frogs, beware.

The other day, I decided that I would start getting up early each morning to walk Toby. This decision is two-fold: 1) Toby has a lot of pent-up energy, and we have to keep him in a crate while we're at work so he needs more exercise [side note: we tried penning him in the kitchen with baby gates, and the Mighty Dog jumped over the baby gate & pooped/peed all over the guest room while we were gone. Oh well - we tried.] 2) I need more exercise, and I am always too tired to do it when I get home from work. So, this morning I set out at about 5:50 to walk Toby. Since most of you have not spent much time with Toby, I should explain that he is a very curious dog. He is very interested in everything that is going on around him. So whenever we go for a walk, if there is ANYTHING in his line of sight, he has to check it out. A piece of trash, that fried chicken leg that was weirdly placed in our street for like a week, and yes, frogs. He is really funny when he encounters a frog, because he doesn't realize that it can jump. Usually, the frog is sitting there, Toby walks up & sniffs it, the frog jumps, and Toby is startled and yet continues to investigate. With most obstacles, I encourage Toby to keep walking because his little "investigations" could potentially add about 45 minutes to our walk if I don't pull him along. However, when he wants to sniff a frog, I let him, because it is really funny to see him so surprised that this little thing just jumped in response to his sniffing. Well, this morning on our way out to walk, there was a frog on our driveway. So, he walked up to the frog & sniffed it. I think this particular frog was trying to outsmart Toby, because he just sat there. I guess he thought he was playing dead. Anyway, so Toby sniffed the frog again, and the frog just sat there in bewilderment. So, Toby hiked his leg & peed on the frog. That's right, my dog peed on a frog. I guess he was marking his territory just in case any other dogs came along to claim the frog?? Who knows.