Here's an e-mail I wrote to my good buddy, Chad. I was super tired when I wrote it and I think for that reason, it has an interesting feel to it that I liked when I looked back at it later. Also, I thought it would give the reader a glimpse into some of the wildlife here in the Itch and some of the carnage I see every night when driving (jk).

Wildlife:
Today was an absolutely gorgeous day here in the Itch. It wa sunny all day, with little blobs of clouds floating by every now and then. It created a beautiful patchwork of light whisping across the rice fields. This was one of about 3 bright sunny days in the month that I've been here so far, but the other two were too hot to enjoy. It changed to autumn here in about 1 week- seriously. An amazingly rapid change. It went from sweltering hot, almost naked at home for sure, to having to close my windows at night to keep out the chill in a matter of days. I hear this is one of the most pleasant and beautiful times of the year here with temps being jsut right, and the leaves starting th change color. The rice is golden and bending deeply under its own ripeness. It has been so neat to watch the rice change from bright green blades, to reddish buds, to golden fleecy heads. It waves in the wind like water and the chirps and burbles of frog and cricket song fills the night. I know I'll be a bit sad as it starts to get colder and many of these little guys die off, or go into hybernation, but alas, such is life and it makes me appreciate them even more. Dragonflys hunt from dawn till dusk, and if you stand in the road and stick your finger high into the air, one will come land on your finger and you can bring it close to your face to see all the tiny incredible details. It swivels its head to look at you, too, but it doesn:t mind you. It's your friend, and it's using your friendly perch to scan the skies for a tasty meal. The other day, at the Jazz Festival in Sendai, I was walking with some friends and suddenly saw a dragonfly about 20 yards away flying right towards us. I shot my finger into the air right as it was upon us and it quickly and gracefully lit upon my finger like the whole thing was planned. My friends were mystified, and to be honest, so was I. Even the Japanes people standing around pointed and said "Mitte!" (Look!). Michelle called me the pied piper of dragonflies and I secretly felt honored. Deep down inside, I felt like I had a sort of kinship with these masters of the insect skies.

Driving at night is actually a bit of a bummer for me because all the rice fields harbor all sorts of frogs. And, expecially when it's wet, these little guys like to sit in the road for some reason- I'm still trying to figure that out- but then as you're driving along, you see these cute little hops all over the place and it's not like you can swerve every 10 seconds or anything! These roads are narrow and treacherous at parts! Well, their soft little amphibious bodies don't even make a bump as my huge machine squshes them where they land. To be fair, on open road I do tend to swerve when I can to try to, straddling them whenever possible, but I can't go far and sometimes my attempt to help ends in just the opposite. :( It seriously is about every 8-10 seconds that I see a little bright blob, illuminted white by my headlights hopping along, not knowing which way to go. It seems the bigger, fist-sized guys know to hop back towards the safety of the fields, but the little guys who are newly born or whom evolution simply cursed with such a small brain, they sometimes hop from the safety of the side of the road, right under my tire. Sad :( Every morning, I expect to see this carnage on the road, but somehow, I never see anything. Do you know why? Yep, the birds mop them up bright and early. Especially the crows. As well as, I'm sure, the racoons and small rodents. Some frogs are just so small that their little bodies are just imbedded into the road and dry up to a flat, thin disk during the next dry spell. Then I imagine they just turn to dust as cars contiuue over their dust. Then I guess we breathe in that dust, so really, there's a little frog in each of us. :) Ribbit!

-Aaron