The Voices

What I intended to do was park my fanny in front of the TV with a beer and watch The Voice. Don't judge. I like The Voice. You don't approve of that, find yourself a classier blogger.

However, my plans were dashed when the temperature rose and the weather turned drizzly mid-afternoon. That's not TV weather. That's frog weather.

For three years now the members of the Harborton Frog Shuttle have been ferrying frogs and salamanders across Highway 30. The amphibians live uphill in Forest Park and the place they have their Spring Mixer and Cotillion is downhill, below the highway. This has resulted in a situation that brings tender-hearted drivers to a screeching halt to sob against the steering wheel. Unfortunately, there aren't very many of those drivers. It's a squishfest. Rob Lee, who lives at the junction of Frog Lust and Highway 30, decided to do something about it.

It's pretty low-tech. Assemble an army of frog wranglers and give them buckets. We pick up the frogs, put them in the buckets, drive them across the highway, and decant them into the swamp. Our chief concern is for the charming Red-Legged Frogs, which, like a lot of other critters, are in some trouble these days. But we'll scoop up the tiny Chorus Frogs too. They're not listed as endangered, except in the sense that they're going to turn into paste on Highway 30, and that's endangered enough for us.

Long-Toed Salamander getting a ride

They're surprisingly easy to catch. It's possible that recent generations of frogs have internalized a collective memory of Highway 30 and they're not all that anxious to cross it. So when they're on their way and someone stands in front of them with a bucket, it strikes them as being a fine time to take a breather.

There are a lot of things that look like frogs when you're wandering around in the dark in the rain. Rain splashing off the pavement looks like small hopping frogs. Stranded clumps of lichen look like frogs. Your more charismatic leaves look like frogs. Water droplets on the grass look like frog eyeshine. You know what really looks like a frog? A frog. You get good at it after a while.

Last year our efforts were less effective and more fun. Aerobic, even. On a good warm, wet night, we were dashing all over the place trying to bag them all. This year, our intrepid frog captains have rigged up fencing with landscape cloth. It's nothing these frogs can't surmount, really. Half of these guys have been mounting everything in sight for weeks now. But it is a puzzlement at first. They poink up to the fence and sit there and say "Huh." And we collect them like so many dimes in the sofa cushions.

In the first part of the season, all the frogs are coming downhill. It's easy to tell the sexes apart. The female red-leggeds are much larger to begin with but they've also let themselves go. They're plump with eggs. They're gravid; the males are avid. Boy howdy they're avid. They're motivated. They're fast. Of course they don't have to deal with bloat. On the way back up it's a little harder. Presumably you can tell the males because they have swollen, let's say, thumbs, but frankly you can tell the females also because, not to be indelicate about it, they kind of have stretch marks.

Yes, at a certain point many of the frogs start heading back uphill from the swamp. And that means we have to intercept them below the highway. There is a considerable number of weeks that we'll have frogs going both directions. Sometimes we're not sure which way they're going. We have to conduct an interview right there in the street.

The red-leggeds make almost no sound at all. If severely provoked, they sort of mutter "Hey, now." And there's a little thumping sound when they, ah, kick the bucket. But that's about it. Still, the swamp is crazy with frogsong. That would be our chorus frogs. The little buggers are total belters, every one. Right on pitch and no affectations. You're not going to find that on TV.

Your Next Idol

The push to become a famous author isn't moving along as quickly as it might, so I have decided to start singing my way into people's hearts instead, yo. I can't actually sing all that well, but there may be ways around that. After all, there are millions of things in print that are worse than what I write, so maybe it works the same way with singing. As I see it, there are two entrees into the world of singing fame: American Idol and The Voice. American Idol would require me to get too close to that scary-ass Nicki Minaj, whoever she is. She has a speaking voice like the last rales of a roadkill platypus, but supposedly she sings. I don't know. American Idol isn't my best shot anyway because I'm at least thirty years too old to idolize. On The Voice, I can try to sneak in during the blind auditions, when the judges have their backs turned and won't be able to see me at all. That's my best side.

The most important rule in singing is that the shortest distance between two notes is to be avoided at all costs. The more notes you can jam in, the more points you get. I can't sing like that, but it's not mandatory, if you can instead demonstrate some kind of quirk. My quirk will be trying to cover every song using only three notes either side of middle C, since those are the only reliable notes I have.

I'm starting to construct my back story. This will be presented in a two-minute video before my performance, so it's important to get it right. I don't have a lot to work with. True, my parents are dead, but that just means I can't say I want to win so I can buy my poor mama a house. I don't have any diseases that I can get a doctor to agree I have. And there's no one in my life who is depending on me. I've seen a man explain that he has to win the contest or else keep working for a moving company, like that's the worst thing ever, and that's too pathetic for this blue-collar girl. Recently a teenage contestant on The Voice admitted, through a brave, straight, white smile, that she had once suffered teasing for her crooked teeth. I know how awful that can be. I used to get it for having hairy legs and knee socks the year I missed the nylons memo. But that's all she could come up with. She's going to have to sing her fanny off to overcome that sorry back story.

Of course, I'll have to practice. This week I'm going to work on the double fist-pump on the heart until it looks natural. Next week I'll lean forward with the mike in one hand and the other arm stretched out behind me. Squinting is next, accompanied by the repetitive three-finger flutter on the mike hand, like a stuck butterfly. I'll have to hire someone for makeup. And I'm going with cowboy boots and a tight skirt an inch below my ass. I'm going to have to check where that is now.

Then all that's left is the song. The most important thing is to choose one that's in my wheelhouse. So first off I'll look up "wheelhouse," and then try to locate mine, and see if there's a song in it. Then I plan to give it my all. The goal is to be a-mazing. If you can't be a-mazing you have no business trying, but fortunately it's not a high bar. A-mazing is just a notch above crazy good, and there are no other superlatives beyond it. And there are several ways of being a-mazing. You can bring it, or you can own it, or you can leave it all out on the stage.

Finally, no matter the outcome, I must not veer off the correct expression of gratitude to the judges. Currently it is "thank you so much." Not "very much," not "I appreciate it," not "thanks a lot." Thank you so much.

Thank you so much.