MB Press: Secret behind victory: kissing frog on its lips

[Herp News]

WINNIPEG FREE PRESS (Manitoba) 04 August 09 Secret behind victory: kissing frog on its lips (Doug Speirs)
St. Pierre-Jolys: Get ready to be very excited because today I'm going to give you a dramatic blow-by-blow account of how my frog and I made out at the Canadian Frog Jumping Championship.We competed in the National Frog Jumping VIP event at the 40th annual Frog Follies Festival in St. Pierre-Jolys, a village about 50 kilometres south of Winnipeg that is home to about 900 people and a large number of nervous amphibians.
As frog-jumping events go, it's an incredibly classy affair, as evidenced by the fact the first activity we engaged in Sunday was a pre-jump wine and cheese party.
(Fact: In elite jumping circles, the wine and cheese party is ALWAYS held first, because after touching frogs, no one is in the mood to handle anything in the "hors d'oeuvres" category.)
The first thing I did was to formally register my frog. It was a tough choice, but I decided to call him Sir Robert Hoppington Esquire (Bob for short) in honour of my boss Bob, not that I am suggesting he has any frog-like qualities.
As we sipped wine, I pressed the defending champion, Morris MLA Mavis Taillieu, to reveal her winning technique.
"Last year, I just put my frog down on the spot and he took off," Mavis confided, "I didn't do anything. It's all up to the frog."
"The secret is to blow on its hindquarter," said Luc Catellier of the local chamber of commerce.
Soon it was time to march over to the competition tent, where our frogs were patiently waiting and having their nerves soothed by a rock band.
There were 23 competitors and each of us was called on stage and handed a random frog in a bucket. We had to scoop the frogs out with our hands, plop them down on the green carpet, then encourage them to jump via the technique of yelling and slapping our hands on the floor while audience members tried to avoid wetting themselves.
Our frogs had to jump three times. The winner was the one with the longest combined leaps.
Every once in a while, a frog would make a break for freedom, hopping away in some random direction, causing the crowd to cheer wildly, until a child wielding a butterfly net captured the escapee.
The crowd was also deeply moved when St. Boniface MP Shelly Glover motivated her frog via the shocking method of kissing it on the lips, which are tough to find on a frog.
But it clearly worked because her frog, Greta Grenouille, rocketed into the lead with a three-jump total of 112.5 inches. As a professional journalist, I asked Shelly what it was like to kiss a frog.
Shelly: "It was wet and slimy."
Me: "Kind of like high school?"
Sadly, there were a few "bad apple" frogs in the barrel. For example, when local RCMP Staff Sgt. Ron Poirier plopped his frog down, instead of jumping, it just turned around and glared at him.
"Taser him! Taser him!" the crowd howled as the standoff dragged on.
Happily, nothing that dramatic occurred, but the sergeant was forced to take his frog back into custody.
As I scooped Bob out of his bucket, he bolted, causing me to shriek. For the next five minutes, a kid with a net would capture my frog, which I would gingerly retrieve, only to watch it squirt away again like a bar of green soap as I resumed shrieking.
"I may not have any teeth, but I will gum you to within an inch of your life!" was the telepathic message Bob was sending me.
In the end, I crawled, shrieking, after my frog, which leaped 93.5 inches, earning me sixth place. The day's big winners were Shelly Glover and her teammate, Greta.
"This is one of the proudest moments of my life," Shelly told me after her victory, then, tears in her eyes, squealed: "But the funniest moment ever was when you were cringing in fear in front of your frog. The little girl screams -- I was laughing so hard I cried!"
So I've got that going for me. Which is fine, because my frog and I have been invited to come back next year. I'm definitely up for it, but something tells me Bob is going to "croak" before then.
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/loc...-52421977.html