ueno frog 上野の蛙 (ueno, japan)

Posted by timothy (Tokyo, Japan) on 8 May 2008 in Animal & Insect.

when i was walking around between ueno and nezu, i saw this good-sized guy hanging out in the shade on some rocks.

funny story about amphibians: when i was younger (about 5 or 6 or so), i was fascinated by toads for some reason. during the particularly hot summer, i had noticed that their skin looked drier than normal-- so i felt that it should be my duty to build a kind of "toad hotel"-- a large rock supported by four squarish pillars, with some fluffy green grass and a small mud pit in the middle--all with their maximum comfort in mind.

much to my dismay, if i recall correctly, merely one or two larger toads did come by and stay for a while; eventually as the days wore on and the temperatures went down, i decided to take down the hotel and fill back in the hole that i'd dug.

the years passed, then a decade; and a few years ago, my mum emailed me to say that they were selling a "toad hotel" in one of the catalogs she subscribes to. and, at that immediate time i wondered: how many people on earth, at a given moment, are considering the same thing? -- how many people are remembering the same thing? and how many people are trying to make their future from that same thing?

i imagine it'd be a fun thing to find out. (twitter away, hey?)

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