Adaptive Curmudgeon

I love living in the country. I pay special attention to everything about my environment; especially the sounds. I love birdsong and coyote howls and I’m always alert in case something rare and interesting is afoot.

Yesterday I was in the chicken coop letting the chickens out for the morning. Suddenly I heard the strangest sound. It came out of nowhere. A long low steady wail. It came from a great distance almost as if I were hearing it from underwater. It was clearly not a mechanical sound and must have come at great volume from something fairly large. It was unlike anything I’d ever heard before and I paid rapt attention. The wail played out and was replaced by a much closer sound. Still a low wave sound but with tremolo and increasing pitch. Then it shifted to a higher pitched series of individual sounds with decreasing length and increasing frequency. A lot like when a coyote howls and ends a long croon with a series of yips. Whatever it was seemed much closer; just outside the barn door.

What could be making such noises? Especially in broad daylight?

Then I realized I was on my knees in the sawdust gasping for breath. I put my hand to my head and felt blood.

I’d walked into a low beam and had clobbered myself. My head was spinning and only gradually did I realize I was still making sounds which no human should utter. So much for the strange wild animal.

There’s nothing cool or dramatic about slamming your noggin into a beam and the recovery has been as uneventful as it has been unpleasant. I’ve been living on a steady diet of Tylenol and self-pity. Despite the many times I’ve been accused of it; I am not a bonehead. I wish I were because my skull hasn’t yet stopped aching.

The first part of being a parent is the realization that you’ve no idea what you’re doing.  The second is the fear that you’re doing something wrong and your kid is going to wind up either a serial killer or (God forbid!) a lawyer.

Tragic failures of the parenting process such as lawyers should be avoided at all costs.

In keeping with our “don’t raise a loser” policy we’ve been taking our urchin to a Karate dojo.  It’s an expense we can ill afford but I wanted him to see an environment where progression is based on merit to counter the public school’s method of rewarding time served.  I’m clueless about martial arts but his dojo seems to know the score.  I love them for it.

My kid appears to love it too.  He aspires to be something between a Jedi Master and a superhero.  I think he grooves on the cool uniform and was inspired by Ralph Macchio.  I haven’t yet convinced him that Yoda is cooler than Obi-Wan but at least we’ve got a way to discuss the value of character.  It’s a deeper well than exchanging fart jokes.

It is unwise to mess with those who are properly trained in the martial arts.

Alas he’s just starting out.  Everyone gets to be a white belt when Mom and Dad cut a check but his first belt test looms.  Like most modern overprotective parents, I wonder how he’ll react if he doesn’t pass his first belt test.  Am I putting too much pressure on him?  My concern weighed on me.

After class, as a reward for his genuine effort, I took him to his favorite restaurant; a McDonalds with a Playplace.  McDonalds is hell and a Playplace is purgatory.  I’d rather be gnawed to death by weasels than go there but he’d earned it.

Frank Zappa wouldn't be caught dead at McDonalds.

It was pandemonium.  A birthday party was winding down and sugar addled feral children were shrieking like howler monkeys suffering heroin withdrawal.

Children need discipline.

The cavernous room echoed with the noise of squealing, yelping, whining, crying, manic devil-beasts (for no human can screech at those frequencies).  They ran about in random directions bouncing off walls, tables, and each other in a frenzied mammilian chemical reaction of stupidity.  Fries, plastic trinkets, spilled soda, and shoes were strewn about.  I desperately wanted to douse the entire place in antiseptic lest I contract something unimaginably gross.  Some of the more rambunctious hellions could use a few shots with a taser to knock some sense in them too.  (Did I just say that?  Yes I did.  Children needn’t act like berserk four foot tall disasters that scream loud enough to make the paint peel.)

My kid tore off into the jungle gym like a hound dog on the scent of something exciting.  I was pleased to note that he wasn’t shrieking like a banshee.  Nor was he covered in ketchup and fry slime.  Nor did he inexplicably run full tilt into solid structures like walls and plate glass.  He was having fun without the gear stripping unhinged caterwalling of the thundering herd.  A few other kids played happily without being self contained Jerry Springer shows.  Their parents and I exchanged mutually sympathetic looks as other parents ignored their broods of demon-spawn engaged in full tilt melee.

The obvious contrast came to mind.  Ten minutes earlier my kid had been at the dojo eagerly watching sensei’s every action.  He had the full and earnest desire to be every bit as excellent as that sensei.  Every session involves behavior beyond “good” and veering into attempts at excellence.  In ten minutes I’d dropped out of the dojo where “seek perfection of character” is not ironic and sunk into a cultural morass where having a temper tantrum on a pile of french fries is unremarkable.  Such a wide gulf.

Talk about a feeling of validation!  Concerns about too much pressure abated.  He seems to have mastered his kata but even if he doesn’t, he’s already risen above the abhorrent freakshow I was watching.  Good for him.  There’s hope for us all.  Though I heartily recommend that all adults avoid McDonalds Playplaces just in case the howler monkeys are rabid.

There is no deep moral lesson in today’s article but every word is true.

I’ve written before that our flock of chickens spend their days “free ranging” on the back lawn but are locked in the barn at night.  I’ve also written that one chicken has decided of its own volition to live totally independently and we call her “Freedom”.  (If you lived on a rural homestead you’d think chickens are interesting too.  It’s what happens when you don’t have cable.)

Freedom is no fool.  Whenever I’m in the vicinity she keeps a keen eye on me in case I’m bringing some treats for the other hen-folk.

In a related event, last night I noticed a mouse stealing the dog food.

Rodents of Unusual Size stole my dog's food.

I set a trap and nailed the sucker by morning.  I used a complex plastic “no kill” trap.  (Before you think I’ve gone all wobbly and joined PETA, be informed that I’d happily use a land mine to kill a mouse but the traps in question actually work pretty well.)  I picked up the trap (with a live mouse in it) and sauntered out the door.   My plan was to toss the little thief into the woods (where he could live a happy life of not stealing dog food) and then let the non-Freedom chickens out for the morning.  And that’s what I did.  I flipped the lever and out dropped a very live mouse who made for the woods…  Actually, that’s not what happened.

Freedom, who had been pecking away at a stump a hundred feet behind me had been watching.  She saw me drop the mouse and came tearing into the scene to attack like a frenzied wolverine with a sharp beak and a bad attitude.  The poor mouse never knew what hit it.  I’m going to have nightmares for a month!

Modern science postulates the following:

The more that we learn about these animals the more we find that there is basically no difference between birds and their closely related dinosaur ancestors like velociraptor.

I agree!  After this morning’s demonstration, I’m convinced that the only thing separating a chicken from a brutally efficient killing machine is size.  I should be packing heat just to collect the eggs!  Should some corporate flak for KFC ever breed giant chickens I’m never leaving my house again.

A chicken.

Freedom the chicken quickly decided that I hadn’t dropped a morsel to it’s taste, eyed me as if to say “if I was five feet tall you’d be next bubba!”, and then trotted off to look for worms.  The poor mouse was a trainwreck.  I was stunned.

A few minutes later one of my nutless useless cats (which are Bob Barker’s fault) showed up to finish the job.  Apparently “live traps” don’t work too well on my farm full of pint size monsters.  Indeed the cycle of life continues here at Curmudgeon Compound with a full schedule of surprises.