Chickens of Doom

Chickens are evil.

I have firsthand experience on this. Chickens want us dead. I've known this since childhood, when I sometimes had to gather eggs on my grandma's farm.

Chicken coops are dark, lonely places, with wire stretched over the windows like bars in a maximum security prison. At first, the chickens would aim for nonchalance as I stepped gingerly over the doorstep into their lair. They'd mutter and cluck around my ankles, studiously avoiding eye contact. My goal was the roost on the far side of the room; the dark holes to the nests pointing at me like canon muzzles. Occasionally, a hen fired out, stirring the powdery air and making me shriek and dance a little bit.

It was when I finally turned to leave, my basket heavy with still-warm eggs, that they played their hand. I'd turn to find a sea of beaky faces flooding the space between me and the distant door. Staring. Silent. Expectant. Wanting my soul but willing to settle for my flesh.

You can have your clowns--chickens are true nightmare fuel.

Once, a rooster treed my sister up a fence. I had to stage a rescue op on the riding lawnmower. I rev’d the engine and gave that bird the run of its life, then swung the mower against the fence for my sister to scramble on. We rode off into the sunset, scattering hens before us, the Indiana Jones theme swelling on the wind.

Chickens. They're bad news. Unless you eat them.

Korean chickens don't cluck. They say gu gu gu. My principal told me this over a bowl of homemade chicken soup last week. Then he asked what the chickens of America say. I had no choice but to give a demonstration for the entire staff of my elementary school and the restaurant at large. It made our waitress' day.

Half an hour later we wandered out to the gravel parking lot. Next to the restaurant stood a boxy coop containing half a dozen brassy-feathered chickens. They did not look pleased to see us. I'm pretty sure they knew what we'd been up to with their former coopmates.

I felt no guilt.

Chickens are evil, but they are also delicious.

-Erin