An Unexpected Start to the Day

We received a completely unexpected telephone call this morning. Barely awake, I was preparing to make breakfast before church. I knew Kurt had awakened, but he continued to lay in bed, nursing the last bit of sleep out of the early morning. And the telephone rang. Since my mouth didn't feel like it had started working yet, I grabbed the phone and handed it to Kurt. The caller ID told us the U.S. Government was on the line. Sounded like a call for my husband to me.

Turns out the post office wanted us to pick up the chickens we had ordered and were expecting tomorrow. Kurt heard "chickens" and "post office" and jumped out of bed. I pulled on my "work" clothes and we started our day. I quickly put together some muffins for breakfast and Kurt slogged through the sodden, flooded yard to start getting the coop ready for an additional 65 chickens. (Moving? Us?)

We actually expected our chickens last week. But they were delayed a week. We did get our 15 turkeys and the 14 surviving ones had been in the coop for the last few days. This morning we had to bring things "backwards" to be ready for day old chickens.

While Kurt went to the post office, I cleaned out the feeders and waterers and finished preparing for our day old chickens. (I also called my friend Darlene and told her we probably wouldn't make it to church. She had never heard of anyone getting mail on a Sunday.) Finally, after an unusually long time, Kurt returned from the local post office - empty handed. No one was there.

I grabbed the telephone and called the number from our caller ID. I kept feeling like the subject of a practical joke. I got a recording that listed the post office hours. Nothing on the recording suggested they kept Sunday hours. Crazy.

A few minutes after Kurt returned home, we got another call from the "U.S. Government." This time I took the call (being able to sufficiently speak thanks to the coffee I'd been drinking). The woman wanted to know if we were picking up our chickens. ???

Turns out we'd received a telephone call from a neighboring town's post office. The lady swore she told Kurt to go to her post office in Evergreen. After getting directions and securing a promise to wait if Kurt got there after 10:00 o'clock when they closed, Kurt took off again in search of our chickens. He finally got home with these:



To the 14 resident turkeys (we ordered 15, but one didn't survive) we added 52 meat chickens (they sent an extra 2), 10 Buff Orpingtons, 6 Rhode Island Reds (they sent an extra 1) and a mystery rare breed.



The poor turkeys didn't know what to make of it all.



This one decided to plop down in front of the feed and secure his spot:



Probably a good idea since meat chickens are little piggies with the feed.

We think we figured out which chicken is the free rare breed: (He is on the left, sort of in the center.)



From the look of the little bump of fuzz on his head, we're thinking we've have another crested chicken. Our best guess is a Golden Polish Chicken.



Gabrielle is very happy about having another crested chicken. Personally, I understand why the little funny looking half blind things are rare. The last one we had kept trying to mate backwards. None of the other chickens could tolerate the poor little thing and one of the roosters finally drove it away. Gabrielle likes to think that little chicken lives happily on his own somewhere in the vast woods next to our house. I let her think that if it makes her happy.