the Super Bowl and the Crappy Half Time
Feb 16, 2017 0:27:56 GMT
wildhorseluvr, Mari-in-IN, and 1 more like this
Post by bretf on Feb 16, 2017 0:27:56 GMT
The Super Bowl and the Crappy Half-Time
First off, let me say this isn’t what you think. It has nothing at all to do with Lady Gaga. Therefore, a little backstory is in order.
Like so many into self-sufficiency and good eating, I have a bunch of chickens that I allow to free range. I eat a few eggs, and sell enough more eggs for the hens to pay their way. In addition, they provide my garden fertilizer, and they are my non-chemical insecticide, eating an unknown amount of bugs. Every now and then, one will even grace the cooking pot. All told, they are quite valuable to my home and lifestyle. Therefore I need to protect them, so I lock them up each night to prevent raccoons, coyotes, and foxes from having a chicken dinner at my expense. Each morning I open the door to their coop up so they can go out again.
Even though the chickens free-range, I do have a pen to enclose them when necessary. Inside the pen is a long feeder, 8’ long, on angle iron legs, raising the main feeder to a little over a foot off the ground. I made a frame and mounted a sheet of galvanized roofing over it to keep the rain and snow out of the feed. The feeder is set a couple of feet from the pen’s fence. The hens decided that the dirt under the feeder is a perfect place for them to scratch and take dust baths, so the ground beneath it is lower than the surrounding area.
This year, we’ve had a winter like we haven’t seen for thirty years. Snow fell and didn’t melt like normal. More snow fell on top of that, and then even more snow. The hens really didn’t want to venture out from their coop into it, but the feed and water are both out there so they had to go out. So the small area between their feed, water, and coop got a lot more poop accumulated than normal.
The snow in the chicken pen, as well as the paths and the driveway got all packed down. Then we got one day of rain, followed by below zero temperatures. So everywhere that wasn’t undisturbed snow was solid ice, about three or four inches thick.
Finally, after the seemingly endless winter, the weather started to moderate, and the temperatures got above freezing. So all of that ice had a film of water on it, making it even slicker than it had been. Some areas the water didn’t drain off, getting quite deep. One spot in particular was the chicken pen. There, besides just melting ice, was all that thawing chicken manure. The layer of water sitting on the ice became a thick, brownish-yellow sludge. The whole area was (and is) pretty disgusting to go through. And of course, a lot of that yellow-brown gunk flowed down to the depression under the feeder. The whole pen is to the point I only wear my rubber irrigator boots there when I gather eggs, feed and water. And of course I rinse the boots off before going back in the house.
So I think that about covers it, the backstory I mean. Now, back to the title of this little narrative.
It was Super Bowl Sunday, and like most of America and a large part of the world, I was watching the game. As halftime neared, I glanced out the window and saw that it wasn’t dark, but it was getting close. I figured all the chickens would be in their house and I could shut them up while the “experts” talked about what each team should do in the second half.
A side note here: my daughter said, “Lady Gaga again? She performed last year.” I had to disagree with her, as anyone who read my story “The Ashen Horse” will know, Super Bowl 50 played a major role in it, and I’ve spent the last six months going over that section more than once.
Anyway, half time arrived, and I donned my irrigator boots and my coat, and headed for the chicken house. One hen picked that moment to eat. She jumped up on the feeder as I approached and pecked ravenously at the grain.
I was tired. I was impatient, it was the Super Bowl after all, and I’d just pulled a rack of ribs out of the oven and I was hungry. I just wanted to lock the chickens up, go eat, and try to stay awake until the end of the game. That was it. Simple, huh? And that one hen didn’t have sense enough to go to the roost so I could save her from the night varmints and get back to the house.
I got between the fence and the feeder and tried to shoo the hen to the coop. She just jumped across to the other side, wanting to eat more before going in for the night. I crouched to reach under that metal roofing to shoo her again, and then my foot slipped on the ice. Flailing my arms did no good whatsoever, and my knee slammed against the feeder, then my back slammed against the fence. With the feeder rocking back and forth like a pendulum, my feet went the rest of the way out from under me, and I landed with a splatter, right in that yellow-brown ooze. At least the feeder stopped rocking without falling on me like I was sure it was going to do.
I fought my way to my feet, locked up the hen house, and sloshed to the house. One boot was filled with the thick liquid, my backside was soaked through, and my knee smarted. At the back door, I took off my boot and drained it, then headed straight for the shower. Once I was clean and had the wash machine running with my soiled clothing inside, I went to the living room and saw Lady Gaga catch a ball and jump off the stage.
What a crappy half time, literally. Dumb chicken, next time I’ll leave her to her own fate with the coyotes.
First off, let me say this isn’t what you think. It has nothing at all to do with Lady Gaga. Therefore, a little backstory is in order.
Like so many into self-sufficiency and good eating, I have a bunch of chickens that I allow to free range. I eat a few eggs, and sell enough more eggs for the hens to pay their way. In addition, they provide my garden fertilizer, and they are my non-chemical insecticide, eating an unknown amount of bugs. Every now and then, one will even grace the cooking pot. All told, they are quite valuable to my home and lifestyle. Therefore I need to protect them, so I lock them up each night to prevent raccoons, coyotes, and foxes from having a chicken dinner at my expense. Each morning I open the door to their coop up so they can go out again.
Even though the chickens free-range, I do have a pen to enclose them when necessary. Inside the pen is a long feeder, 8’ long, on angle iron legs, raising the main feeder to a little over a foot off the ground. I made a frame and mounted a sheet of galvanized roofing over it to keep the rain and snow out of the feed. The feeder is set a couple of feet from the pen’s fence. The hens decided that the dirt under the feeder is a perfect place for them to scratch and take dust baths, so the ground beneath it is lower than the surrounding area.
This year, we’ve had a winter like we haven’t seen for thirty years. Snow fell and didn’t melt like normal. More snow fell on top of that, and then even more snow. The hens really didn’t want to venture out from their coop into it, but the feed and water are both out there so they had to go out. So the small area between their feed, water, and coop got a lot more poop accumulated than normal.
The snow in the chicken pen, as well as the paths and the driveway got all packed down. Then we got one day of rain, followed by below zero temperatures. So everywhere that wasn’t undisturbed snow was solid ice, about three or four inches thick.
Finally, after the seemingly endless winter, the weather started to moderate, and the temperatures got above freezing. So all of that ice had a film of water on it, making it even slicker than it had been. Some areas the water didn’t drain off, getting quite deep. One spot in particular was the chicken pen. There, besides just melting ice, was all that thawing chicken manure. The layer of water sitting on the ice became a thick, brownish-yellow sludge. The whole area was (and is) pretty disgusting to go through. And of course, a lot of that yellow-brown gunk flowed down to the depression under the feeder. The whole pen is to the point I only wear my rubber irrigator boots there when I gather eggs, feed and water. And of course I rinse the boots off before going back in the house.
So I think that about covers it, the backstory I mean. Now, back to the title of this little narrative.
It was Super Bowl Sunday, and like most of America and a large part of the world, I was watching the game. As halftime neared, I glanced out the window and saw that it wasn’t dark, but it was getting close. I figured all the chickens would be in their house and I could shut them up while the “experts” talked about what each team should do in the second half.
A side note here: my daughter said, “Lady Gaga again? She performed last year.” I had to disagree with her, as anyone who read my story “The Ashen Horse” will know, Super Bowl 50 played a major role in it, and I’ve spent the last six months going over that section more than once.
Anyway, half time arrived, and I donned my irrigator boots and my coat, and headed for the chicken house. One hen picked that moment to eat. She jumped up on the feeder as I approached and pecked ravenously at the grain.
I was tired. I was impatient, it was the Super Bowl after all, and I’d just pulled a rack of ribs out of the oven and I was hungry. I just wanted to lock the chickens up, go eat, and try to stay awake until the end of the game. That was it. Simple, huh? And that one hen didn’t have sense enough to go to the roost so I could save her from the night varmints and get back to the house.
I got between the fence and the feeder and tried to shoo the hen to the coop. She just jumped across to the other side, wanting to eat more before going in for the night. I crouched to reach under that metal roofing to shoo her again, and then my foot slipped on the ice. Flailing my arms did no good whatsoever, and my knee slammed against the feeder, then my back slammed against the fence. With the feeder rocking back and forth like a pendulum, my feet went the rest of the way out from under me, and I landed with a splatter, right in that yellow-brown ooze. At least the feeder stopped rocking without falling on me like I was sure it was going to do.
I fought my way to my feet, locked up the hen house, and sloshed to the house. One boot was filled with the thick liquid, my backside was soaked through, and my knee smarted. At the back door, I took off my boot and drained it, then headed straight for the shower. Once I was clean and had the wash machine running with my soiled clothing inside, I went to the living room and saw Lady Gaga catch a ball and jump off the stage.
What a crappy half time, literally. Dumb chicken, next time I’ll leave her to her own fate with the coyotes.
