| 70SATMan |
04-23-2013 06:34 PM |
My dad is a world famous smoked chicken griller (if your world happens to be in a 10 mile radius centered a mile out of Northern Danville). At the particular time I'm screaming, he is in the zone. Dead chicken has his attention not the living.. Man, you have to turn those things at the right time or they just won't come out right....
He is around the corner of the garage, out in the front of the house and out of the line of site to the hen house (if that would have mattered:rolleyes:). My bellowing (who am I kidding at this point....shrieking) receives only a "WHAAAT???"
Now they say that the phrase "the face that launched a thousand ships" is a figure of speech for Helen of Troy. The same thought could be applied to that one word question. A figure of speech really from my Dad that launched a dozen unspoken questions along with a few truisms. All this I determined from the drawn out pronunciation of the word, the pitch of his voice and the sound pressure which we all know relates to volume.
"What are you doing?"
"Why are you yelling?"
"Have you got those eggs for your Mom yet?"
"Can't you see I'm in the middle of turning my world famous smoked chicken?"
"You better work it out!"
"Don't make me drop what I'm doing and come over there!"
Lot of info packed into that one word..... Bottom line? Help was not coming from that direction. It's one of those parent intuition thangs.... He knew I wasn't in mortal danger.
By this time, I'm starting to panic. Damn roosters are between me and the pasture gate. It looks like I'm left with running the gauntlet. A sudden shift in the wind brings a thick cloud of smoke from around the corner of the garage bringing the smell of the hickory and world famous smoked chicken. I'm ready to make a break for it when out of that cloud of smoke strides my Grandma, 2x4 in hand. We aren't talking about the cheap soft grain 2x4s that you get at Home Depot today...It was that tight grain Doug Fir that only the 70s could turn out...She calmly opens the pasture gate coming straight toward the White Devils (there's the windup). Henry, thinking he's spied fresh meat heads toward her with wings a flappin, you can tell he's going in feet first (and the pitch).
As a kid I was lucky enough to see Hank Aaron hit home runs at Wrigley against the Cubs. Sure the Braves beat the Cubs that day and I was far from pleased about it but, looking back I see now that it was a privilege to be there to witness a part of history.
It was like watching Hank take that home run swing.:D Man she launched that rooster. Henry laid on his back for a good five minutes while the other two cowards got run off. I thought we were going to be having some extra pieces for Dad's grill but, damn if that rooster didn't get up, walk around dazed for a bit and headed for the other end of the pasture. I was saved. Still had to go gather them eggs while Grandma stood watch;) but, I was saved.
I found out years later from my Mom that Grandma as a young girl was an outstanding athlete. Played hardball against the boys and softball with the girls. That explained the perfect grip.
So, I embellished a little with the cloud of smoke:D;) but, that's basically how it went down..
Couple of years later we made the decision to harvest all of the chickens, Henry included. Grandma and Grandpa came over to help. Grandpa and my Dad manned the hatchet. My Grandma made the chicken catcher out of a length of wire and kept the butcher block busy. Mom made a huge pot of Chicken and homemade Noodles that night. My sisters didn't eat as I recall. I had thirds.
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