Frog Strangler

 It was raining heavily this morning. After such a dry summer and fall, it was a welcome sight.

My wife was wide-eyed as she marveled at the volume of water falling from the sky. She announced, "It's about time we had a frog strangler."

True. But, as usual, my mind slipped into memory mode after hearing the familiar euphemism.

It was a warm late spring day and my fishing partner and I were having no luck. Since my boat was a small stern-steer bass boat, we decided to navigate the narrow river that fed into Lake Kickapoo in north Texas. The water was placid and greenish-brown. The fishing was no better in the river.

But the muddy shoreline boasted quite a large audience of hefty bullfrogs. I turned and said to my buddy, "We would have had better luck frog-gigging." Suddenly, a noise reminiscent of a baby with a loaded diaper broke the silence beyond my voice.

My friend yelled, "Look," while pointing  toward the muddy bank.

I witnessed a phenomenal thing; a frog that was likely over two pounds ran screaming across the surface of the murky water and slammed head-on into the side of the boat.with a resounding thud.

At that very moment I developed  strong empathy toward that baby.