I took this photo a few years ago on our deck filled with garden tubs and planters. I love this photo. As a joke, I passed it around work and titled it "Why Women Rule" (no bad thoughts directed at the menfolk here - just good old humor).

All in all, personally, I think it's a great picture. I took several and if you view them one after the other you can see that the male, headless, is still exercising his right of procreation.

If you look closely you can see that the female is looking right at you. It's as if she's saying, "Really Dahling, can't you see we're in the middle of something?"

The male's body stayed attached to her for two more days! His color went from bright green to a sick and dying yellow, as did hers. For some reason his body didn't let go for a while. When I found her again yellow and pale I told her girlfriend, it's time to let go!

I thought this would be a fun one to see what kind of titles we can come up with - keep them clean please. Try and think of something (like in the old movies, the classics, where they'd had double meanings and played on their words) that's cute and maybe has a double meaning.

As a former managing editor for a small-town newspaper, besides overseeing the weekly newspaper production, I took pictures, developed film, created halftones, typeset, laid out the paper, wrote stories, conducted interviews, reported stories from the edges of fires, crime scenes, atop mountains and by the sides of the Merced River.

We used to buy our film in bulk and roll our own so I learned to take a lot of photos. With digital cameras today, you can just delete what you don't use. So much less wasteful, and so much fun. I've gotten some great shots right off my deck looking east into our meadow replete with deer, turkeys and a myriad of other creatures not necessarily photographable.

(c) 2008 Laurie J. Brenner, photo and article (useable with permission)