My Dear Karl

I go very seldom to the canteen. It´s expensive and rather not healthy. But sometimes I do go. Volkswagen makes excellent Curry-Wurst (German) and it´s also fun to bond with colleagues.

So the other day I went (yes, I know, I was on holiday...).

It´s always extremely full on Tuesdays, the Currywurst-Day. So it was then. And amongst all those hectic people there stood a frog. A very big frog. He looked lost, and hurt. Hurt in the sense of injured.

I looked down and he looked back like he wanted to say, "help me?"...

New was... there was not only the canteen, but mingled in were shops. And a vet. How practical is that, no? So I looked down to the frog and said, "hey, if you want me to help you, follow me".

So he did. The vet took the poor fella, bent his really very long arms and legs and said, "nope, he´s just all right - will you keep him?"

Actually, no. Honestly, I was a bit disgusted by him! But I didn´t say that. I looked at him and he looked back like... you guess it, I kept him. Bought a litter-box, food and a food bowl at the vet-store and gave them 50 €, because they said they also care about animals who don´t "belong" to anyone.

The frog then slowly followed me.

No, I didn´t take him to the canteen - lunch-time was over anyways.

Next hurdle: 5 1/2 stories to go to my office. I hate the old elevator, that is no option. After some hops I realised he won´t make it. Not in my time-scedule. So, we looked at each other and then he hopped carefully in my arms.

Eek.

He was cold. And a bit slimey, too.

I showed him the rooms and after work took him the same way down to my car. Same procedure at home. Ingo looked at us as if we were crazy. I tried to explain and realised the frog has no name. So, since we live in Karlstreet, I introduced him as Karl and Karl looked quite ok with the name. I showed him the apartment and then I realised... Karl is not an ordinary frog, he is a king-frog and the crown is made of his skin.

Days came and went by, we fell into a nice routine and with the time I got used to how Karl´s skin feels like. I liked him and enjoyed his company.

Then autumn came. Karl got weak.
In the afternoon he layed down in his bed. He looked at me. Kinda sad, but also kinda reassuring.

And then he faded. I cried and he faded more.

I saw a tin - inside his body!

After a while the tin was all that was left. And some time after that I took the tin. I opened it. I found 5 million €.

Five million €!!

And I was sad I had lost a friend.

Then I woke up.

Following day we ran errands and Ingo said, let´s see if we need something from the hardware-store.

He found nothing.
But I stumbeled over Karl:



Life is weird sometimes, no?