Meet Trygve and My New Job

I don't have a lot of time because I have to get to bed early so I can get up for work in the morning. I got a full-time job for the summer at the firm I usually work limited hours for out of my home. I haven't worked full time or in an office setting since 1987. Even back then I only lasted about three months. This is a much better situation and while I may miss my freedom, I'm learning a whole lot about litigation, legal secretarial duties and office protocol, not to mention how to ride a city bus again, how to wear shoes that don't feel good and how to smile and say hello to lots of people and act friendly toward them all day long. Some parts of this job are more of a stretch for me than others.

Those of you who know me will understand what I'm talking about. Those of you who really know me will tell me to stop being so hard on myself, though you can never really know what great strides I am making in the social department by going off to work in this huge law firm every workday.

Now, about Trygve.

Trygve is my one surviving praying mantis. I had been given about half a dozen, three of which survived their first few molts and would probably still be around today if I hadn't left them outside on the picnic table in their plastic jars in 90 degree heat. Did I mention I got a full-time job? Anyway, the one in the largest container survived the sun, but the other two were crispy when I got home that night. This is actually sort of a relief, less to take care of, if you get my drift, but I did suffer the usual guilt before moving on to indulge the one left. Two other siblings (he had about 100) are still out there, one at the Milwaukee County Zoo, taken in by my zookeeper neighbor, and another a few blocks away at a friend's house. Hers has turned green, but mine is still brown. They say that can happen - green or brown. I am jealous because green is my very favorite color, but Trygve wears brown well. (I was sort of jealous last week during computer training at work for similar reasons. I was being trained with a lawyer new to the firm. We got all sorts of passwords for different areas that we would have to access. For one particular function I was given the password "purple" and the lawyer was given another, much more desirable color that I really shouldn't mention because she is a lawyer and all and one should be proprietary about these things. But anyway, she got the one I wanted and I got stuck with "purple". Well, yesterday I had to use that password for the first time and guess what? It didn't work. I called IT and they told me my password was actually the other one! That was a little spot of sunshine on my day. Of course, I didn't tell you any of this.)

So, tonight I got home around 7:45 pm and found that Trygve had molted while I was out and was now at least 25 percent larger than when I left this morning. His empty shell was hanging from a branch in the jar. I just took out a ruler and measured him and he's nearly two inches long, not counting the outstretched limbs.

My daughter caught a firefly tonight and we threw it in there with him and settled down to watch the show. He went for it almost immediately, but seemed surprised at the result of his first strike. Fireflies are beetles, after all, and have a rather hard outer shell. For about 45 minutes he kept his eyes on that firefly and paced all around the mesh top, making circles as the prey wandered about. He seemed so eager to get at it, yet afraid at the same time. I don't think it can hurt him at all so I'll just leave it in there and see what comes of it. I think it's off to the pet store for more pinhead crickets on Saturday. I tried to take a photo of my handsome new bug, but there is nothing that does him justice yet and I will wait to post a picture until I get a good one.