Friday, March 04, 2005
Dickie... the killer cock
Without further delay, the story of Dickie. The killer cock...
As many of you know from the sheep bathing story, my mother fell heavily into country livin' when they bought the farm. The first thing to happen in Mom's countrification was the procurement of a coop full o' layin' hens and the struttin'est cock you ever did see. He got his name, Dickie, for a reason.
Now if you remember, my mom does tend to 'dabble' in nature, but sometimes her dabblin' can be seen as downright interference. I think Dickie got it into his little peabrain that he 'n the missuses were only getting their gourmet feed (yes, my mom would, at times, cook for the chickens...) for the sole purpose that my mother could raid the nests of his harem and kidnap the ova of his progeny. So he started gettin' a little on the threatening side of cockdom.
Just let me say for those of you who have never had the pleasure of being up close and personal with a rooster: please take note of the look in their evil beady eyes and the length of their spurs. 'Cuz if they're lookin' at you all nasty-like, rest assured they got absolutely no damn reason to NOT flay you open like a ginsu knife with those treacherous weapons attached to their feet.
One summer morning, my mother was in full swing of her usual morning routine: taking out scraps for the chickens, throwin' some stuff on the burn pile for later, collectin' eggs, pickin' over the garden... just all the mundane things one does in the summer when one lives on a farm. At one point, Mom was standing at the burn pile marveling over the fact that some watermelon seeds had taken purchase and were sprouting viney arms to the sun, with little teeny tiny balls o' melon clinging surreptitiously as if they didn't belong.
Little did Mom know there was an evil presence behind her with a half wit of the same idea that something did not belong in this yard. While bending over to check out the new, somewhat miraculous growth in her burn pile, my mom heard an unforgettable *whirring* sound that raised the hair on the back of her neck. She straightened up, turned around and....
THERE WAS DICKIE. THE KILLER COCK. Coming straight at her like the scene outta 'Psycho' except this little bastard was sportin' a cockscomb instead of a wig and four-inch spurs instead of a dagger. It all happened so fast, but the little bugger filleted my mom as deftly as my Uncle Butch does catfish. I'm not sure how she managed to get away, but Dickie left his mark: a deep five inch gouge on the inside of her calf. After two days of bleeding and seeping, she finally allowed my stepdad to take her to the hospital for it. Good thing, too. Barnyard goo-gak is NOT good stuff to have in a wound. By the time I showed up, a week after it happened, the battle scar was an angry purple pucker emanating tendrils of the most vile yellow and still *ack* seeping. In short, it was nasty.
Now then, let me ask you: if this had happened to your mother, wife, sister, whoever... would you or would you not put the cock DOWN? I may not believe in the death penalty for people, but if you have something on your land that is a physical threat to you and yours, I say put a bullet in its brain. But no. My mom adored Dickie. "It's not his fault he's stupid," she'd say. "He's just trying to protect his girls." Yeah, Mom. I ain't buyin' it.
See, I'm not so sure this cock was as stupid as we all thought...
One morning I decided to go out and do the morning rounds for Mom. She'd gone to town for groceries and my stepdad was extremely busy carmelizing the onions for the French onion soup I'd requested for breakfast (it's a very delicate business, that). They both told me there had been no further threatening behavior from Dickie, so I really shouldn't worry too much. That was my first mistake.
Second mistake: wearing shorts and a pair of old Birks.
Third mistake: turning my back on Dickie... but it was only because I couldn't find him around the chicken coop and assumed he was off in the pasture somewhere.
Once again, though, there was a human at the burn pile. **WHIRRRRR**
I turned around to see the barred rock bastard comin' right for me. I don't know where he came from, but I sure wasn't going to stick around waitin' for him to give me the shiv, so I started running around the burn pile. Dickie's hot on my trail. A few times around the burn pile, once around the barn, down the hill to the garden, back up the hill to the burn pile... and it hit me. "I AM SMARTER THAN THIS ROOSTER." So I stopped running. Dickie stopped about eight feet away from me, boring hot holes of hatred into my skin. I leaned over, slipped off a Birk, and *whoosh!!* threw it at his head.
I missed.
More running ensued. Another stop. The last Birk goes flying, this time glancing off Dickie's side. That seemed to really piss him off and he came at me with more of a bloodthirsty look in his eye than before. I admit it. I was utterly horrified at this point. With bare feet I went running toward the house, skewering my feet on the shower of tiny thorns from the black locusts. I might mention that this entire time I had been screaming for my stepfather. I also might mention that my stepfather is pretty deaf. (He lives with my mother, after all...)
By the time I burst into the house, feet bleeding, hyperventilating and broken out all over in a cold sweat, Allen was just finishing up the carmelization process. I ran downstairs to where my gun (a Colt .22 revolver) was kept, flipped open the barrel, no ammo. I ran back upstairs shouting to Allen "Where's the ammo?" "It's in the upstairs closet, honey." Upstairs I went, rooting through the ammo box for the appropriate box of shells, loaded the Colt, stuffed extra rounds in my pockets and back downstairs I went.
"Ang, what are you doing?" my stepdad asked, almost as an afterthought.
"I'm gonna go out there and kill that son-of-a-bitchin' psycho cock you got runnin' around in the yard!"
Now, my stepdad is an extremely easy-going guy. Not a lot sticks in his craw, if you know what I mean. When he speaks, it's deliberate. Sometimes it's downright slooow. So imagine my reaction while he very pointedly tells me that I should not kill my mother's killer cock, but rather, I should teach him a lesson. Well, in a body wracked with adrenaline, it was all could do to muster "I. have. six. lessons. right. here."
Alas, it was not to be. Allen would not let death become Dickie. Instead, he showed me where they kept the cane and the super-soaker filled with ammonia water. Then, he showed me how to casually wait for Dickie to get close enough to squirt in the eyes and then, while dazed, bean him lightly on the noggin with the cane. I still think shootin' the bastard was more humane.
Epilogue: Dickie died about a year later. Cause unknown. According to my mother, it was due to being drop kicked by a large Puerto Rican.
Who dat snappin' back? |
As many of you know from the sheep bathing story, my mother fell heavily into country livin' when they bought the farm. The first thing to happen in Mom's countrification was the procurement of a coop full o' layin' hens and the struttin'est cock you ever did see. He got his name, Dickie, for a reason.
Now if you remember, my mom does tend to 'dabble' in nature, but sometimes her dabblin' can be seen as downright interference. I think Dickie got it into his little peabrain that he 'n the missuses were only getting their gourmet feed (yes, my mom would, at times, cook for the chickens...) for the sole purpose that my mother could raid the nests of his harem and kidnap the ova of his progeny. So he started gettin' a little on the threatening side of cockdom.
Just let me say for those of you who have never had the pleasure of being up close and personal with a rooster: please take note of the look in their evil beady eyes and the length of their spurs. 'Cuz if they're lookin' at you all nasty-like, rest assured they got absolutely no damn reason to NOT flay you open like a ginsu knife with those treacherous weapons attached to their feet.
One summer morning, my mother was in full swing of her usual morning routine: taking out scraps for the chickens, throwin' some stuff on the burn pile for later, collectin' eggs, pickin' over the garden... just all the mundane things one does in the summer when one lives on a farm. At one point, Mom was standing at the burn pile marveling over the fact that some watermelon seeds had taken purchase and were sprouting viney arms to the sun, with little teeny tiny balls o' melon clinging surreptitiously as if they didn't belong.
Little did Mom know there was an evil presence behind her with a half wit of the same idea that something did not belong in this yard. While bending over to check out the new, somewhat miraculous growth in her burn pile, my mom heard an unforgettable *whirring* sound that raised the hair on the back of her neck. She straightened up, turned around and....
THERE WAS DICKIE. THE KILLER COCK. Coming straight at her like the scene outta 'Psycho' except this little bastard was sportin' a cockscomb instead of a wig and four-inch spurs instead of a dagger. It all happened so fast, but the little bugger filleted my mom as deftly as my Uncle Butch does catfish. I'm not sure how she managed to get away, but Dickie left his mark: a deep five inch gouge on the inside of her calf. After two days of bleeding and seeping, she finally allowed my stepdad to take her to the hospital for it. Good thing, too. Barnyard goo-gak is NOT good stuff to have in a wound. By the time I showed up, a week after it happened, the battle scar was an angry purple pucker emanating tendrils of the most vile yellow and still *ack* seeping. In short, it was nasty.
Now then, let me ask you: if this had happened to your mother, wife, sister, whoever... would you or would you not put the cock DOWN? I may not believe in the death penalty for people, but if you have something on your land that is a physical threat to you and yours, I say put a bullet in its brain. But no. My mom adored Dickie. "It's not his fault he's stupid," she'd say. "He's just trying to protect his girls." Yeah, Mom. I ain't buyin' it.
See, I'm not so sure this cock was as stupid as we all thought...
One morning I decided to go out and do the morning rounds for Mom. She'd gone to town for groceries and my stepdad was extremely busy carmelizing the onions for the French onion soup I'd requested for breakfast (it's a very delicate business, that). They both told me there had been no further threatening behavior from Dickie, so I really shouldn't worry too much. That was my first mistake.
Second mistake: wearing shorts and a pair of old Birks.
Third mistake: turning my back on Dickie... but it was only because I couldn't find him around the chicken coop and assumed he was off in the pasture somewhere.
Once again, though, there was a human at the burn pile. **WHIRRRRR**
I turned around to see the barred rock bastard comin' right for me. I don't know where he came from, but I sure wasn't going to stick around waitin' for him to give me the shiv, so I started running around the burn pile. Dickie's hot on my trail. A few times around the burn pile, once around the barn, down the hill to the garden, back up the hill to the burn pile... and it hit me. "I AM SMARTER THAN THIS ROOSTER." So I stopped running. Dickie stopped about eight feet away from me, boring hot holes of hatred into my skin. I leaned over, slipped off a Birk, and *whoosh!!* threw it at his head.
I missed.
More running ensued. Another stop. The last Birk goes flying, this time glancing off Dickie's side. That seemed to really piss him off and he came at me with more of a bloodthirsty look in his eye than before. I admit it. I was utterly horrified at this point. With bare feet I went running toward the house, skewering my feet on the shower of tiny thorns from the black locusts. I might mention that this entire time I had been screaming for my stepfather. I also might mention that my stepfather is pretty deaf. (He lives with my mother, after all...)
By the time I burst into the house, feet bleeding, hyperventilating and broken out all over in a cold sweat, Allen was just finishing up the carmelization process. I ran downstairs to where my gun (a Colt .22 revolver) was kept, flipped open the barrel, no ammo. I ran back upstairs shouting to Allen "Where's the ammo?" "It's in the upstairs closet, honey." Upstairs I went, rooting through the ammo box for the appropriate box of shells, loaded the Colt, stuffed extra rounds in my pockets and back downstairs I went.
"Ang, what are you doing?" my stepdad asked, almost as an afterthought.
"I'm gonna go out there and kill that son-of-a-bitchin' psycho cock you got runnin' around in the yard!"
Now, my stepdad is an extremely easy-going guy. Not a lot sticks in his craw, if you know what I mean. When he speaks, it's deliberate. Sometimes it's downright slooow. So imagine my reaction while he very pointedly tells me that I should not kill my mother's killer cock, but rather, I should teach him a lesson. Well, in a body wracked with adrenaline, it was all could do to muster "I. have. six. lessons. right. here."
Alas, it was not to be. Allen would not let death become Dickie. Instead, he showed me where they kept the cane and the super-soaker filled with ammonia water. Then, he showed me how to casually wait for Dickie to get close enough to squirt in the eyes and then, while dazed, bean him lightly on the noggin with the cane. I still think shootin' the bastard was more humane.
Epilogue: Dickie died about a year later. Cause unknown. According to my mother, it was due to being drop kicked by a large Puerto Rican.
