a chicken tale

So I previously alluded to poultry. Sunday before last I convinced The Brother to help me with my never-ending yard work. We finished the first phase of the bed on the side of the driveway. Such a big accomplishment! We were hurriedly bagging up weeds before the sun went down (you know, at noon), and we looked up to see a chicken at the end of the bed flick, flick, flicking mulch out of the bed and onto my pristine driveway. Sigh... I asked it if it would at least turn around while hunting so that the mulch stayed off my driveway. It complied.

Seriously. A chicken.

I went inside and was sitting at my computer and saw it walking around my front yard. My FSIL came by a little later to bring me a little gift and we were standing outside chatting. The chicken apparently made its way to the narrow alley side of my garage and was trying to propel itself through the tiny slats in the picket fence. Hello, chicken, you don't fit. Didn't stop it from trying. About 30 times. We gave up watching it, bored. Later it realized it just needed to turn around and leave the way it came. I thought it was leaving leaving.

The next morning I had to get up early to go to the airport. I opened the front door to leave and the chicken was on the porch. We startled one another and it jumped off the porch into the plants.

Well, while I was out-of-town it must have stuck around. I didn't see it when I got back on Tuesday but it was there Wednesday. I went to the grocery store to pick up some Thanksgiving groceries and came back just as it started raining. I sat in my car a little bit and decided to make a break for it. The chicken was taking refuge on the porch. On the back of the wicker chair right next to the front door in fact. I didn't want to juggle two armfuls of groceries while unlocking my front door with a chicken staring at me. What if it freaked out when I got close to it?

Did I mention that I grew up in the country? Apparently I have acclimated to city life.

So I did what any self-respecting city girl would do. I yelled and flailed my arms. It didn't care. I threw pieces of mulch in its general direction. It didn't care. I sprayed it with the water hose. It jumped off the chair and onto another one around the corner, leaving me to freely enter my home.

I let The Boyfriend know that the chicken was still roosting on my porch. Didn't want him to be startled when he got there. He walked right by the chicken who hadn't left its place on the second chair. Didn't notice it. To his credit, the chicken was quite still and quiet.

So he did what any self-respecting boyfriend would do. He chased it. In his work clothes. With strep throat. He chased it. It hid in the brush that is my ungroomed flower bed. When it came out later, The Boyfriend ran outside barefoot and wrangled that chicken. You read that right. He grabbed that chicken and walked it down the street and promptly placed it in someone else's (fenced in) yard. It hasn't been back yet.