KENNETH

Well I decided to write today. Hopefully I will be motivated to do some more writing this week. With Erins help last month the record store exploded. It was all I could do to just keep up on the shipping. I'm not sure how this has happened but writing has become a guilty pleasure. I love slipping away into my land of memories and words. The problem is my workaholic side disdains spending time on frivolous folly.

I watch my channel 5 friends in the morning . Yes they are my friends. They are every ones friends .They have perfected the art of casual news. I have spent my morning with Mark and Sam for over 10 years now. They are a weatherman and entertainment reporter plus the veterans of the program. People come and go but Mark and Sam are always there. Together they have respectively been married 5 times during this period. I guess being on the morning news is not good for a marriage.

As with every casual morning news show they have there humorous news story. Last weeks was a chicken living on a Los Angeles college campus sign. Somehow this crafty chicken found her way to a secret Valhalla. A place where she had all the grass and bugs to herself. No more battling the pecking order for her food. Nope this was her secret place.

Unfortunately it was on a busy Los Angeles street corner. Los Angeles is a big city place with big city folks. Most only see live chickens at county fairs in cages. Soon after she found her secret Valhalla, college students found her. They started to feed her. Her secret Valhalla just got better. That sealed the deal . She was going nowhere.

Soon she was darting in and out of traffic. Not safe for the chicken or the drivers. Yup, chickens just don't belong in the city. It did make for a wonderful news story. They all marveled how this little black chicken could evade capture.
I have had chickens for years.They roam free on my palatial 1/2 acre estate. One look at this little black chicken and I knew.They could not catch her because she was a "KENNETH".

I'm not sure the year "KENNETH" was born. I believe she is at least 5 years old. She definitely is first generation "mutt" chicken. A cross between something and something.

The previous year I had purchased purebred chicks. At least 5 different kinds. They had the run of the property. I loved watching them .It was also a great experience for my preteen daughter. She learned about pecking order and socialization through the chickens. I would like to believe it helped her understand junior high life. Although as most of you know nothing truly prepares you for Junior High.

One beautiful balmy spring morning I walked out to find 10 baby chickens trailing a hen. Trust me there is nothing better than a baby chicken. Ten baby chickens only multiply that feeling by ten. I was beyond excited. Having a small amount of chickens for years I had never had this. It was truly a miracle. It was with that first brood of homegrown chickens I learned the lessons of nature.

As the days progressed I watched them grow. You could not go anywhere near them or their mother. Hell hath no fury like a mother chicken.As the days wore on their numbers started to dwindle. Every other day one would be missing. Only the strong would survive. This was nature in its true form. The slower weaker chicks being dinner for the snakes and possums. Having chickens was truly becoming bittersweet. Still three young black chicks survived to "chicken puberty" , the time when a gawky young chick breaks from their mother.

"KENNETH" was one of these three. Not a very pretty chicken ."Mutt" chickens never are. She was one of my little miracles ,surviving the baby chicken Apocalypse to "chicken Puberty". For days I would watch them grow and thrive. Then the unthinkable happened.

As I am an Internet business my connection to the Internet is of utmost importance. Back in the day I used dialup connection. I had two telephone lines one personal the other private. One fateful spring day my Internet line went out. For a workaholic like me this was beyond stressful. immediately I called the local phone company to complain. How dare their phone line not work. Didn't they know my business depended on them? Yes I can go off like no other. Hell hath no fury like a workaholic with no work.

Finally I was connected to a "problem solver". Thinking back I feel sorry for the man. I am not nice when I am stressed. He told me to go check my phone box located on the side of my house. On the way back a small black body floating in the blue plastic goose pool caught my eye. My heart sank. It was one of the 3 surviving to chicken puberty. Carefully I plucked the small lifeless body out of the pool. It was still mushy and soft. Not the hard deadness that most truly dead chickens have. Did it move? I swore I felt it move.

I rushed back to the office. Oh my god I had the "problem solver" on the line. Do you know how long it takes to get to the "problem solver" from the phone company? I found a rag nearby and wrapped up the lifeless chicken body.Now I was shook. I told the "problem solver " what he needed to know and immediately started to babble. I went on and on about baby chickens drowning in plastic goose pools. I'm sure this was a first for him.

He told me to hold on while he tested the line again. During this time I did the unthinkable. Yes I did. I gave the baby chicken mouth to mouth resuscitation. Alternating of course with rubbing its cold little body and pressing on where I believed her little heart was.She moved! Yes she moved! The baby chicken was alive!!! I had saved the baby chicken! Soon she began to shiver and wheeze.

The "problem solver" came back on the line. I babbled on more about saving baby chickens. He became excited too. Soon we were bonding over a drowned baby chicken. No there was no way he could fix my line but he would send a lineman out. His name was "KENNETH". I told him I would name this chicken "KENNETH" in honor of him listening to me babble. He felt honored. I'm sure he had the best work story at the water cooler that day.

"KENNETH" thrived. Soon she became a proud mother chicken.Again and Again and Again. Every 3 months she would become the proud mother of approx 10 baby chickens. Like always approx 3 would survive. Over the course of 3 years my brood grew fron 12 to 37 chickens. Young roosters ran in gangs raping and pillaging the slower older hens. Chickens were everywhere. Pandemonium began. I worried about the animal control coming to help me control my chicken hoarding tendencies.After this experience I understand old lady cat hoarders. It doesn't take much for this type of situation to get out of hand. I was becoming a Chicken hoarder.

Being an avid Sci Fi buff my husband attributed my problem to "the Butterfly Effect". I had changed the course of history. Nature intended for "KENNETH" to die. Keeping "KENNETH" alive created a rainstorm of chickens. He probably was right but I would do it all again.

Soon the great chicken roundup began. It became a neighborhood event. Groups of children and sometimes adults would chase down chickens putting them in small cages .I would take them to the local feedstore and exchange them for sacks of chicken food. Soon I was down to my older favorites and of course "KENNETH" .

My husband was adamant about catching "KENNETH" as she was the cause of the chicken pandemonium. Didn't happen though ."KENNETH" was uncatchable.

"KENNETH" is still with us. I am secretly glad. Hopefully with less horny roosters around she will not procreate like that again. We will see what happens this spring.

When I saw the chicken on the news I knew it would be alright . She was a "KENNETH" .Looked just like her. The mutts of the animal always fare better. News update as of today has her finally being captured by the Arnold family. They named her "Lucky". Lord help them as I know Lucky is truly a "KENNETH".