A girl and her frog

A girl and her frog, originally uploaded by mhall209.

Today my wife and I went to the Calaveras County Fair, AKA the Frog Jump. Our county fair is a take off from Mark Twain's story "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" which was written in the gold rush days when Mark Twain lived in the area. For the last 68 years on the third weekend in May people come from miles around to competitively jump their frogs. The fair has all the other things a typical American county fair has; rides, animals, and exhibits. But here the focus is the frogs.

You can bring your own frog or rent one. This little girl rented one. The way it works is you set the frog on the little pad, in the picture it is a small circle of carpet. Then you do whatever you can to coax the frog to jump! The distance is measured from the starting point to the tail of the frog when it lands from its third hop.

This was the first time I actually sat and watched the frog jump part of frog jump! I just wnated to get a couple good shots. Mission accomplished.