The chicken hero saga 17: Then and now and what's to come

     It had been an exiting few months for the hero and the harvest, too bad his official historian's quill had broke so he couldn't write about it. What's that you say? Why couldn't he just get a new quill, you see only the finest writing instruments could be used to tell such a grand tale, and to get a new quill the historian had to make a long trek through many lands to find a rare mallard, then remove it's center feather and drain the water off him, it was worth it when people saw the historian's beautiful writing, when ask if he resented the hero for making him go to such lengths for the beautiful ink, the historian usualy just said it really was water off a ducks back. Some months ago Maria, the eldest of the harvest had been sat down by the council and told she could no longer perform her duties due to fears and concerns of the townsfolk, as she was being led out the door she tried to place a curse on the head of the harvest Petrus the second of his name, the hero watched as they led Maria away, he knew she would land on her near decrepit feet and that blast he heard a short time later was just a mere coincidence.
     Maria wasn't the only one that had departed, Tylerus had left for the great land of Torontus to help build doors and windows for new huts, leaving his sister in the care of Jamieus the magical elf, he promised to take great care of her and breed many strong sons, though his own weakness was quite legendary.
    Also newsworthy was the return of Petrus the third of his name, who had left the harvest to help oversee the harvest in Pearl Mountain, he doesn't say much of his time there, when asked he just usually falls into a fetal position and cries. However, upon his travels from the armpit that is Pearl Mountain he met a mystic from a roving band of gypsies, he was able to barter a deal for the few beans he had in his pocket for a magical drawing tool that made whatever he sketched come to life, now some people thought it was forged by Lucifer himself from fires hotter than even their hottest of ovens, causing the hero to quip that it was sketchy as hell, which caused everyone to burst out in laughter, cause everyone laughed when the hero quipped, well there was that one time that one person didn't, they were later banished.
    Then there was the day when one of the council of elders stumbled on an unmanned heard of cattle and thought that they could be useful in the chicken harvest. It was decreed from on high that from now on the chicken harvest would also be the cow harvest. They were going to throw all their resources into it, grain, corn, wood, whatever it took. The council wanted this to be the best meat the townsfolk had ever eaten so they assembled a team of apothecaries from every corner of the earth to create a new way of cooking, and lo they created a formula that the cow would slowly cook at the dawning of the sun and would not be ready till the dawning of the morrow. By this time the elder in charge of the cows had become quite mad and when he saw the formula at work he exclaimed
   "Now that's COWAZY"
    That was enough for the rest of the council, tired of his cow craziness they banded together and threw him into the eternal chicken fire, his screams of  "COW THAT'S HOT" were the last words ever herd from him.
   The busy season had started at the harvest and as people have done throughout the ages the townsfolk flocked in droves to feast and revel in the merriment. The dawning of this day would bring the celebration of the Black Friday, the day when the sun did not rise and the townsfolk took to looting all the stores, and on the morrow of the morrow was the local village parade where the villages worshipped a false idol in the form of a bearded fat man and hoped to get presents. This busy season had already done some weird things to the workers at the harvest, Kennius the cook, partaker of Jamieus' magical plant was broken two days in, left a mere shell of himself walking around only muttering the phrase "Stuffing......stuffing.....stuffing" over and over again. Bogeyus, man of numbers and literature just walked around all day counting and screaming "I HAVE TO ORDER MORE, THERE'S NOT GONNA BE ENOUGH" despite that fact that were perhaps seven of those things already, he finally reached his breaking point one day when the hero asked if they could get a certain thing and he grabbed his ordering quill, pointed it high in the sky and screamed " I HAVE THE POWER" then pointing the quill towards his cat as if it would transform into a huge beast. The hero knew of only on man who could do that, and Bogeyus was not that man.
   The hero was enjoying these days, he was happy with his fair young maiden Annastasia, walking his trusty steed Bear who was also a dog, and she walking her trusty steed Brody who was also a dog. it was quiet, no evil villains to speak of, perhaps he had found the contentment he had always longed for. Then, just he and Annastasia were enjoying the peace and quiet they saw a flock of townsfolk running, one of them, who appeared to be the leader screaming
  "DON'T EAT THE GLUTEN YOU WILL GET SICK"
  Annastasia looked at our hero with a quizzical look "What was that about?"
  The hero just looked and responded "I"m not sure but I think our peace and quiet is over"

In Rod we trust..........until we don't

  Throughout the rich and interesting history of Newfoundland its people have always thought of it as the little engine that could. Our history of hard times, brutal weather, and love of salt meat have given gave us a thick skin that could weather all the abuse we took from other provinces, and the rest of the world. Then something happened, up through the ground came a bubblin crude and all of a sudden we had money, we could buy things, and our thick skin went away. Now if you anyone across the world bad mouths our traditions the pitchforks come out, we have gone from a province with a strong sense of community to not being afraid to yell and and deride the elderly.
  It was a beautiful fall day in July when Rod Stewart took the stage at Confederation Hill to a throng of adoring fans. Everyone was happy and singing all the songs they grew up with, decked out in their summer parkas and tuques, and everyone was in awe of Rod, here he was, 200 years old and still moving like a 100 year old, busting a hip across the stage. Earlier in the day after experiencing good ol fashioned Newfoundland weather first hand Rod Stewart went into a local store that sells fur coats and asked for some clothes to make sure his back up dancers wouldn't freeze, the owner of the store saw an opportunity and he took it, in most cases that is what heroes do, in this case it is what people looking for publicity do. After putting Rod into a sealskin coat he asked for a picture, hey you can't fault him for it, you do what you got to do to make a buck, and if it gets you noticed then it worked, and boy did it get him noticed.
  Now for anyone who doesn't know, Newfoundlanders are sensitive when it comes to the seal hunt and it's history. Opponents of the seal hunt are all like "DON'T YOU HURT THAT SEAL" and Newfoundlanders are like "GET BENT" so it was not a surprise that when the picture of Rod in the sealskin coat went viral provincial pride was at an all time high. I haven't seen the province come together like this since the first episode of Republic of Doyle. Reactions were mixed between pumped and SUPER pumped, Rod was the man, and Paul McCartney could suck it, and other celebrities who dared speak ill of the seal hunt could suck it, we didn't need you anyway, we had Rod on our side. It is like we finally had the support of the coolest kid in class, we were accepted, we were somebody.
  We were also jumping the gun, for you see eventually the fog lifts and people get to go home, which is what Rod did, and he saw the picture, and no doubt saw the heat he was taking the the anti-seal hunt people. Rod came out, said he was upset that the picture of him went online, he doesn't actually support our seal hunting ways and suddenly became the most hated man on Confederation Hill since Cathy Dunderdale. People jumped down his velvety throat when he said he didn't know anything about the industry but didn't support it, and made fun of him for it. Hey, I barely know anything about sex trafficking but I don't support it, who has sex in traffic anyway? All those cars honking at you. People lit the torches they should have used for warmth on the hill and were ready to burn Rod at the stake, of course they won't get their chance, he's gone now, likely never to come back if he's seen the reactions at all, and this ladies and gentlemen is why we can't have nice things.
  It is hard enough to get big acts to come here as it is, most of them don't even know where we are, hell the Eagles thought they were in Ontario, though that's probably because they had dehydration due to lack of water at Salmon Fest. If we, as a province, can't learn to let things go and let everything bother us we deserve to have Shannyganock as headliners at every big show, which is not a knock on them, they are a great local band. So what if Rod Stewart says he didn't know what the coat was made of, I don't know what any of my coats are made of, and everyone has pictures of themselves on the Internet they don't want there, and probably didn't know were there. I'm not on anyone's side here, there are always going to be groups that support killingof things and not killing of things, even Jesus was in the middle of one of those battles. It's like our province is on is one one of those dating sites and thought we had  finally found someone who understood us, till they left us in the cold, but don't worry everybody there's plenty of seals in the sea.