Hot Dogs, Blogs, Snakes and Frogs

When I started this blog, I wanted to chronicle the "life and times of a hot dog man." Even though I make the best hot dogs, I simply can't write about my day every day because it would bore me and anyone reading this to tears. Most posts would read like this:

"Today I got to the truck, turned on the grill, chopped onions while the water and beer started boiling, refilled the soda coolers, stocked the chips, filled the condiment bottles and then sold the best hot dogs. Today was (hot/ cold/ rainy/snowy/ cloudy/ sunny). Some funny people stopped by to eat and I made a (lot of/little) money. Then I cleaned up and went home."

Yawn.

Don't get me wrong, its a really cool job but not if I want to write about it every day. That is why I expound on other subjects, post cool videos, etc. That's also led me to start up other blogs. I don't want to bore people, but I still want the "Hot Dog Truck element" alive in this blog.

So here's a little tidbit of my day every day around this time of year:

As some of you know, I have two signs that I put out to let passing motorists know about my fabulous lunch special. I put each sign about 100-200 yards from the truck in either direction each morning at about 10:15. This also lets people know I am open for business.

One sign ends up in front of the office building and the other ends up down the road where there is a wooded hillside on one side of the road and wetlands on the other.
See the sign near the telephone pole?

This in itself is not a thrilling part of my day, but when I am walking back from putting that sign up, I pass a series of small ditches that are filled with water from road and storm drain run off. In the ditch nearest my truck, there is always a family of frogs! Two weeks ago I saw a bunch of tadpoles in the water-some ready to "become" frogs. Here is one that's already turned into a frog (he's in about the center of the photo-see his eyes?




There are still a bunch of tadpoles, but their pictures didn't come out. These are common green frogs, the kind you'd find in any pond or swamp in New England. Each spring I "adopt" my little frog family in the ditch and I stop by each morning to check on them. Last year the most I saw at once was 8, but I am sure many more than that are spawned in this ditch each spring. The other morning I saw several garter snakes prowling the "shores" of the ditch. I snapped a picture (see below-if you double click the photo to get the full sized pic, you can make out the garter snake-its black and yellow- amongst the sticks just below the rock).

I saw three different garter snakes around the edge of the ditch the day I snapped this picture. Garter snakes EAT frogs so it will be interesting to watch the frog population this year!

I always liked frogs and snakes as a kid and our family has a 5 foot long Ball Python as a pet. I also like to observe nature. Even in spots most people would overlook-like roadside ditches-nature is abundant.

I have seen deer, racoons, turkeys (the bird kind AND the people kind), turkey vultures, all kinds of hawks, and even coyotes near my hot dog truck. I hope to be able to snap some pictures of more wildlife, but for now I'll enjoy my family of frogs and their arch enemies the garter snakes.