run over frogs with the mower).

Aw. It’s always so sad when you kill an animal and then have that awful “Wtf did I do??” feeling. I was once firing at a green anole with a bb gun out in the backyard, just for fun, not really thinking anything about it. I would shoot at it and it would run around trying to dodge the shots. Well, eventually I nailed the lizard right through the throat. He didn’t fall down and give me a thumbs up for hitting him like I thought he would. He lay there bloody and gasping for air. At first I was thrilled with my kill, and ran in to show my mom. She was proud of her little hunter, but the more I looked at my prey the more I thought about his lizard family who would be missing him, the lizard life he’d never have, and the future lizard adventures I had destroyed with one little metal ball. I started crying and gave the little guy a proper burial in the same backyard where he lived and died. I went to check on the grave an hour or so later, and saw a bird chowing down on the corpse. It made me feel a lot better about the whole situation. I didn’t kill a lizard, I just provided a bird with its dinner! So just think about whatever ended up eating your dried frog when you threw it out. I’m sure it was put to use. What a cathartic post.

HEY ALL! I’m back from Portland. So… what did I miss when I was gone? ULTRAMAN, Hoverbored, thanks for the stages! I’ll try them out soon, but for now, my new game… MARIO STRIKERS CHARGED! EVERYWHERE was out of Mario Kart Wii AND Wii Fit… I cried. Well, I’m off to bed, and will be on tomorrow. See ya later, X-E!

Aaron:No prob X-E buddie =) And I know what you mean about EVERYWHERE being sold out of Mario Kart Wii! Thats why I had mine ordered off the internets! It pays to have a buddie that OWNS his own video store!=D

Same thing happened to my cousin, only in his case it was his mom’s fault, since she told him that if he put the frog in water it would drown. (My aunt is kind of stupid like that…)

Felt bad for my cousin and the frog, since I was with him when he made the discovery.

In Chrono Trigger, I have never not gotten Magus. Magus and Toad just have to work out their differences as they are always in my main party together.

Matttttt….Maaaattttt……I haven’t forgotten………..I will haunt you…..forever…….and ever…….I demand a sacrfice…….

Awesome Post! Reminds me of snake hunting in the woods near my place when I was a kid. Thanks once again for making me long for my childhood Matt!

I never had a frog or turtle. I did have baby quails though…they died in the first day.

Last night my best friend Harry and I were in the electronics department looking for an adapter that I found out they don’t sell anymore at our local Walmart (fuckers!) and we started staring at the Wii’s and started talking about the money budget for this week and he said well we can survive until Friday if you want a Wii I have the money. So uh we have a Wii in our living room now :D That is all we have, he is working for 12 days straight because a co worker is going on vacation and he is usually who works when my best friend is off for the weekend but that means we have some extra spending money coming. I am going to have to wait until Monday or Tuesday to play because I am not going to hook it up to my small regular tv I am going to hook it up to the big screen (63 inch DLP tv) so that means he needs to cough up 30 bucks for an HDTV cord for the thing. Also I think we are also getting Wiiplay and the rechargeable dock next week. And I think that is it, no mario kart or Smash bros until the next time we are ahead in the bills. I know you guys play smash bros ALOT but I think I would enjoy mario kart more. I am still debating.

Is Nintendo still doing that thing where when you register you get two free rubber grip skins for the wiimotes? I saw a video on youtube were a guy got two rubber grip skins in the mail because he registered his console. Maybe that was just the first month or something. I dunno. Is there anything else I should know? See you guys I’m going to bed “yawn”

We used to have tons of toads in our yard. One year for the fourth of July we caught about a dozen, put them in a bucket, and drew numbers on their back with magic marker. Then we drew a big circle on the basketball court, dumped the bucket of toads out in the middle, and had ourselves a toad race.

The best part was that we kept seeing toads with numbers all through that summer. Big number six, in particular, seemed to hang around the porch a great deal. Either he was looking for another shot at the limelight, or waiting for his chance at revenge.

ATTACK OF THE RACING TOADS!!! XD Goob: if you can, get both, because theyr’e both very fun , very easy games. Whichever one you get, it doesnt matter because I have both and will play you as soon as you get it hooked up. =) P.S. I REALLY do think you’d like Brawl! If you enjoy video games even a TINY amount, then get Brawl! The action is SO choatic that you don’t have to worry about it getting repetitive.

Also, did you know about the frog extinction crisis going on now? http://www.savethefrog.com has more info.

There was a large drainage ditch that ran behind my house, so naturally that’s where a boy would spend nearly all of his waking hours. I captured many creatures there, including turtles. I would put the turtles in my sandbox in my backyard. Usually after a day or so of captivity, I would start to feel bad for them and put them back in the ditch. I was soft-hearted for animals even as a kid.

I remember when I was young (7 or

my mom and I found a turtle by my bus stop that had been hit by a car and had a big crack in its shell. We put it in our wagon, took it home and then to the vet.

The vet cleaned it and put some stuff in the crack and said that if we could we should keep it and bring it back once a week until it was healed and able to be released. He told us how to keep it and what to feed it. We kept him in a large fish tank we had laying around. We built an awesome little habitat for him.

I named him Donatello (after my favorite Ninja Turtle) and we kept him for about 2 or 3 months until the vet said he was healed. We took him over to the local protected Wet Lands and released him.

when I was a kid I found a turtle walking across the street in front of my house, not too surprising, except for the fact that I lived in the middle of downtown Boston……. not even a suburb. Obviously the little guy escaped from his owner. I convinced my mother to let me keep him and got a tank and water and fed him every day. Apparently snapping turtles get REALLY REALLY big, so after about 4 years my mother convinced me to take him to my uncles place in New Hampshire with a man made pond. Little did we know that snapping turtles ate fish, and the $8,000 of rainbow trout that he stocked in his pond were gone in weeks…… apparently after that the turtle decided to head to the river. At least that is the story my uncle told me

However, you have to enter your console serial number. AND, all Wii’s being sold now should include these jackets anyway…if you didn’t find one when you opened it, look harder. All Wii-motes should include the jackets now, too.

Also, Brawl is awesome. The amount of content will keep you occupied for months. I know I will personally never see all the trophies..There are more than 500 of them…

Wow, guess I was just a lazy kid, we had a pond near our house but instead of catching frogs we would catch tadpoles or just the frog eggs and leave them in a bucket on the back deck until, BLAMO instant caught frogs. (actually 90% of the time something would come along and eat the eggs or tadpoles. wow I just now realized that as a kid I was a frog abortionist, learn something new about yourself every day I guess)

When I was a kid we used to catch toads when we went camping in the summer. They would stay a live for a while, but usually I ended up with frog jerky. One horrifying time though I woke up in the night to the sound of my cat eating my poor toad. Another time while camping at a lake with our parents my friends an I caught like 30 toads over the course of the weekend. We ended up feeling bad and finally let them go only to find out that the teenagers in the camping spot next to us were catching them, roasting them on the fire, and eating them. DAMN TEENAGERS!

Hmmm, maybe this explains why X-entertainment buys lobsters from the market and sets them free.

Yeah, I’ve caught a few toads and turtles and things, but my mom would always freak out so I let them all go. It was probably for the better anyway.

One time when I was out in the country at one of my relative’s houses, I saw this HUUUGE frog in their pond. It was scary and awesome looking.

Heartbeeps was just one HBO. I watched it but don’t quiz me on it because I still have no idea what it was about or what happened.

My girlfriend is unbelievably afraid of frogs. She told me that when she was a kid, there were frogs blocking her path to the front door of her house and she had to call her mom to come move the frogs before she could go inside.

My husbands scared of toads. I think where I live we have toads not frogs. I think it’s the fact that when you pick them up more than likely you’re going to get a golden shower that freaks him out. I love them though!

things to do today:
-add water to Froggy’s coffee-tin-sized cage beside my bed

I am guilty of murdering numerous little beasts, always by accident. Once while running down my rainy block in early adolescence, I slipped on a slug, exploding him from BOTH of his ends. What a way to go. My stomach still turns a little when I think of it.

And two years ago, my beloved little betta fish, Mister Incredible, was floating lifelessly in his bowl. I did a little ceremony and put him in the toilet. No sooner did I flush, than Mister Incredible sprang back to life! He fought the current of my porcelain throne for about 3 seconds before disappearing into the abyss.

The only turtles I ever had were of the teenage mutant ninja variety…likewise, the only frog I ever had was of the Genghis variety.

We dissected frogs in high school and the formaldehyde smell made me light headed…I almost passed out.

i have frog fear- a serious case. it stems from when i was a little kid and there was a frog in our toilet and it almost jumped on me.

cb - toilet frogs very seldom will suction onto your face, so you don’t need to worry about that. What you SHOULD worry about is squids. They will suck your eyes out. Squids are always starving for eyes.

I bought some hermit crabs from lake george 2 years ago and they’re amazingly still alive. As long as they have the right food, water, temperature and humidity they can live for quite a while (or so I’ve read). The crabs I’ve bought at Petco always die quickly though…

My brother had two box turtles growing up. They were named Raphael and Donatello. They didn’t live very long. Probably because he was really young.
I never had to dissect a frog or anything in high school because I was in the band and had an ex-stoner simply oblivious band director who didn’t know or care if you skipped class to hide out in the bandroom. He’d even sign his name to notes as long as you promised you were “practicing for festival”, which meant playing cards in the practice rooms. I got out of alot of experiments and oral presentations this way.

Hanging out in the band room was the best part of my entire High School Experience.

Without band, high school would have been unbearable. I live in Southeastern Louisiana, so the best part of band for us was marching in Mardi Gras parades. The day after a parade you were pretty much excused from doing anything in other classes because you had been out until 1 a.m. the night before.

Toilet frog wins hands down against toilet duck. Toilet duck battles dirty toilets, but toilet frog is at war with humanity.

JoshC, The affectionate mollusk “Prairie Squids” roam the plains in search of people to give their love to. Seek not to understand the nature of this beast, but only allow it to show you its tenderness once and your heart will belong to the squid forever.

Just make sure you have your debeaking tools handy. Prairie squid beaks are mighty sharp.

I remember having a tiny frog when I was about 5 yrs old. I’d decided to give him a ride on my tricycle and set him on the handlebars.

The next thing I knew, he’d jumped off and I’d somehow run over him. I picked him up and his little eyes reminded me of those tiny canned blueberrys that come in the box of muffin mix.

Frogs will die for seemingly no reason, I have found. Last year I found a frog inside an inflatable boat after a heavy rain. I put him in a jar and prepared an old fish tank to suit a frog’s needs.
Some gravel, a nice flat rock sitting partially submerged in the water, so he could sit leisurely in or out of the water at his pleasure, real plants and fake plants, both shaggy enough for him to hide in or sit upon.

I git up the pet store for him, got him a fake rock to chill with, he could climb on it or hide underneath, more plants, water heater, water tablets and shit.
Fresh crickets to munch on.

When I found him he was about the size of the tip of my thumb, from the tip to the first knuckle. I was able to feed him just with a few ants I got from the porch every day. He eventually grew to about 3 inches long and I had to buy crickets every two days.
After every time I fed him, he would chirp.

He lived until January, fine one day, gobbling down crickets and singing one day, white and bloated the next day.

Somethin’ Funny - that’s just the way life is. We’re all of us just one moment away from white and bloated, our cricket gobbling days behind us.

Did anybody else notice this picture on July 5th’s entry? It anagrams to fallout shelter:

Jack
Nice find! There is also a picture behind the 2 side by side pictures of the Robo Force robots in the 07/05 entry. I can’t say for sure, but it looks mysteriously like a Coconut Crab

OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN! OH MAN!

I hope this leads too a SUMMER advent calendar! Which will in turn lead to Waiterbot!

They are in the folders of the Megaparty pics. They don’t have links that I can see. Since I found the crab pic the first day I have been checking every entry to see if there are any more.

I am sorry.
I am a frog killer.
I didn’t do it on purpose.
It really was an accident.

I had the best intentions for that firebellied toad, but my lack of resources and knowledge on the critter led me to accidentally kill him.
I tried to feed him- I got him mealyworms. He loved them.
But then, he stopped eating one day… he was still alive cause he’d move, so I kept his water dish full and hoped he was just hibernating.
But he just started wasting away. Still alive, but he wouldn’t eat. And one day, he just … I found him dead. Trying to crawl away. He lived about 4 months.

On the other hand, the reason I had a firebellied toad was becuase I was going to give it to my friend for her birthday, but when I saw a full-grown Bullfrog for sale for $10, I had to get the Bully for her.
That bullfrog led an awesome life in the pond in her backyard, i tell you that. So if Firebellie dies to give Bully a better life, so be it, I guess.

and by the way, that Coconut Crab Hssxlllo stuff is really freaking me out. How did JACK find it again? I tell ya- Jack’s playing for the other team.

I have had hamsters die. 2 were old age sorta…and my husband left the window open and it got sick…then one died right after I got it…. i gave a pair of dwarf hams to a friend and the one bit off the others head…and then a mom and baby ate the other weaker baby…who I was hoping would live, because it was a rare red eyed argente’

Not much to go on. But it is a clear message from him. So i’ll take what I can get.

Like FM said above, it’s not much but it’s something!!!! My summer just got 8 trillion times more fun!

My sisters used to love catching frogs in our various backyards. The southern New Jersey shore area is mostly swampland and beaches, prime frog real estate. They weren’t really allowed to keep them, though. Mom was adamant about that. She didn’t mind other reptiles, like turtles or iguanas, but no slimy frogs in her house. I wouldn’t be surprised if they kept them hidden somewhere anyway, but I don’t remember ever seeing them. I wouldn’t have touched them. I’m not a big frog enthusiast. I’m no fonder of slimy things than our mother.

My brother actually has a turtle named Jim he’s had for a long time now. Or it should be said, Mom does. I think she’s the one who really feeds him. Jim was named after my brother’s favorite snack, Slim Jims. He wanted to name him Michaelangelo, but for some reason, Mom vetoed that idea.

I forgot who requested it, but I’m back from Vegas and I was supposed to find a lens store downtown that had a poster of Matt in some funky contacts. The only time I went to downtown I was so hammered I totally forgot. I’m sorry.

I’m surprised to have not seen a blog about this year’s Dewmocracy, unless I’ve overlooked it? What is everybody’s views on the new flavors? Which one is getting your vote? I’ve had all three, but at different times, so I can’t really make a solid decision. I’m about to go to AM/PM and pick up all three for a final showdown. Bat’leths and all. If I remember right, I’m leaning towards Revolution.

Scratch that. E-Z Mart, AM/PM, nor Walgreens had any of the 3 candidates in stock, E-Z Mart looked like the only one who even carries the flavors.

What the hell? Even after freshly coming to this blog opening a new Firefox tab just now, your 4 comments weren’t there until after I posted.

Anywho, it goes well. Finally living 100% on my own for the first time ever. I keep trying to visit as much as possible, but X-E is blocked at work and when I’m here at home, I only find time to read the blogs, but never post.

Excited to see another Summer MegaParty, though. Everybody having a great summer so far? I’ve been able to go on vacation, but a week in Vegas is exhausting, and my return flight landed 4 hours before my shift started, so it was more of a kick ass trip than it was a vacation, but I’m hoping to go camping the last weekend of this month and then again in early August. My idea of a true vacation.

I received a chain email at work today with an email named “Memories for children of the 80s”. Out of the 20-30 pics, only a handful were worthy of being contained in an email labeled as such. Pee Wee sitting on Chairry, a side shot of some gnarly ass British Knights, and a screenshot of Fraggle Rock. Even the obvious ones were missing, like TMNT and Smurfs, not a pic of a Burple, Big Wheel, or Zap It gun in sight. Some people, eh?

Holy crap this site cracks me up

, and I love that this is an animal/childhood story, ’cause I can weigh in (though mine is more sinister):

-at age 10, on rainy days, at recess, I would go outside and patrol the pavement, searching for post-rainfall worms…after finding them, I would take that little plastic red cheese-spreader thingy that comes with “cheese ‘n cracker” snack-packs, and I would cut the worms in half with this implement. I would cut in half as many worms as I could find, and strangely, they would still live, and each half would worm away from the other. I guess it was kind of mean to do that, but worms are so low on the foodchain, that I didn’t feel too guilty at the time (or now). Also I didn’t have too many friends at age 10, so this seemed like the way to pass time…whatever, I grew up to be cool and hot (enough), so it’s all good.

Romi:I did some stuff to bugs when I was a kid that I regret now! I know, I know, they were just bugs, but still. It’s not something that keeps me up, it’s just that I don’t like that I killed something I didn’t have to. Oh well, at least I repented for it. =) If your curious as to what I did, I burned ants with a magnifying glass and picked them up and dropped them into any spider web I could find nearby. I also burned a caterpillar once with a magnifying glass and it’s back bubbled a little and then it started to bleed. Although I stopped befor I killed the caterpillar. I also went inside and got some sugar for the ants. =) The things I did when I got bored.

I’m glad that you repented, and I was starting to feel a little guilty as I read your comment, but then I realized that if the two halves of the worms kept moving their seperate ways, then not only did they live, but they had multiplied! So really I was replenshing the worm population, which is sort of a community service…but really, who wants more worms? It was like a worm-version of the movie Multiplicity, in that it was just as disgusting as the idea of there being more than one Michael Keaton.

Funny you mention those hermit crabs. I am now the proud owner of a slightly illegal turtle obtained in one of the myriad souviner shops in Pensacola Beach that specializes in such things and have given those hermit crabs as presents to others before.

We didnt do frogs in school, instead we got rats. I still recall the day some of my classmates’s rats dried out and they had to crowd around those of us with good rats left. The day we did reproductive organs was hilarious. Despite my bad motor control skills, I got to be the one wielding the blade as my male classmates winced at me poking around rat testicles. It would have been enjoyable if not for the scent…

And what befell the original inhabitant of the can…. did you set the hermit crab free or leave him in there with the frog?

When I was a kid I lived in an urban area, but I spent every weekend at my mom’s co-worker’s farm exploring the woods on a little black pony. One time my friend and I went for a long gallop along the edge of a hay field. When we got back, we discovered that her pony had stepped on a frog and his hoof was packed full of gross amphibian guts. It was NOT pretty but I can only assume it was a quick, painless death.

At my childhood home, we have lots of little tree frogs we call “peepers” because they peep constantly at night. Also, when my aunt lived in Georgia, she sent us a tape recording of the screaming frogs they have down there…they sound exactly like a woman screaming.

I never had any critters growing up, really…I liked frogs and stuff but I would never have touched them as a kid because I loved playing outside but didn’t like getting dirty and slimy. I did however bring a mealworm home that we raised in school as a science project and kept him for a few weeks until he died.

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