Today's most valuable lesson

I am very proud to say I now know what cane toads and sausage rolls have in common. First of all, meet Toadby:

Toadby is a rather misfortunate cane toad who spends most of his time flaking out (ha ha) in the back lane from the college to the uni. Since this is the fastest way to the uni from our deck we have to walk past him all the time. I can pretty safely say that he hasn't visibly decomposed AT ALL since he first appeared. The smell, on the other hand, makes it pretty obvious that there are definitely some bacteria at work.

It's hard to imagine something that small and flat can smell so bad. I was gagging when I took this photo. See the sorts of sacrifices I have to go through to entertain you people?

Lunch today was sausage rolls, because some brainiac decided that they'd put it down on the special requests list. Everyone's first bite of these sausage rolls was followed by one of those "This isn't quite right" looks. They tasted kind of fruity, almost more sweet than savoury. Still, I bolted one down and grabbed another one for later.

On the way home from my Geology prac today I said g'day to Toadby. Usually the wind only blows one direction down that lane, so once I'd gotten past Toadby I thought I was in the clear. Typical, the wind had changed. I got a nice strong whiff of decomposing cane toad. Awful! A bit later in the evening I went to eat that sausage roll. My first bite was recieved a little differently this time. For some reason, it tasted exactly the same as Toadby smelt. That's what had grossed so many people out at lunch. I'd finally put my finger on what it tasted like, and it made it all the more revolting. One of those things you never thought possible.

Just a note. As it turns out, I didn't get that question on eating rocks (below) right. Makes me wonder if all those wantons I've eaten in the past might have been bull testicles or something.