Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Ain't nobody here but us chickens

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ABC Wednesday starts again today with letter A.
And strangely enough, what came to mind was one of the first jokes I remember my grandmother telling me as a kid in Chicago.
"Ain't nobody here but us chickens!" is the punchline of the old joke.
It is the answer the farmer hears when he hears a commotion in the chicken coop one night and calls, "Who's in there?!"

Apparently it became a song as well. You can hear all the lyrics sung by a crowd of Muppets in this funny video.

My moshav (a collective agricultural village) in the Jerusalem Hills is on all the sides of a hill, on terraces. Agriculture is impossible. So in the old days the government told the moshavniks in the mountains that they must raise laying hens. Every household had to build and tend a large henhouse, in Hebrew, a lool.
Now the moshavim, like the kibbutzim, are largely privatized. But we still have about fifteen big chicken coops, loolim, in operation. Always big fresh eggs at the little grocery store.
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19 comments:

  1. I'm not quite sure, but I wonder if that wasn't also used in "Chicken run". A great choice anyhow.

    Mr. Linky is out running too. Or maybe he has just chickened out.

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  2. When I was in high school, I was given a chick from an incubator in biology class. Took it home and she developed into a hen. We loved her eggs. Then one day, I came home from school and discovered that someone had stolen her.

    Dad bought 2 new chicks, but they turned out to be roosters. One was given away and the other we ate.

    Their names? Pee Pee, Popo, and Jojo.

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  3. Thank you for including the Muppets, I love them. Great choice for A

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  4. What an ingenious choice of "A". Very interesting and thanks for that little bit of history.

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  5. I love it! Now I know how to say henhouse b'ivrit (Lool!). Thank you very much for adding to my meager Hebrew vocabulary.

    If you check my page you will see pics of my own shlosha tarngolet. (three chickens)

    All the best,
    Lea

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  6. OMG, I had forgotten all about that video!
    Very clever!

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  7. I didn't know that!

    cluck cluck

    aloha shalom

    Comfort Spiral

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  8. Nothing like big, fresh eggs!
    Unfortunately, I can't stand the smell ;)

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  9. Very interesting, Dina! We had chickens when I was a girl growing up on a farm, but they were allowed to roam around the farmyard. I guess today they would be valued as free-range chickens.

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  10. Thanks for making me smile .... the muppets addition was priceless! love your blog!!!!

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  11. Hi!
    Great "A" post!! I just love the muppets and the song was cute! Have a great day!

    Sherrie
    http://sherrie-plummer.blogspot.com/2009/07/abc-wednesday-round-5.html

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  12. Great idea for today and I enjoyed the little history lesson! :D

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  13. When my daughter was about three we hatched a chick from an egg at home with a homemade incubator. When she learned that chicks came from eggs, she wouldn't eat eggs anymore. She said it made the mommy chickens sad.

    An Arkies Musings

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  14. Very cool. Thanks for another little cultural lesson.

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  15. i've never seen one myself - great to have fresh eggs every day

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  16. Now I've got that song in my head! A friend of mine performs it on occasion, it's quite catchy actually.

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