Times Past: Mystery of Laundry

Reblogging

Farm Life Ain’t for Kiddies and Cowards

indian dress and henOriginal art by Kathleen Holdaway Swain

Being a farm kid is not for sissies and cowards. The dark side of the chicken-raising experience is slaughtering, plucking, cleaning, and preparing of chickens for the pot.  I watched as Mother transformed into a slobbering beast towering over the caged chickens while we shooed them into the corner of the chicken-yard.  She seemed particularly calculating as she stooped, giving the poor chickens the impression the threat was over. Running her hooked wire clothes hanger at ground level into the midst of the terrorized multitude, she snatched a startled chicken who’d never expected to be attacked at the foot. Exiting the enclosure with her victim, she held it firmly by the head, giving its neck a quick snap before releasing it to turn its last crazy race.  Chickens take a while to get the connection between a broken neck and the end of life.  We crowded by, horribly thrilled by what we knew was coming.  It was scarier than “The Night of the Living Dead” as the chicken flapped its wings, ran with its head hanging crazily to one side, and chased us in ever larger circles until it  finally reached the Pearly Gates.  It looked horribly cruel, but done properly, a quick snap of the wrist breaks the chicken’s neck instantly, giving a quick death.  Sometimes, Mother killed several chickens for the freezer, treating the waiting chickens to a taste of what they were in for.  It didn’t calm them down a bit as the watched the dearly departed flop around the yard.

Roosters are necrophiliacs, turned on by the sight of floppy-necked hens racing by. If one is enticing, just imagine the effect of a yardful! Lustful roosters have no problem resorting to violence toward moralistic humans trying to get between them their fascinating harem. For some reason, Mother was equally determined her chickens not be interfere with her chickens.

Once the chicken was disabled or dead, Mother grabbed it, plunged it into a pot of boiling water, plucked the feathers, slit its pimply white belly and removed its entrails, cut off its feet and head, and prepared it for dinner or the freezer.  I was repulsed when Mother found  unlaid eggs in the egg cavity and saved them for  cooking.  That just didn’t seem right.  I was happy to eat the chicken, but future eggs…disgusting.

Mother looked out one day and saw one of her laying hens eating corn, oblivious to the fact that her gizzard was hanging out.  It bobbed up and down gaily as the chicken pecked corn off the ground.  Apparently she had suffered injury from a varmint.  Clearly, she wouldn’t survive with this injury, so Mother and I tried to catch her.  At least, she could be salvaged for the table.  Well, Her running skills were still intact.  We chased her all over the yard with no luck.  Finally, Mother decided to put her out of her misery by shooting her.  She missed.  She fired again and shot the hen’s foot off. I knew I could do better.  I shot her beak off, then hit her in the tail.  By this time, we both felt horrible and had to get her out of her misery.  Finally, the combined fatigue and her injuries had slowed the poor beakless, tailless, gizzard-bobbing, one-legged chicken down enough so we could catch her and wring her neck.

All chickens didn’t end life as happily.  The LaFay girls, Cheryl, Terry, and Cammie raised chickens for 4-H completion with the of the flock destined to fill their freezer. Late one Thursday evening while their mother was at work, they realized tomorrow was the day for the 4-H barbecue chicken competition.  Mama LaFay wouldn’t be in until way too late to help with slaughtering and dressing the chickens.  After all the time and effort they had put in on their project, they had no choice but to press forward without Mama’s help.  They’d helped Mama with the dirty business of putting up chickens lots of times.  They’d just have to manage the grisly business on their own.

Cheryl, the oldest sister, drew the short straw and won the privilege of wringing the chicken’s neck.  She’d seen Mama do it lots of times but didn’t understand the theory of breaking the neck with a quick snap.  She held the chicken by the neck at arm’s length and swung it around a few times in a wide arc giving it a fine ride, but no real injury.  When she released it, it just ran off drunkenly.  The girls chased and recaptured the chicken a couple of times, giving it another ride or two before the drunken chicken flew up into a tree, saving its life.  Acknowledging her sister’s failure, Terry stepped up to do her duty.  She pulled her chicken from the chicken yard, taking it straight to the chopping block, just like she’d seen Mama do so many times.  Maybe she should have watched a little closer.  Instead of holding the chicken by the head and chopping just below with the hatchet, Terry held it by the feet.  The panicked chicken raised its head, flopped around on the block, and lost a few feathers.  On the next attempt, Cammie tried to help by holding the chicken’s head, but fearing dismemberment jumped when Terry swung the hatchet. The poor chicken only got a slice on its neck.  By now, all three girls were squalling.  Cheryl tied a string on the maimed chicken’s neck.  As Cammie held its feet they stretched the chicken across the block.  By now, Terry was crying so hard so really she couldn’t see.  Taking steady aim, she chopped Henny Penny in half, ending her suffering. Guilt-stricken, they buried the chicken.
Defeated, they finally called their Aunt Millie, who came over and helped them kill and dress their chickens for the competition.  They triumphed and won second place in a field of two.  God only knows what the other team’s chickens may have endured.  All’s well that ends well.

Great Food

imageFor a hearty, satisfying breakfast, give this a try, homemade biscuits and sausage gravy.  Please note, I made no claims about calorie count or fat content, I just said hearty and delicious!  I simplified instructions for new cooks.

Linda’s Sausage Milk Gravy

Scramble one pound of breakfast sausage in skillet and brown slightly.  Sprinkle with 1/2 cup flour.  Stir and smooth as it browns.  When sausage is not quite brown enough to serve, stir in 1 cup water to stop browning.  Stir until even consistency about like yogurt.  Stir in enough canned evaporated milk to get slightly thinner than gravy consistency.  Simmer 5-10 minutes, scraping skillet periodically to avoid burning until biscuits come out of oven.  It will get thicker as it simmers.  Taste before you season.  May be seasoned well enough from sausage.  If too thick, stir in a little more milk.  If you get it too thin, simmering will thicken.  Serve over hot biscuits.

Substitution:  Can make this gravy in bacon drippings.  Stir flour in hot (not flaming drippings.) Lower setting to medium.  Scrape bottom of skillet constantly with metal spatula as mix browns to mix well.  When the mix is smooth and slightly darker than mocha stir in about 1 cup cold water, stirring and scraping constantly.  Will steam and thicken quickly.  Add water or milk to dilute to gravy consistency. Whisk frequently and allow to simmer 5-10 minutes for smooth gravy. Season to taste.  May not need much salt.  Bacon is salty.  I like bacon gravy brown.  Adding milk to dilute makes gravy white, but you always need use water to gravy first to preventing scalding and curdling of milk.

Bud’s Biscuits(12 biscuits recipe can be easily doubled or tripled)

Get these in oven before you start gravy.

We use self-rising flour, but if you have all purpose, stir in 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder and 1/4 teaspoon salt for each cup flour and mix well.

2 cups flour

1/2 cup shortening

8-10 ounces evaporated canned milk dilute or concentrated to your taste.(save remainder of can for gravy.)

Pre-heat oven to 400 and grease baking pan. Cut shortening into flour.  You can use spoon or pastry blender.  When it is well-mixed and you don’t see big, separate lumps of shortening.  Mix in about 7-8 ounces of the canned milk, if you need to, add just a bit more till mix resembles stiff mashed potatoes. Mix will not be smooth.  Be sure to mix in extra milk a bit at a time if you must.  Dough has to be stiff enough to roll out.  Dust flour over top of biscuit dough and turn onto lightly floured surface. A clean smooth dishtowel, wax paper, or bread board work well.  Knead three or for times till dough well-dusted.  You can get ready to bake one of two ways.  Either roll dough out about 1/2 inches thick, with rolling pin, folding about four times to make layered biscuits and then roll to 1/2 inch thick, cut and bake.  The other option is flour your hands, pinch off dough about 3/4 quarters the size of your palm, dip in a bit of flour dust and roll three or four times.  Put in pan smooth side up.  Butter tops and bake at 400 degrees on middle rack till tops are starting to brown.

After biscuits cool, save left-overs in ziplock bag.  They are great for about three days.  The gravy reheats well, too.

 

Laughter the best medicine – The Archives revisited – Navy, Marines and Hypnotised Seniors – Oops.

Reblogging this hilarious post from Smorgasbord.

#BlogBattle Week 50 – Prompt: Pure

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Genre: Drama / Humor

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A Little Malarkey

Grandma Mercy had no patience for wimps nor fools. In her book, Sidney fit both categories. “How’d you ever hook up with a fool like him?”

“Now MeeMa. What’s done is done. No point tempting your blood pressure. He’s a good man.” Celeste paced the hundred-year kitchen, stepping on the creaky spots she still remembered. Freckled and ponytailed, she looked closer to eighteen than thirty. ”I’d like tea. You want tea? Where’s the kettle?”

“Sure. Made double chocolate brownies yesterday. The man’s hands are softer than a baby’s brand new skin.” Grandma reached into a cupboard for the treat tin and another for cups and saucers.

“He’s a scholar. A University Prof. What’s wrong with that?” She watched the gas flame catch beneath the beat up kettle. “Where’s the one I bought you for Christmas?”

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Terrible Tom Turkey and the Thingamajig

Original art by Kathleen Swain

Evil turkey

Evil turkey

Awfuls chasing turey

Awfuls chasing turey

When I was a kid, we often went places normal people would never intentionally go.  Periodically, Daddy would realize he hadn’t spent any time around social misfits and needed a fix, bad!  One day he announced he’d had heard of somebody who lived back in the woods about four miles off Tobacco Road who had a thingamajig he just had to have.  Never mind, all five kids needed new shoes and the lights were due to be cut off.  He NEEDED that thingamajig!

He HAD to check it out, driving forever down rutted roads that looked like they might disappear into nothing. Finally we got back to Mr. Tucker’s shack. Mr. Tucker was wearing overalls and nothing else. Apparently buttoning overalls wasted valuable time needed forpile junk collecting. While Daddy and Mr. Tucker disappeared into the tangle of weeds and mess of old cars, car tires, trash, broken washing machines and other refuse scattered around the house and into the woods.  Mother sweltered in the car with the five of us while Daddy and Mr. Tucker rambled.

It was hot. It got hotter the longer we waited in the punishing July heat. We opened the car doors, hoping to catch a breeze as it got hotter and hotter. The baby and the two-year-old were squalling out their misery as Mother fanned them.  Daddy wasn’t known for the consideration he showed his family.  He was “the man.”

Mrs. Tucker, a big woman in overalls came out in the front yard and started a fire, never even looking our way. She probably thought our car was just another old clunker in their yard. It got even hotter. We were all begging for a drink of water. Daddy was still gone, admiring Mr. Tucker’s junk collection. Daddy could talk for hours, unconcerned that his family was sweltering in the car.  He thought misery was character-building. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know the people he’d just stumbled up on. We spent many an hour waiting in the car while he “talked” usually having stopped off on the way to visit some of his relatives.

Finally, in desperation, Mother got out of the car, introduced herself to Mrs. Tucker, and asked if we could have a drink of water. Mrs, Tucker turned without speaking, went into the house, came back out with some cloudy snuff glasses, called us over to the well, drew a bucket of water, and let us drink till we were satisfied. That was the best water I ever had. Mrs. Tucker pulled a couple of chairs under a shade tree and Mother sat down. We all sat down in the dirt in the cool of the shade and played. Daddy was still prowling around in search of junk, but things looked a lot better after we cooled off and had a drink. Mrs. Tucker was interesting to look at, but didn’t have a lot to say. She had a couple of teeth missing, had greasy red hair that was chopped off straight around, and long scratches down both arms.

Mother tried to talk to her, but Mrs. Tucker wasn’t a great conversationalist.  I suspect she didn’t know too many words.  I couldn’t take my eyes off the missing teeth and long scratches down her arm. Despite Mother’s attempts to quell my questions, I found out a lot about her. She didn’t have any kids. It didn’t take long to figure out she “wasn’t right.” I was fascinated and wanted to ask about what happened to her teeth, but knew that would get me in trouble, so I asked how she scratched her arms. Mother told me to hush, but fortunately, Mrs. Tucker explained. It seemed she was going to put a rooster in the big pot in the front yard to scald him before plucking him.  He’d scratched her and gotten away before she could get the lid on. Apparently she didn’t know she was supposed to kill him first. Just at the point where things were getting interesting, Daddy came back and I didn’t get to hear the rest of the story.

Mrs. Tucker gave us a turkey that day, teaching me a valuable lesson. Don’t ever accept the gift of a turkey. Ol’ Tom was going to be the guest of honor at our Thanksgiving Dinner. Daddy put him in the chicken yard and Tom took over, whipping the roosters, terrorizing the hens, and jumping on any kid sent to feed him and the chickens. We hated him. Mother had to take a stick to threaten him off when she went out to the chicken yard. He even flew over the fence and chased us as we played in the back yard till Daddy clipped his wings.

Before too long, we saw the Nickerson kids, the meanest kids in the neighborhood, headed for the chicken yard. Mother couldn’t wait to see Tom get them. Sure enough, Ol’ Devil Tom jumped out from behind a shed on jumped on the biggest boy, Clarence. Clarence yelped and ran. The other boys were right behind him, swatting at the turkey. Unlike us, they didn’t run out with their tails tucked between their legs. They launched an all-out attack on Tom, beating him with their jackets, sticks, and whatever they could grab. They chased him until they were tired of the game. Tom never chased any of us again, but Mother never got around to thanking the Nickersons.

Rudy Carries On

imageJody’s rooster acted just like him, except maybe for the drinking.  He was in a chronic bad mood, always looking for a fight. We could hear him coming. “ Aruuh, aruuuh, aruuuh.”  He sounded like the screeching of metal rubbing against itself.  He entertained himself by stalking around and finding someone or something to attack.  We all despised Rudy, and ran when we heard, “Aruuh, aruuh, aruuh.”   I was visiting the neighbor kids, Lainy and her mean big sister Nita, when Rudy hopped the Austin’s fence into their yard.  If Nita ever played with us, we could usually count on a mean trick, like stomping our mudpies or kicking down the walls of our playhouses.  As we sat in the grass making clover chain necklaces, Nita jumped up and ran in the house.  She latched the screen door behind her, not saying a word.  Lainy and I just kept on making our necklaces when we heard, “Aruuh, aruuh, aruuh,” right behind us.

Rudy had sneaked up on us.  We tried to escape, but he jumped high on Lainy’s back, hanging onto her hair, clawing and scratching her with his big spurs.  I made it to the front porch, but Rudy hung on to Lainy, flogging and clawing.  Every time she tried to make it to the porch, Rudy clawed her again, and off she went, his beating fueling her terror.  Poor little Lainy ran round and round the house, that sneaky Nita running from window to window, door to door, laughing and enjoying the whole thing.  When Lainy’s mother realized what was going on, she raced to Lainy’s rescue. Rudy kept spurring Lainy somewhere out in the yard . Finally, Lainy’s mother caught up to her and pulled Rudy off her.  Furious as a mama bear, she whirled Rudy around smartly to snap his evil neck, slung him a few times around her head to do be sure she’d done the job right, then turned him loose to do his final chase around the yard.  Even though his head hung to one side and flopped madly as he ran in circles, it wasn’t comforting to see the depraved monster coming at us again.

Jody Austin had started over to save his property when he realized Rudy had gotten in over his head, but reconsidered when he saw Rudy’s sad fate at that enraged mama’s hands.  Nita didn’t fare too well when her Mama made time to deal with her, either.

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Rudy the Rooster and his Boosters

imageThe Austins lived just across the pasture from us. Jody Austin “drank.” In our neck of the woods, “drinking” meant a man was considered disreputable, prone to beat his wife and children, and probably didn’t work. It sounded a lot like today’s alcoholic. Jodie qualified magnificently. It was rumored that he had shot a man in a bar. Folks left Jody alone. Every Saturday night Jody hosted his “drinking” buddies for a binge. The festivities started with a huge bonfire. As they sat around on barrels, old cars, and broken lawn chairs, they tossed their cans out in the darkness. They got louder, sometimes had a friendly fight, occasionally rolling all around the fire, finishing off with a little singing…a treat for all the neighbors.

Jody and his gang of rowdies got sufficiently drunk, they started crowing trying rouse the rooster! Jody had a fine crowing voice, but roosters are territorial, determined to keep their harem to themselves. Since roosters habitually are “early to bed and early to rise,” it usually took about four tries to get Rudy the Rooster going.  His initial response was usually half-hearted and anemic. Roo-ooh- ooh-ooh-ooh-oooooh. He obviously needed his rest. Jody’s buddies took a turn crowing. Rudy was riled now and ready for a rooster fight, but couldn’t find a single rooster to whip. The partiers thought this was high humor. They all took turns crowing. After a particularly authentic crow, Rudy called back “ROOH-OOH-OOH-OOH-OOOOOOH!!!” The longer the competition went on, the madder Rudy got. He must have hated Saturday nights and drinking.

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