Madder Than a Wet Hen!

So we're going to lay all the cards on the table in today's episode.  Sunday is a day of rest at Our Maker's Acres Family Farm.  We sleep a little later, then get up and feed the animals, have a cup of coffee and a good breakfast at a leisurely pace.  Then we get cleaned up, put on "church clothes" and leave for Sunday School at about 9:45 am.  Except this past Sunday, the routine wasn't as leisurely and relaxed as it normally is.

It was a little after 7 am and I was deep in REM sleep.  The fan was blowing on me, the bed was oh so comfortable and I had just flipped the pillow over to the cool side.  Then, all of a sudden, there's loud banging on the french door to our bedroom.  I groggily walk over, lift the shade, and peer out.  It's Tricia.  She says, "All the chickens are out!  I need help!"  

"But it's the Sabbath," didn't seem like the right thing to say at the moment.  I'm especially glad I didn't try that after thinking of our Lord saying the following: 

"And answered them, saying, Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the sabbath day?"  Luke 14:5 KJV

I got dressed with the quickness and headed out for our first annual chicken rodeo, grabbing two crabbing nets from the garage on the way out.  We have a chicken tractor in the back yard with approximately 50 birds in it that we hatched out of our incubator.  I'm about to butcher the roosters and set the hens loose in the pasture, but the last batch of hens aren't quite big enough yet.  Note to self: I need to speed this process up.

Everyday I feed and water them 3 times a day and move the tractor to fresh grass.  Apparently, somebody (OK, it was me) forgot to close the door securely the previous night and in the morning all 50 birds were out, scattered around in the yard.  By the time I got out of bed, Tricia had filled the gutter with feed and had about half of them back in.  She's quite a chicken whisperer.

This is where things got dicey.  Normally, we're a good team and work together well.  But she had a plan to get them back in.  I had a plan that differed.  Her plan was to work together and gently "herd" the chickens in, leaving the door to the tractor open.  I immediately saw a fatal flaw in that plan.  My plan was to use the nets to catch them one by one.  She didn't like my plan.

While trying her plan, which involved leaving the door open, she walked behind the tractor and all the birds that were in the tractor got out!  I might have criticized that maneuver.  I went out to the barn to do the normal chores and let the situation cool down a little in the back yard.  When I got back, I got the net and chased those doggone birds until we caught all but four.

Tricia was legitimately upset with me because she said she's not a man and can't run around catching birds on a Sunday morning before church (especially when I left them out).  She's 100% right, you know.  I apologized profusely.  I didn't want the sun to go down on anger even though it wasn't even 9 am yet.

After Sunday School, we sit together in church.  But, I perceived something was awry.  There was a Bible and a Sunday School book between us.  Where we generally sit close together on the pew, there was a sizable distance between us.  A neighbor came up after church and noticed the wide neutral zone between us and asked "if there was trouble in the camp?"

Tricia told him about the chicken rodeo and the resulting fall-out and we all got a good laugh out of it.

All is good now.  There are several morals to the story:

1. Communication is key!
2. Teamwork is crucial!
3. Remembering to secure the door to the chicken tractor is a top priority to achieving Sabbath rest!
4. I have a gracious, loving, forgiving wife.