Dense Frog Advisory!

Thirty-six degrees in Madison and rain falling on top of snow which can mean only one thing....dense fog is on the way! And what's more perfect for fiction than a cloak of fog over the landscape?

It hides things and makes the ordinary mysterious...all elements for a murder...or a bungled assault on a military position...or a ship in Arctic seas with its engines out and icebergs near! All stories designed to make your spine try to crawl right out of your body and seek the safety of the nearest chiropractor..

Except when you have an imagination like mine. It often tends to look at the comic side of things. So, when I saw a forecast for dense fog, my mind instantly transformed it into "A Dense Frog Advsiory." Silly, I know, but it's stuff that just keeps popping up in my head without any invitation on my part. And it's very helpful for the cartoon-drawing side of my creativity

So, right now, I picture a huge and very stupid* frog lumbering over the Wisconsin landscape, squashing Hyundais and Home Depots with its wet tonnage.
*I mean, what kind of amphibian is thick enough to come out in the winter, anyway?!


And the question occurs to me, "What's going to happen to this frog?" I mean, it's either going to freeze to death...starve to death...slurp up pedestrians with a mile-long tongue in a frantic attempt to fuel itself....or be brought down by 155 mm howitzers brought in by the National Guard because they're the only artillery pieces big enough to do the job.

Imagine the mess! "Left lane of the Beltway closed due to frog innards! Avoid this area until remains are toad* away."
*One thing I've discovered over the years is that highway departments are notoriously poor spellers.


Well, by now, you've gotten the idea. Your imagination can take you anywhere if you just loosen the reins and let it have its head. It also allows you to mix metaphors freely.

In fact, I have a Metaphor Mixer in the kitchen, and I highly recommend it. It saves time and when you add in a lot of adjectives and adverbs, you get a fine purple color. But, as with any appliance, you have your prose and cons!

Hey, if you'd like a decidedly action-adventure oriented science fiction series (with a dash of humor), try my "Fragger Sparks" series at Amazon, Fictionwise.com, Synergebooks and elsewhere! The three books out now are:

The First Misadventure of Fragger Sparks, A Ranger Leads the Way
The Second Misadventure of Fragger Sparks, A Ranger Loses His Way
The Third Misadventure of Fragger Sparks, A Ranger Paves the Way


A fourth book, The Blood of Fragger Sparks, is on the way, but before I can continue writing on it, I have to get a frog out of the driveway! See you next time!