Tonight, when the Monster and I stepped out into the rainy night for our final (brief) walk of the day, we almost landed on a toad that was sitting, very very still, on the sidewalk just off the front porch. My Clevelander student was with us, and she and I spotted the toad at the same moment--and were both glad that the dog was distracted by something in the entirely opposite direction.

After the dog and I returned to the house, I got out the camera and went back out to take the toad's picture. I got two good (though overly flash-bright) shots. Yet when I looked at the pictures I'd transferred to the computer, those two shots were gone (and, since I'd already reformatted the memory card, irretrievably so). Which means that tonight you're looking at the dog once more, doing his level best both to be patient with me and to play unbearably cute just before bedtime.

Two pieces of goodness, one from each end of the culture spectrum:

The new Poets House (in its new, rent-free-until-2069, lower Manhattan location) opens tomorrow, and if I lived in New York City I would be desperate to make a space in my day to get over there.

The show Glee gets better every week.

(Told you they were from both ends of the spectrum.)