Long Dirty Monday

Last night we feasted by candle light to celebrate Wesley and Caitlin's birthday. We had a big long table, ate cock-aux-vin avec our laying hens; our vegetables, roasted and mashed; Yvonne's apple cider; Juanita's incredible gluten-free baguette, and Wesley recited the Mad Farmer's Liberation Front.

This morning started with a jolt, more or less. A five minute breakfast then out with my coffee. I was preparing for the chicken slaughter. Well... my, our chicken slaughter. A somewhat needless endeavor that Yvonne and I wanted to experience.

I was the more experienced in the matter and thus it was my job to prepare for the events to come. We hung up the state-of-the-art chicken killing cone made from an old plastic sleigh, lent to us by Sean, taped up some plastic and underneath placed a wheel barrow with some straw to catch the blood. We put a garbage bag in a bin to pluck the feathers into and lay a plastic table cloth on the picnic table to do the gutting.

Caitlin had the water on to boil and Jake emerged from his Westphalia which he had drunkenly slept in preceding the festivities last night. It must have been bizarre for him to walk out into the windy, dark morning and see me sitting outside the garage in my complete filthy rain gear, apparently doing nothing. He was, of course, soon informed of the events to come and ended up documenting the process and fetching us bowls of warm water and pots of coffee.

Yvonne and I were nauseous. Caitlin was more or less decidedly Not participating. Jake said he'd do it if we didn't want to. The water was ready. I asked who was going first. "You!" chirped Yvonne.

I grabbed the chicken from the cage and popped it in the cone. I reached in from the hole at the bottom and felt its warm neck and pulled it out. The chicken was totally calm. It didn't even do anything when I dug the blade into its neck until the blood began to pour and its head went limp, then it contracted and the nerves began to fire. There it was. The rest was no mystery, I had done it before.

After the gutting and whatnot, we mucked out the chicken coop in the barn and found far too many baby mice which Yvonne ended up drowning. We then moved about 60 laying hens from the chicken trailer into the barn, except for one that escaped. Banjo, our young lab, ended up killing her. Caitlin was livid. She threw it to the pigs. Then the trailer was mucked out.

Long dirty Monday.

My chicken is currently simmering on the stove with a carrot, parsnip, celeriac, red pepper, onion and six chicken feet.