Poor Dora's almost done with life

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

I have put her in a box next to the fire so that she's warm and comfortable for her last few hours. She can't even lift her head, poor thing :-(

She was never much of a layer, being a bit worn out by the battery farm by the time we got her, but she was a lovely friendly girl who liked to sit on your shoulder and take bites of your sandwich if she got the chance.

On her gravestone, I shall write, 'She Was A Good Hen'.

[Berni]

Seems a shame to just bury her and let the worms get all the goodness.

Did you name her after the Defence Of the Realm Act?

[Rich]

do the kind thing and quickly wring her neck?

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

Why, you yourself have undoubtedly enjoyed her eggy offerings. She was one of a batch - Dora, Flora, Bunty, erm, others.

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

for the appropriate action. She is simply sliding peacefully into the abyss.

I know my hens, r.

[Berni]

remarkably simple creatures and their ability to feel what we think of as 'pain' or 'distress' is highly questionable.

[Rich]

[Berni]

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

I can assure you that chickens feel not only pain, but every emotion you do. No, scratch that, chickens feel more emotion than you, for chickens are possessed of a soul.

[Berni]

Seriously, though, what is wrong with these people? :-(

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fd/Chicken_and_Waffles_201_-_Evan_Swigart.jpg/800px-Chicken_and_Waffles_201_-_Evan_Swigart.jpg

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

Give it until tomorrow.

[Berni]

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

Fried chicken. And syrup. On the same plate. :-(

They're going to elect trump, aren't they? They're actually mental.

[Berni]

Mind you, I've seen them eat sausages with pancakes and put syrup on it.

They're off their faces on sugar, mad as a box of frogs and capable of virtually anything imo.

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

[Rich]

You should read it at her funeral - You have to read it in a west country accent for full effect.

Oh. I am a battery hen,
On me back there's not a germ,
I never scratched a farmyard,
And I never pecked a worm,
I never had the sunshine,
To warm me feathers through,
Eggs I lay. Every day.
For the likes of you.

When you has them scrambled,
Piled up on your plate,
It's me what you should thank for that,
I never lays them late,
I always lays them reg'lar,
I always lays them right,
I never lays them brown,
I always lays them white.

But it's no life, for a battery hen,
In me box I'm sat,
A funnel stuck out from the side,
Me pellets comes down that,
I gets a squirt of water,
Every half a day,
Watchin' with me beady eye,
Me eggs, roll away.

I lays them in a funnel,
Strategically placed,
So that I don't kick 'em,
And let them go to waste,
They rolls off down the tubing,
And up the gangway quick,
Sometimes I gets to thinkin'
"That could have been a chick!"

I might have been a farmyard hen,
Scratchin' in the sun,
There might have been a crowd of chicks,
After me to run,
There might have been a cockerel fine,
To pay us his respects,
Instead of sittin' here,
Till someone comes and wrings our necks.

I see the Time and Motion clock,
Is sayin' nearly noon,
I 'spec me squirt of water,
Will come flyin' at me soon,
And then me spray of pellets,
Will nearly break me leg,
And I'll bite the wire nettin'
And lay one more bloody egg.

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

I'm going to have to have a stiff drink now.

[Rich]

[Berni]

I'm sorry, r, I hadn't realised you were educationally subnormal. :-(

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

It's... not my favourite. It sort of rhymes, I suppose. So that's nice.

Here is my favourite poem:

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

[Berni]

[Berni]

trying to tread up there, I don't imagine.

Also, I'm dubious about his claim to have touched God's Face, tbh. I can't imagine the Almighty would stand for that sort of thing.

[Rich]

[Berni]

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

[Rich]

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

[Berni]

The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

Worse, it's pretentious ****.

Art school ****, indeed.

[Berni]

The man was a liar, I'm sorry to have to say. :-(

[Sir Charlie of Nicholas]

I'm pretty sure that's how it worked.

[Berni]

It's not for just anyone.

[Berni]

[Herbette Chapman - aged 15]

[Luis Anaconda]

[Berni]