Some years ago there was a small grocery near the university in Albuquerque. To avoid being crushed by supermarket chains they’d gone upmarket, with gourmet offerings on their shelves next to the Hamburger Helper. One of the things they offered were fresh turkeys on major holidays.
I’d ordered my turkey there for several years and was quite happy with the results. One year I ordered a 12-14 pound bird, and when I came into the store to pick it up, I was told, “Sorry, but a coyote killed your bird this morning.”
Well. It’s not often you hear that.
“We have one unclaimed bird left,” the butcher continued. “But it’s a little larger than what you wanted.”
“How big is it?”
“Twenty-six pounds.”
I left lugging this enormous bird in a plastic sack, leaving a blood trail behind. Fortunately I’d put a cooler in the trunk for the bird, so I didn’t leave my car smelling like a charnel house.
The bird was huuuuuge. It was so big that it wouldn’t fit in the oven. The roasting pan sat on the oven floor, and the top of the turkey was flattened by the oven roof.
And it took forever to cook. But though a few parts of the bird were scorched, the rest turned out just fine, and we made an excellent feast after the bird was finally done, about 8pm.
And there were so many leftovers that we ended up freezing most of them for later. Even so we ate leftovers till we were crosseyed.
If there’s a moral to the story, its this: Don’t let the coyotes get you down.
“Don’t let the coyotes get you down.”
Snort! You will have to pay for that … somehow. 😏
Or perhaps stop eating meat – the planet would like that.
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