Morally outraged

I thought of this tune this evening while I was changing the chickens’ litter.

The girls are still a bit too young to go outside, but they’re old enough to make a big, stinky mess of their cage every day, and they’ve outgrown the box I’d been using to contain them while I changed their litter.

Because I didn’t want “chickens in the trees” (or, in this case, climbing on the computer keyboard and leaving droppings all over the carpet), I put the dogs outside and then sort of borrowed Scout’s crate to use as a temporary holding facility while I took the cage apart and dumped the litter out of the bottom tray.

As I was bringing the tray back inside, the dogs decided they’d had enough of being in the yard and came dashing back inside with me.

Scout, of course, made a beeline for my office, where she discovered her crate on the floor, full of chickens.

To say that she was morally outraged at the presence of the squatters would be an understatement.

Watching her frenzied reaction to the situation as I chased her out of the office so I could transfer the chickens safely back to their cage, I suddenly started humming, “There are chickens in my crate … there are chickens in my crate …” to the tune of this little ditty from Sesame Street.

YouTube is wonderful for many, many reasons. Chief among them is the way it allows me to extract bits of childhood memories from the dark recesses of my thought and relive them instantly. For instance, I used to sit in front of the TV every day, hoping and praying that Sesame Street would include the cartoon about a pinball that bops around a machine while the Pointer Sisters sing a counting song in the background. You can imagine my delight when my sister sent me a link to a YouTube clip of that cartoon a couple of weeks ago, apropos of nothing. It was like Christmas and my birthday, all rolled up in one!

Anyway, I am pleased to report that there are no chickens in the trees here in Red Fork. They are safely ensconced in their own cage, and Scout is curled up in her now chicken-free crate, relaxing on the hand towel I gave her as a peace offering. She will probably get bored and take her frustrations out on the towel in a little while, but for now, peace has been restored, and everybody is happy.

Time to dash out for some ice cream before I dive into the huge stack of projects in front of me this evening. I need to clean the kitchen and bathroom, run the vacuum, write an Indie Tulsa review, lay out a newsletter, build a half-dozen ads, and get back to work on the Trip Guide. So of course what I am doing instead is watching YouTube videos and heading out for ice cream. But I am operating on the theory that the ice cream will serve as jet fuel to get me moving — rapidly — in the right direction. The only question is whether I’ll go down the block and get a pint of Ben and Jerry’s from QuikTrip or waste half the evening driving across town for a double dip of MaggieMoo’s with plenty of chocolate chips and sprinkles mixed in….

Emily