So a couple days ago our neighbor stopped by and told me that after the chicken trucks came to haul away his broilers, there were still some chickens left in his chicken houses and we could have them if we wanted, for free. We’d need to pick them up at night when it was dark (they’d be easier to catch that way), and they’d be ready for butchering in four to six weeks. I smiled, said thank you, and told him we’d give him a call that evening after I got a chance to talk to my husband. Then I called Mr. Handsome and told him about our bonanza. Surprisingly enough, he didn’t fuss like I had expected, and he even seemed kind of pleased by the offer.

However, that all changed once he had time to digest the news and ponder the details of what 30-40 broilers would mean for him. “I’m not ready for them! I have to make a place for them to stay. When am I gonna find time to do that, huh? And then I have to take care of them for a whole month! It would be easier to just buy the meat from the store…” Yadda-yadda-yadda.

My family backed me on this one though, and yesterday after our Easter lunch of my mom’s creamy potato soup, my sister-in-law’s salad, pickled eggs, hot cross buns, chocolate peanut butter eggs, and coffee, my dad and Mr. Handsome headed out to the barn and got to work on the new chicken coop.

It involved a lot of welding.

Whenever Mr. Handsome welds, it sucks all the power which makes the lights in the house fade and surge and fade again.

The lights flickered all afternoon and in to the evening.

At around ten o’clock they decided to quit building, even though the coop wasn’t quite finished, and left to round up the sleepy birdies. They came back with about fifty—50, FIFTY, FIFTY!—of them.

They’re parked in the yard, still in the trailer (hitched to the Dixie Chopper), for now.

Mr. Handsome got up early to work on bettering their situation. I suppose he’ll move them to their fattening-up, free-ish-range home tonight.

Some people are under the erroneous impression that Mr. Handsome is a serious man. True, he can be stingy about flashing his pearly whites and generous with his garumphing, but he does know how, if the mood strikes, to break loose, bounce off the walls, hang from the ceiling, and show his goony underbelly.

When he breaks loose, he goes hog wild.

He can lay it on reeeeeal thick.

Sometimes he gets so bad that I freak out—something I have every right to do considering I am married to the man in these pictures!

Maybe I should join a support group. Is there such a thing out there? If not, I guess I could start one. I think I would call it Wives of Spastic Husbands (WOSH, for short).

But just when I start thinking about calling the padlocked van with wire-meshed windows to come haul his royal silliness off to the Funny Farm, he goes and does this:

…and then I can’t help but take him seriously again.

I have finally learned to operate the scanner component of the printer-scanner-copier that we have owned for four-plus years, thanks to some brotherly assistance. My options for blog illustrations have broadened exponentially. Here’s a sampling: Mr. Handsome at age 21.

Back then he had no idea how much empathy (in case you can’t see the writing, he’s wearing what is called “The Empathy Vest”) he would be required to muster up and dole out—at least he was enthusiastic about it!