Charlie-isms, Snow, and Zombie Roosters

A couple of new Charlie-isms:

I can't believe I forgot this one. This has been a favorite of ours for as long as Charlie has been talking. One day Daddy came in from outside to find Charlie snacking on a small bowl of minimarshmallows. Charlie looked up and said in tones of great triumph, "I got snows!"

Likewise, I came home from work on Friday to find Joe still working on the truck and Charlie watching "Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs" for the hundredth time. Charlie, it seems, had largely fended for himself as well as a five year old can for most of the day, as he announced to me when I walked in the door, "I ate a hundred gorilla bars today!"

And when we were out playing in the snow after dark last night (Weird things happen to second shift families. 7:00 p.m. is the middle of our afternoon...), Charlie turned to me and said, "Kids, don't try this at home!"

That brings me to the snow. They keep threatening us with 5+ inches of snow, which, for a small town librarian translates to 100 old ladies completely depleting the Christian romance section because they've got to have something to read while we're "snowed in." In this case, we did actually get the snow, and it did actually close some things: the schools and the library. So I guess it's a good thing that the ladies stocked up on books, eh?

The cold temperatures have driven our remaining to roosters to spend their nights snuggled up on the potting bench Joe built me two summers ago, which in turn has driven Joe to call it the "pooping bench." Red is looking much the worse for wear. He appears to have frostbite on his comb and wattles. The combination of the two above facts has led us to decide to put Red out of our misery. Joe decided to do this the other day when Charlie and I were out getting groceries to spare us any possible trauma. While I would've expected him to just shoot the dodgy bird, Joe decided to get old fashioned and break Red's neck. A quick snap, and Red looked quite sufficiently to have joined Earl in the Great Corn Patch in the Sky, so Joe laid him to rest in the woods across the street from our house where, hopefully, there was too much underbrush for Lucy to decide to bring him back. Turns out that was not what he should've been worried about. The next day, Joe called me up on my cel phone:

Joe: You'll never believe who is outside the window pecking at corn.
Me: You're kidding.
Joe: Nope.
Me: I thought you were sure he was dead.
Joe: He looked dead.
Me: Maybe he's a zombie.
Joe: How can you tell?
Me: Well, go out there, and if he looks at you and says, "Bok bok bok bok braaaaaaains!" run for it!