About those chickens....

Jennifer asked about the chickens...and there is a (short) story to tell.

The chickens actually came from my dad's side of the family. His older sister and her husband have a varied collection of animals, including horses, cows, dogs, cats and chickens. My mother and my aunt used to do a yearly summer exchange of children, I would head to CT to learn to ride horses and my cousin J would head north to get his summer reading accomplished under the supervision of my mom the English teacher. One summer my uncle decided to offer up some baby chicks to my sister and a kitten to me. We carted our pets back to the farm, and my mother grudgingly took in both the chickens and the cat as she wasn't driving them back to CT.

Turned out the chickens had salmonella, and my sister caught it and became very, very ill. The chickens were disposed of (I couldn't tell you how) and my sister had a long, painful recovery. My mother swore she would never have anything to do with fowl of any sort ever again; I became permanently scarred and live in constant fear of salmonella poisoning. Just ask M about my neuroses around chicken products.