On Eggs and Other Deviations from the Status Quo

A good friend (and, happily, neighbor) of mine keeps chickens in his back yard, which I've decided is about the coolest thing a person living in urban environs could possibly do. One, because it's a great conversation starter, but two, because you then get to eat eggs that look like this:



I hardly know what to say to properly eulogize the egg I had for breakfast yesterday (see above). I have become so accustomed to the pale yellow, anemic looking yolks from eggs you get in the grocery store here in the States. Look at that yolk!  Practically orange, so full of iron and protein and yummy fatty goodness...  I forgotten how much more rich and delicious a free-range, organic, right-out-of-the-chicken's-butt huevo is than the watered down, hormone-full sad-excuse-for-an-ovum that passes for an egg in this country.  I remember the first time I ate an egg outside of the USA.  I was in Peru, I was 19, and when I told the woman I was staying with that I wanted an egg, she went outside, found some craftily-located roost, took an egg out of the nest, and served it sunny-side up.  I thought I'd found nirvana.  Let us pause for a moment of sacred silence, because in terms of the simple joys of eating good food, it doesn't get much better than this.

And speaking of simple joys, I want to celebrate a signal event in my life, coming up on March 4.  I am a registered Democrat, but I have lived all of my adult life in the U.S. in Republican states.  North Carolina, Utah, New Mexico, and now, Texas.  Which is to say that, because of this cursed system of the Electoral College (oh, how I hate it), my vote has never once "counted" in a presidential election.  Not that this has stopped me from voting, but when I do so it is with a sad sense of resignation -- the only time I remember being at all hopeful was in the 2004 election, when I lived in New Mexico, but that, as I'm sure you all remember, was a bust.  But now!  On March 4 when I vote, when I caucus, oh my goodness.  My vote will COUNT!!  I know it's "counted" in primaries before, but I've never been in a Super Tuesday state, not to mention Iowa, New Hampshire, and their ilk.  The race was all sewn up by the time it got around to where I was. For the first time in my life I feel like a true part of a participatory democracy, and it is both energizing and fantastic.  The class I T.A. for is studying the American Revolution right now and I was just reading about Boston and all those town hall meetings when for the first time in Anglo-Saxon history the property requirement was dropped for all men to participate, and the working class flooded the streets and the meeting halls.  I got so excited as I read it, because for once, I knew almost exactly how they might have felt.  I'm not saying I'm going to go dump tea in Lake Travis, or tar and feather Republican congressmen, but it's exciting nonetheless.