The One Where My Husband Owes Me. Like WHOA.

So. My husband is away right now. Up in his hometown hunting at his cabin. Eva and I were supposed to go with him, to visit my mother-in-law, sister-in-law and Eva’s cousins, but the cousins have the chicken pox so we decided to steer clear.

Yesterday, it poured rain all.day.long. Like, poured. As in, feet getting soaked because of the deep puddles on the driveway in the potholes.

Around 8:30 p.m., my sweet husband sent me a hey tell saying that he just realized he forgot to lock the chickens up in the coop before he left and could I please go out there and make sure they were inside, and shut the door?

A little background information – we live on a farm and we have chickens. Some for eggs, some for meat. These are the husband’s domain. I will cook and eat the eggs and the meat but I will not take care of the chickens. I do not feed them, I do not go in the coop, I do not collect the eggs. Heck, if I can help them, I don’t even look at them. I am not in with the birds. I dislike birds. A lot. They give me the creeps. So, my relationship with the chickens goes only so far as seeing the evidence of them once they are brought into the house in the form of eggs or roasting chickens.

Needless to say, I wasn’t very happy with his request. I made every excuse in the book why I wouldn’t be able to go out there to check them. It’s dark. It’s raining. I’ll get cold. Hello! I AM WITH CHILD! Finally, he convinced me it had to be done. So, I bundled up in his coat, a pair of my boots and a flashlight and headed back to the chicken coop. He promised me I wouldn’t even need the flashlight because the motion censor light would come on once I got back there. It didn’t.

And I was greeted by flooded grass. As in, 2-3 inches of water sitting on top of the lawn. And my boots were not waterproof. So I went back inside, called him and told him I just couldn’t make my way back to the coop. I’d never survive. He told me to put on my big girl panties, put on rubber boots in the garage and go back out. At this point, I had run out of excuses. So, I donned some boots that were about 32 sizes too big and trudged my way back again. And into the nasty, stinky, chicken poop infested coop.

And what did I find? A LOT OF CHICKENS WERE NOT INSIDE.

We just got new chickens on the weekend, so I guess they don’t know the place well enough to know where they were supposed to go to find shelter and get inside, so instead of walking into the warm, cozy coop and cuddling up with their neighbours, ten or so of them were huddled together on a pile of cinder blocks in the back corner of the outside of the pen. Right against the wall of the coop. But, the opposite wall of where the door is to get inside. They were wet and shivering and squawking. I tried to herd them off the cinder blocks and chase them into the coop so I could shut the door. No way. These guys were not moving.

So, I did what I had to do. And to this moment, I’ll never know how it was possible.

I picked them up, one by one, WITH MY BARE, SOAKING, FREEZING COLD HANDS, and carried the little buggers to safety.

It was disgusting and creepy and scary. But I had no choice. I couldn’t leave them out there in the freezing cold rain to die? Well, they probably wouldn’t have died, that’s a bit over dramatic, but still … it would have been heartless to leave them.

Needless to say, my husband quickly got an angry text, that may or may not have included one or two words I’m not overly proud of, telling him that he is LUCKY I SAVED HIS CHICKENS and that he owes me big time. I believe my exact words were, “My wish is your command for like a YEAR”.

I wish I had photos to give documented proof of this expedition (and trust me, you wish I did, too) but you’ll just have to take my word for it.

Old McLucy is back. In full action.