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#1
10-19-2006, 04:58 PM
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Lessons learned from chickens
I'm a very simple man. But I DO pay attention.
When I was eleven years old, I bought some Rhode Island reds, mixed batch (straight run). It broke my heart to cull out the rooster chicks at eight weeks, but, as my Mom said, "You only need one." Many delicious Sunday dinners followed. Lucky I didn't name them. So, I ended up with twelve hens and one rooster. When I fed them for a few months, I watched their behavior. The pullets seemed so aware before they became hens. The rooster was oblivious. I'd feed them cracked corn and ground oyster shells, hoping for the first eggs. After a while, they finally started laying. I put a sign at the end of the driveway..."Fresh brown eggs for sale- $1 a dozen". I sold almost as much as their fed cost at the local Agway. I got to eat plenty of omlets too. Through it all, I paid attention to their behavior. I'd let them out of their coop in the early morning. They had been safe from the racoons, foxes, and weasels all night. Dad and I built their little house right. I'd gather the eggs. They'd scratch around in the yard, pick at bugs and go to the stream for a drink at mid morning. If a shadow came across them, they'd run under the apple trees or thorn bushes. They didn't like hawks. After lunch, I'd go out to check on them, toss them some corn in the driveway where they were picking grit for their crops. In the afternoon, they'd rest and dust. They'd do a lot of cluckin' to each other...hen talk stuff. Then at dusk, they'd go back to their coop. Just like clockwork, night after night. Seems to me the thing that they taught me was that the "chickens always come home to roost". They always did. So, this little metaphor has a point...the chickens have come home to roost, again, they always do: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/1019-20.htm DTS 
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#2
10-20-2006, 02:31 AM
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Oh look,DTS, the sky is falling!!
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#3
10-20-2006, 10:40 AM
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Quote:
__________________
"Always be yourself...unless you suck!" Last edited by somerfrost : 10-20-2006 at 10:42 AM.
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#4
10-20-2006, 11:22 AM
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Quote:
__________________
"I don't feel like that I am any better than anybody else" - Paul Newman
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#5
10-20-2006, 11:30 AM
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Quote:
Naw..just a repub "chicken hawk"....moulting. Where did all these feathers come from? btw..."humor" is indeed a great "defense mechanism". Reality sux, right?
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#6
10-20-2006, 01:46 PM
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DTS: Humor is my best weapon against 'reality'! And yes, OUR current reality does!
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#7
11-08-2006, 08:45 PM
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Quote:
I didn't forget this thread. Looks like the chickens found thier way back to the roost. Cluck, cluck. Here comes the sky! So, now the next chapter in the poultry story... One day I went to the local pet shop about a week before Easter. There were plenty of cute ducklings, so my brother and I each bought one. His duckling was named "Dicky". Unfortunately, it died withing a couple of days. Must have had a bad "ticker". I named mine Dubby. This one lived, but after a few hours of watching this one, after I got back from the pet shop, I realized that one of its little webbed feet was completely malformed. It was a seriously lame duck. Though it couldn't move around on land too well, I did my best for it. Dubby even had trouble quacking. When it tried to say "quack-le-ar", it came out as "quack-u-lar". It was very cute at first, but after a few days inside my house, mom made me take it outside so it could fend for itself. It just never really fit in. It walked like a lame duck. It quacked like a lame duck. And it sure stunk like a lame duck. I don't know how all that stinky duck poop came from such a little lame duck. Yup, it WAS a lame little duck. One day, two Canada geese landed on the pond where Dubby was hanging out. They semed to tolerate him at the beginning but he just wanted to follow behind them all the time. The one goose (I named him Rummy) met an unfortunate demise when he went up on the bank and a raccoon got him. The other goose (I named this one Rovie) saw what happened to "buddy Rummy" and flew off...never to be seen again. Go figure. That left Dubby, the pathetic lame duck paddling around in endless circles in the pond. Poor thing couldn't swim in a straight line, with that crippled foot. Before too long, a big fat raccoon was sitting on the bank of the pond, watching that lame Dubby going round and round... spinning in circles. Spinning. Luckily, my dog scared off the raccoon. Unfortunately, soon afterwards, a bolt of lightning came shooting out of the sky and hit the pond. It was electric! Yup! Poor Dubby never even knew what hit him. Mom cooked him in l'orange sauce. If memory serves, he tasted a bit lame. Quack! Quack!
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#8
11-09-2006, 04:56 PM
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Just putting this one back near the top so I can find it easier next time, and so that Timm doesn't have to go searching for it.
Next chapter will be about squirrels and nuts. Then the skunk story. It really stinks. Stay tuned. DTS
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#10
01-05-2007, 02:31 PM
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Quote:
Up coming stories..."donkeys", "kitties", "big dumb bass"...I've spent a lifetime with gaining lessons...just sharing. DTS
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#11
01-05-2007, 05:07 PM
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Clowns
I'll get back to donkeys, kitties, and bass later. Today I'm talking clowns. There are lots of them. They make me laugh so much! Do you remember Emit Kelly? Bozo? Soupy? There are so many! Clarabell? Gosh, I could go on and on. Clowns keep showing up all the time. I like the act when they keep coming out of the car, or the ones that have a little dog that tries to cheer up his master. How about the pail of water chase? Some of the best are silent. The really funny (or pathetic) ones, also laugh worthy, get me going to the floor when they open their mouths (or keyboards). Can we have a press conference please? In a strange way, some clowns try to be funny with intent. The ones that aren't really trying, the ones that make serious gaffs, are the ones that really make me roar. If only they'd keep their mouths shut. Then they'd realize the absurdity they present might not be funny at all...at least not worth dying for. All in good humor, nuck, nuck. Huff ha huh. Clowns have been around for quite a while. Some clowns don't even realize that they're clowns, so it seems. Can you say Chaplin? Costello? Gracie? Curly? Laurel? Ha Ha! I bet you were just thinking I was going to name somebody else! Now there's a joke right there. I didn't. It's part of a good delivery. Like launching a "smart bomb" out of nowhere that hits its mark. Unexpected. Hits you in the gut, and pretty soon you're rolling on the floor, peeing in your pants. It's like some things I've heard lately..."civilized war", "army intelligence", gaffaw, gaffaw! Clowns are all around. I sure love them all. The ones that try to be funny, and those that don't. Laughter seems the correct response. So in the famous words of the psychiatrist on MASH, "Ladies and gents, take my advice. Drop your pants, and slide on the ice." LMFAO!!!
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#12
01-08-2007, 02:32 PM
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Lies
I'll start by saying that I don't like them. Lies are lies, no matter how they're dressed. Some can see through them, some can't. Sorry for them. Raise your hand if you like being lied to. I thought so...me neither. In the early 1870's the Kwahadis were fighting a guerilla war against cavalry troops led by Ranalds Mackenzie, the tough young colonel who had lost a finger in the Civil War. The insurgents called him Three Fingers. Mackenzie and his cavalry men chased their opposition across the Staked Plains of the Texas panhandle, yet found that they were as much the hunted as the hunters. Quanah, their leader would not relent. He, afterall was trying to safeguard his lands and the buffalo they depended on from the encroachment of usurpers. Mackenzie was never able to defeat them, though he came close to death when they put an arrow into him. Mackenzie was on a mission and used any and all excuse to justify his actions. There was one lie after another. The Kwahadis were free and untamed on the Staked Plains for many years. They would not negotiate with a liar, a butcher that tried to paint them as butchers. Kill them... disrespect and denegrate. Sadly, once the buffalo had been killed off in Kansas, the US Cavalry found an ally, the white buffalo hide hunters that came south to find their slaughter, taking the great beasts for their hides and leaving the meat to rot on the wasted carcasses in the sun. Though the Medicine Lodge treaty had been agreed to, which forbade the white hunters from continuing their slaughter in the panhandle, the Army did nothing to stop them. A new white leader came. his name was General Philip Sheridan. He said, "Let them kill, skin, and sell until the buffalo are exterminated, as it is the only way to bring lasting peace and allow civilization to advance." The whitemen's thinking was to take away the source of food from those that were in need, they would submit and go to reservations. In response, other tribes, the Comanches, the Kiowas, the Cheyennes, and the Arapahos didn't see it that way. The battle of Adobe Walls was the result. The battle was fierce. Quanah had his horse shot from beneath him. The result was three whites killed, tweny-seven Indians. After the warriors left, the remaining whites chopped off the heads of the warriors and stuck them on posts in the corral. There was no end for many years. The actions of the invaders only inflamed the resistance. Despite starvation, tattered tipis, and the real threat of having their old people, their children and infants, their women, slaughtered, the warriors lead a chase for many years across the plains, relying on their scrawny ponies. In 1875, Quanah surrendered. Though he had never lived in a house, eaten at a table, or slept in a bed, he finally found that on the day of June 2, 1875, at Fort Sill, he and those he led could go no further. For the next twenty years, he learned from the liars he hated, those that had broken their treaty with him. He became a wealthy rancher, a major stockholder in the railroad, a friend of two presidents and many congressmen. In the early 20th century, President Theodore Roosevelt established the first National Park, Yellowstone, to protect the few remaining buffalo. Quanah remained critical of the whitemen's ways. He spoke against wasteful farming and ranching practices, the carnage that turned the grasslands to mesquite-scrub prairie. His words remain, "This was a pretty country you took away from us, but you see how dry it is now. It is only good for red ants, coyotes, and cattlemen." Quanah died on Feb. 22, 1911. The "dust bowl" raged for many years on his once sacred lands during the 1930's, the Great Depression. Seems that the whitemen saw the wisdom in their lies while others see the truth that Quanah spoke. RIP Great Warrior, Quanah. Truth can only be seen by those that wish to see. Lies are easily seen. Last edited by Downthestretch55 : 01-08-2007 at 04:54 PM.
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#13
01-10-2007, 11:04 AM
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Two Horses That Survived After Their Battles
I love horses, especially those that survive their battles. One that comes to mind is the warrior named Barbaro. He captured many hearts, many admirers. He continues to fight despite his set backs. Barbaro, many are continuing to root for you, including me. Your courage despite the pain and agony shows what a gallant warrior you have established yourself as, whatever your outcome. Fight on! Here's another gallant horse that you might be interested in. He was owned by Capt Miles W Keogh who led him into battle in 1876. His name was Comanche. Keogh died with his hands holding his reins, though Comanche had been wounded nineteen times, he was the sole survivor of the battle. The battle set up when a military leader was sent to secure the Bozeman Trail so that supplies could be sent to goldminers to the west. Despite treaties that had been previously signed and broken that stated the buffalo on which they depended would no longer be slaughtered, the Sioux were not believing the rhetoric. Red Cloud, Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull had heard enough. So on the fateful morning when General Custer led his 7th Cavalry to defeat the insurgents near the Little Big Horn, Comanche brought his master, Capt. Keogh, to the conflict. Though Custer had been proclaimed as the all American hero, the real hero of that battle was Comanche. Keogh hid behind him. Comanche took the arrows that were not intended for him but rather for his master. And after the slaughter, Comanche was the only survivor. The Indians resepected his courage, protecting his rider against all attacks. For his remaining seventeen years, he was not ridden again. His preserved remains can be seen at the University of Kansas. http://www.custerslaststand.org/source/comanche.html Barbaro and Comanche, may your courage serve to remind us all.
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#14
12-05-2006, 12:36 PM
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Now go piss on your Chrismas tree.
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#15
12-05-2006, 01:12 PM
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Thanks for explaining. My guess was that your "PC" was about "politically correct". I wished you and all the posters a Merry Christmas in a way that means something to me, and hopefully you and everyone else. I don't know about "formatting". Peace on Earth and good will to all men and women. DTS
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#16
12-05-2006, 01:49 PM
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Well, Baba,
I'm glad we worked that out through the pm's. Peace on Earth and goodwill to all. DTS
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Hybrid Mode
