the chicken coup

Okay, so back to that chicken.

Now, I know what you’re going to say: what’s a chicken got to do with winning the heart of a woman? Nothing, really; but I figured if I could eat yard bird at home, I could make it through a meal at a restaurant. Anyway, that’s the way I saw it.

Did you know researchers actually found traces of the anti-depressant Prozac in chickens they tested? Seems being a chicken these days is as stressful as it is disgusting. Researchers also found traces of Tylenol and Benadryl, leading them to believe that chickens are not only susceptible to headaches, but allergies as well.

But the thought of me actually buying a raw chicken, taking it out and setting it on the counter with all that Salmonella just oozing everywhere, then cooking it and watching as all that Campylobacter comes bubbling up to the surface, it was all just too much. No, sir; I didn’t sign up for that.

Like it or not, there are an estimated forty thousand Salmonella cases reported in the United States every year? And that’s just the reported cases. The CDC, Center for Disease Control, estimates the number of actual cases to be much higher, as many as one million. Other pathogens like Listeria, Monocytogenes, and Toxoplasma are also commonly found in chicken and can lead to human kidney failure.

So I had this idea. What if I was to purchase already-cooked poultry, like a greasy bird from Colonel Chicken? Deep-fried meats may not be good for your heart, but when it comes to creepy little crawlers, there’s virtually no way they can survive the volcano-like environment of a deep fryer. Even in a solid piece of chicken breast, microbes have little chance of hiding out deep in the tissue to avoid extermination. Most studies show, even E. Coli can’t survive such conditions.

But then I heard about this 19-year-old student in England who actually found a chicken brain in his KFC meal. A real brain, complete with little macaroni-looking parts. Some of it hadn’t even been cooked yet and was still pink.

Purchasing a deep-fried bird was made doubly difficult after hearing that a man in Baltimore, Maryland, actually found a cute little crispy mouse inside his Popeye’s fried chicken dinner.

And it isn’t just chicken. In 2009, two Domino’s Pizza employees made a video of themselves shoving string cheese up their noses and farting on salami sandwiches. The video was posted on YouTube.

A Taco Bell employee urinated on a plate of nachos and posted that image online, too. A “sandwich artist” at Subway placed his penis between the buns of a loaf of bread, then uploaded the photo on Instagram. What is it about the Internet that makes people just have to share their dirty deeds, even if it means going to jail?

Even the police aren’t safe. A McDonald’s employee in New York once put broken glass on a cop’s Big Mac. The worst part was, the officer bit into the burger and cut up his mouth really bad. He even broke a few of his teeth. The way I see it, if a cop isn’t safe at McDonald’s, who is?

These are just the stories we know about. I imagine there are hundreds (if not thousands) of incidents where stoned and stupid employees do everything from hocking up loogies on burgers to masturbating in sandwiches. For all it’s worth, I might just as well go snorkeling in a septic tank.

Not even the finest restaurants are safe.

Did you know that a woman found a condom in her bowl of clam chowder at the upscale McCormick and Schmick’s in Irvine, California? The worst part was, she didn’t even realize it until after she’d put it into her mouth.

So I got a pollo loco from one of those rotisserie chicken places, the kind where at least you can see them cooking it in front of you. It cost me an extra ten bucks, but I got them to deliver it.

There I was with my fork in hand, ready to dig into that chicken carcass and it was all I could do not to puke my guts out right then and there. But I had a plan. It was a long shot, but if my theory was correct, then it was the reason for my sudden metamorphosis the other day back at the grocery store. Anyway, there was only one way to find out.

In my left hand I had a fork; in my right, a knife? No, sir. Remember the rubber mallet? It was time to deal with an unruly brain.

Brain cells.

I gritted my teeth and raised that mallet high.

Brain cells.

It smacked the shit out of my skull.

Brain cells.

My ears started ringing.

Brain cells.

I hit myself again.

Brain cells.

Now I was seeing double.

Brain cells.

One more wallop for good measure, and that was the best meal I ever had that wasn’t served out of a can. Beat the hell out of chicken of the sea.

For those of you wondering what it feels like to hit yourself in the head with a rubber mallet, it’s like banging a gong, where your head is the gong.

In layman’s terms: it hurts. A LOT. Think back to the worst hangover you ever had. Now, multiply that by a hundred. No, a thousand! That’s the closest I can come to describing it to you. But what I can also tell you is, it kills a lot more brain cells than alcohol, or marijuana, and a lot faster.

It might be painful, but boy does it get results. Not even once did I think about that chicken, how it was probably still alive when they passed it through the scalding tank: kicking, squawking, banging its head around with its little eyeballs popping out of its sockets. No, sir. Didn’t even cross my mind.

It was good; but when my head started feeling better, I realized that feasting on murdered fowl at home was one thing, doing it at a restaurant—out in public—was quite another.

Still, I only had a few hours to go and no other plan. So I smacked my head again, and a few times more, and dug back into that bird. I swear I could hear that chicken squawking, pleading for its life as I tore away at its flesh.

I thought about calling Fanny and canceling, then I realized I didn’t have her phone number. Even if I did go knock on her door, she probably wasn’t home. And anyway, I was even worse at backing out of situations as I was getting into them. One time I sat through a four-hour seminar on vaginal hygiene and yeast infections. I’d walked into the wrong room and the last thing I wanted to do was call attention to myself.

No, sir; I was in it for good this time. With just a few hours left to go, however, I did get this one idea. It involved a restaurant.