Chicken with it's head cut off.

So, I was thinking about how crazy my life has been lately and the title for my blog popped into my head, "Chicken with it's head cut off". I really feel like I have been running around like a chicken with it's head cut off. I haven't even finished Christmas shopping and I still have so many other things to do before Sunday. I was looking for a picture that I could post with this entry when I came across this picture and fascinating story. It cracked me up and so I thought I would share.


Have you ever felt you were running around aimlessly, like a chicken with its head cut off? Well, in Fruita, Colorado, you can do that every year at the annual festival that honors Mike, the headless chicken!
Believe it or not, and many people don't, a Colorado farmer attempting to dispatch a chicken for dinner in 1945, ended up with one of the biggest non-hoaxes of the era, and a place in the Guinness World Book of Records for the headless chicken who survived the longest.
Lloyd Olsen had been sent out to the yard, to sacrifice a plump young rooster of about six months. And guess who was coming to dinner to eat it? His mother-in-law. Knowing how she favored the neck, Olsen went about his task with the idea of keeping on the mother in law's good side, by keeping most of the neck on the chicken. He succeeded in a way he'd never have expected in his wildest dreams.
When the chicken (who later became known as Mike, although nobody remembers why) was decapitated, he refused to lay down and die. While many birds slaughtered this way will appear to run around for a few seconds, it's actually a nerve/adrenalin response by the body, with no actual intent to escape. They drop down, and die. But not Mike.
He continued to run around the chicken pen. Olsen let him be, and the next morning, found Mike asleep with his "head" under his wing. Figuring that any bird who wanted to live that bad, was worth the work, he began feeding grain and water directly into the gullet through an eye dropper. When Mike was still alive a week later, Olsen packed him up, and drove him to the University of Utah, to explain the phenomenon.
Apparently the axe had severed the head above the brain stem, missing the jugular vein and leaving the entire brain, and one ear. A large clot had stayed any major bleeding, and the wound healed over, leaving the gullet open for feeding.
Not only did Mike live for another 18 months, but he grew to a creditable eight pounds, and became a national news story as well as a sideshow attraction. Mike went to that great chicken coop in the sky during a road trip in Arizona, when he began to choke in the middle of the night, and Olsen was unable to find the eyedropper with which they kept his throat cleared.


Pretty amazing huh!

Cosmic blow-outs

Scott and I pride ourselves on our unique relationship. We feel it a blessing that we rarely ever, and I mean hardly ever, fight! But of course, no one is perfect and therefore on occasion, and again it is rare, we can get into a tiff or two.
Yesterday just happened to be one of these days. I had a full evening planned and was just getting home from work when Scott called me on his way home and asked if I would take him over to Spencer's. Spencer had asked Scott if he could borrow our ladder and since they had plans to drive to Draper together for a dinner meeting, he thought he would be nice and deliver the ladder before they left. I had need of the truck for some errands I had to run and so Scott asked if I would drop him off at Spencer's, along with the ladder(since the truck was needed to get the ladder to Spencer's) and then I would take the truck for myself.
Since Scott was fully aware of my plans and time limit for the night, I felt that this request was a little too much. Unfortunately I handled the situation wrong, and from there everything back fires. I won't get into the even longer story, but for whatever reason, whenever we get into a heated argument and feelings linger for over thirty minutes or so, something disastrous happens. It's like the cosmos feel the unusual disarray and a cosmic reaction occurs!

The cosmic reaction:(we've left the house in the truck together and we're not talking) Suddenly, the ladder is lifted from the back of the truck and slides out into oncoming traffic.

Scott; "Holy $%&8!"

Me; " " (nothing) I mean come on! We're still fighting!

Scott recklessly pulls into someone's driveway and turns around heading the other direction to retrieve the, hopefully still intact, ladder. As we head toward the ladder, cars are running all over it. Ok, it was just one car, but it was a good run over.

After we finally retrieve the ladder and it's securely in place in the back of the truck we silently head off toward Spencer's again.

Rewind 6 1/2 years: Scott and I are living in Holladay. We decide it's about time we return the twin mattress that Scott's parents let us borrow. We load the mattress and box springs into the back of our then purple Tacoma!

Tiff, Tiff, we start to fight (can't remember the details) and we're off again, silent, heading toward the freeway. We're getting on the on ramp when all of a sudden the mattress catches wind and sails out and lands in the middle of the freeway! We watch in horror as multiple cars drive right over the top shredding and mutilating the just minutes ago, almost new, twin bed!


Forward 5 1/2 years: We are on our way home from camping. Everything has been shoved into the back of our truck. We're exhausted, we've had a very long weekend, and we are in the middle of a pretty good fight. BAM!!! du dun du dun du dun. The tire blows on the truck and were going 75 mph. Scott is frantically trying to gain control. We finally pull over and survey the damage. It's pretty bad, and we realize we're pretty lucky we didn't roll.


Rewind 3 years: We're in our Apt. in Holladay again. We have a free Friday night, it's summer, and we decide to walk to the store to grab some drumbsticks. As we are leaving I snidely say, "do you have your keys and your wallet?."

Scott; "Why do you ask that all the time! I ALWAYS HAVE MY KEYS AND I ALWAYS HAVE MY WALLET."

the door is locked, and we are on our way. Five steps later Scott stops and informs me that he doesn't have his keys. GREAT!

long story short, we finally get back into our apartment 4 hours later!

I guess there's a reason we choose not to fight as much as most couples. We are trying to survive, trying to make it through the day, having a uniquely "non-fighting" relationship will in the end truly be what allows us to live as long as we do!

You can never cry too much in one day...Right?

I consider myself a generally happy person, but that all changed for me in a period of about 12 hours! I'm sitting at work yesterday morning and I got this unbelievable rush of emotion. For really no apparent reason the flood just started to come, so much that I have to get up and leave and go to the bathroom to finish off my burst. Yes, it's true, I started my period two days ago but unfortunately this is nothing new! And I admit, I've cried during months that I felt there would be some progress in our fertility situation to find out I was wrong, but it was nothing like today.
I sat in the women's bathroom for about 15 min just sobbing. After I got back to my desk from my uncontrollable breakdown, I get a call from my manager asking if I will come to her office to speak with her. Great!!! My eyes are red and my nose is throbbing from being blown so much. So after a few hand sweeps across the face for air I make my way to her office hoping in the next few seconds the walk will magically make me look refreshed.....Uh, NO!! I get to her office and the first thing she says to me is, "Are you ok? Have you been crying?" Oh crap, oh crap, here comes the flood and all of my dignity gone! So I blunder through what I think is upsetting me. My manager is a very great human being! She was very understanding and sympathetic. I cried and laughed in her office for over 30 min. Then, later we have a meeting and we're talking about the sub for Santa we are doing this year through work. AGAIN, I start to cry. Just talking about this family we'll be giving Christmas to just made me well up and I cried again. I had to leave the meeting just to get control over myself. Holy COW!! This is absolutely INSANE!! I needed to get over this, and quickly. I was coming across as a nut case. Nothing bad has happened to me, and I haven't experienced anything upsetting, at least nothing new. It has to all be hormonal. It has to be!
So I go to lunch with a friend from work and we laugh so much that I start to cry. Can I not get away from this today, Geez. It was great to be laughing and enjoying the rush of endorphins that were sweeping through my body, but did I have to end it with tears coming out my eyes?
I finally leave work. I'm absolutely exhausted from crying. I get in the car and my radio is tuned to FM 100. All Christmas music. The song comes on about the boy in the shoe store who's trying to buy shoes for his dying mom. You know the one that everyone should know by now because it's played so much during the holiday. Yeah, so I cry again. WHAT IS GOING ON!!!
I get home, Scott if fully aware of the state I have been in all day, thanks to texting. He takes me into his arms and all of a sudden the world is right! He's the only one who can calm the giant bawl boob inside! We had plans to go work out when I got home. Instead we spent the night in enjoying each others company. Exactly what I needed. Later that night I fell asleep and never slept better. I guess I needed a good cry, but the whole day, COME ON!!!