THE "COOP  D' VILLE"


On the television show Pawn Stars,  the Old Man sometimes uses the phrase "Some people's children" when talking about his son and grandson.  Sometimes I use the phrase "Some people's wives" when referring to my wife Peggy.  Most times her ideas are great.  Most times her ideas even bring me enjoyment.  In fact,  most of the time, I'm glad when she shares one of her ideas with me.  But then sometimes I just shake my head and say,  ( usually under my breath of course so she can't hear me, ) "some people's wives."   One of those times happened a few months ago when Peggy said to me......"We need to build a chicken coop."  Well I knew in this case "We"  meant "You" and I also wondered what we needed with a chicken coop.  So,  to find the answer to "Why do we need a chicken coop?"...I went to the reason for this question, which was Peggy.  Her answer made perfectly good sense when she answered   "To raise chickens.".......Hmmmmm I mumbled while scratching my bald head.  Then my second question was directed to myself......"Why do we want to raise chickens?"

I immediately told my wife,,,,, "I'm not gonna slaughter  any chickens."  Now don't get me wrong.  I love chicken.  Chicken is probably my favorite meat and if cooked properly is very healthy,  but if the Good Lord had want me to slaughter my own chickens,  He wouldn't have put a Kroger up on Hwy. 5.  She then informed me she just wanted hens so we would have fresh eggs.  As she mentioned fresh eggs my mind again started working in that weird way it sometimes does.  If you read back a couple of sentences,  you will notice I mentioned the word ...HEALTHY....Hmmmm I said.

As most of you know, a little over two years ago I had my heart rebuilt.  That's right.  My heart was reconstructed with four bypasses and a new valve.  A Pig Valve if you will.   The doctor told me I hadn't taken very good care of myself.  When he finished with my surgery and was about to send me on my way,  he told me I had been given a new lease on life and unless I was ready to check out of this place,  I needed to take a little better care of myself.  I had given cigarettes up a while back and hadn't  been much for alcohol for years but now I needed to put the pipe down and eat a little more healthy.  There's that word again ...Healthy....  Well, I did put the pipe away and for awhile I ate very healthy.  I had my weight down and was feeling good.  Then it happened.  I started going back for seconds.  One donut turned into two.  One scoop of ice cream turned into the whole pint.  Darn,,,,, food sure does taste good!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then I realized I was headed down the wrong road again so I ask my doctor to set me up with a nutritionist.  This he did and once again things were going good.  Then,  as I stated earlier,  my wonderful wife has this great idea.  She wants a  "chicken coop".  Again I shook my head as I said to myself,  ( of course under my breath again )  "My Wife the Chicken Rancher".....Then,  as my mind was working' I thought,  "surely I can talk her out of this."  After all,  we hardly ever eat eggs any more.  You know..."the HEALTHY  thing.....eggs are full of  cholesterol.   Maybe she just needs a pet I thought.  I had asked her a while back if she wanted another dog.  She said she didn't as it would be hard to go anywhere over night because we would have to ask someone to feed it.   I know....we could get a herd of turtles.  They are maintenance free and I remember once my Uncle C. W. fed me some turtle and it tasted real good and I hear it's pretty healthy.  We could have a snake farm.  I once ate rattle snake and I even liked the taste of it.  Or even an ant farm.  They say ants are full of protein.  I once had an ant farm when I was a kid and it was no trouble at all until I dropped it and it broke and those little suckers went everywhere.  Mom had me walking around for a week with a can of Raid performing chemical warfare on my pets.  I became the Jeffery Dahmer of the ant world.  I think that's why I have a hard time even today killing anything.  Or how about a cat or two I thought and then I shook my head again.  NAWWWW I said to myself...I never really have liked cats but again I thought to myself...I do like Chinese.

Well,  once again Peggy got her way.  We built her a chicken coop.  Remember here, "when I say we, I really mean me".  Since we live in Douglasville we call it the  "Coop  D' Ville".   We haven't got us any chickens yet but maybe we will this week.  Peggy says we can give the eggs we don't use away.  We're just extended the acre plus farm.  All of our other animals are wild so domesticated chickens may be a pleasant thing to have around for awhile.  You see,  the birds we have eat all our cherries and blueberries.  The squirrels eat all the apples and pears.  The deer eat out of the garden and this year the rabbits have gotten fat on the beans.  I would love a good ol' pot of rabbit stew.  Well  at least the critters have let us have the tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers.   I guess we will have to buy the food for the chickens,  then I will have to learn the southern pronunciation of "guano".   As a young fellow I just called it chicken _______!   You can fill in the blank !!!!!!

SOME PEOPLE'S WIVES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!