Monday was the coldest day so far this winter season, with the temperature hovering somewhere around two degrees fahrenheit when I first stepped outside to fetch a bucket of kindling to warm up the stove.

When the temperature is that cold, I usually try to get the stove good and hot before I put in my bigger wood. Besides, the kindling is right beside the door in a bucket and I didn't have to go outside to fetch it.

After I got up and around, I headed down to the chicken lot to check in on them. The water was frozen solid and the chickens hadn't been outside at all. When I threw them in some food, one of the hens stepped outside and started flying around in an apparent attempt to keep her feet off the ground.

I realized then that they really haven't seen much snow that stayed on the ground for long. I suppose they usually just stay inside during such times. Last winter, they were just chicks and I fed and watered them inside their house, which I heated with a lamp.

This year, they've had to tough it out more.

Even so, they are still producing eggs—I retrieved three Monday morning. Two of them had frozen and cracked open, turning from eggs to eggcicles. Since they apparently had frozen solid during the night or early that morning, they didn't spill out. In fact, I didn't notice at first that they were cracked open until I noticed how cold they were.

The third egg wasn't frozen, but it was also very cold.

It's a bad time of year to be a chicken.

Last week a neighbor's dog got into them, killing three and scattering the others far and wide. As I walked around finding them, I was disappointed to find my rooster hiding under the wood stacked under the back porch. He didn't look like he had a scratch on him. Now there's a real hero for you. They don't call them chickens for nothing.

Some of the others had hidden here and there. Two of the ones that eventually died were alive when I put them back in the pen, but they died soon afterwards.

After I found a good number of them up on the hill above the house, I walked up there and they followed me home like the Pied Piper (without the music, of course). They appeared genuinely glad to see me. These birds are almost like pets in a way. I know it's hard to feed anything for a year and then watch it die.

I set out to find the owners of the dog, whom I located shortly thereafter just up the road. The dog had only been out for about 15 minutes when the chaos broke loose, they informed me. Feeling fortunate that I didn't lose more birds, I later told the neighbors we'd call it even if they'd keep the dog up. I made them promise to come by my house later to have a meal. In turn, I pledged not to serve chicken.

Since I had several things already on my plate and it was getting near dark, I put the three dead birds in a box in the back of the truck to contend with later.

The following day, I had to arrange a birthday party for my youngest and served food for those who came. There were about 25 people or so there, mostly those with young children.

Trying to find a good, but fairly inexpensive, meal to serve, we opted for oven roasted chicken leg quarters with green beans and mashed potatoes from the garden. The food was at least as good as the $25 birthday cake, which I didn't try after I noticed it was dying all the kids' hands and mouths red and purple. Of course, we didn't forget the ice cream, either. A birthday party without ice cream is like a park without a swing set.

Most of the adults helped to clean up after the party and not thinking about it, I sent a couple fellows out to the truck to take the garbage out.

"What are you doing with those chickens?" One asked.

"What chickens?" I replied honestly.

"The ones in the box in the back of the truck," he said.

"Oh, those," I said. "I had them out there in case we ran out of food for the party."

I'm not sure if he entirely believed me, but the sight of dead chickens frozen in the back of truck (feathers and all) was enough to make him wonder, I'm sure.

Luckily, the meal was over by then and he'd already eaten whatever he was going to eat and most of the other guests were gone. I later told him that I was joking, but you never know. It's always good fun for me to keep people wondering.

Speaking of keeping people wondering, my mother sent me an e-mail about a ‘true' story (I say it that way because I wasn't there) in which a pilot for a small carrier held up by bad weather at the plane's destination airport. Telling his passengers that takeoff would be delayed by about two hours, he offered them the opportunity to get out and stretch their legs.

One lady, who happened to be blind, also was on the plane. She was the only passenger who didn't get off to walk about the airport. The pilot offered to help her if she wanted to go out, to which she replied, "I don't care to stretch my legs, but you could take my dog for a walk."

Soon afterwards the pilot, of course wearing his trademark pilot's sunglasses, walked down the steps with the dog, causing quite an uproar with the other passengers. According to the message, most of them opted for other airlines. I probably would have wondered myself; I'm sure anyone might be shaken to see a pilot with a seeing-eye dog. That just goes to show you that you can't believe everything you see and even less of what you hear.

I've even learned lately I can't even believe all the things I think I can remember, but folks tell me that only gets worse with age. It's always best to keep an open mind and an open heart toward others. That way we can be sure to give everyone the benefit of the same doubt we hope for ourselves. Besides, whenever we place our trust in our fallible senses (or in my case, non-senses), they're sure to lead us astray.

Get more tongue in cheek commentary this week's issue of the Alleghany News!

Email: allnews@ls.net