Hi Naomi,

I would have answered to your mail earlier but I have had quite a bad
accident which to a large extent is your fault.

You wrote that at the annual picnic they probably missed me - *and my
troop of dancing chickens*!! This came as quite a surprising comment
because I haven't got a troop of dancing chickens and never had. But
it certainly sounded like a good idea. I would like to go into showbiz
and since I am 29 years old it's sort of about time I do something
about it.

A friend of mine grew up on a chicken farm and he could get me the
chickens really cheap and so I bought 23 of them. Cute little things,
they were too. My friend helped me take care of these, my new fluffy
friends, and it was hard but pleasant work feeding them, talking to
them, taking them for walks in the park and stimulating them in
different ways to prepare them for their limelight future.

Unfortunately it was very very difficult....well, impossible
actually, for me to teach them any tricks at all and since I had
already gotten myself hired for 3 well paid gigs this stressed me a
bit. I petted the chickens and I danced for them and did tricks and
yelled at them in frustration and threatened to eat them and I would
even kneel down and weep and beg them to cooperate. Nothing happened. 
The chickens played it cool and pretended not to hear my cry for help.

Some time went by and the day of the shows pulled closer and
I... well.... wasn't *well* if you know what I am saying. There were
only two things on my poor mind: One was the beautiful vision of me in
a shiny costume in front of a line of 23 chickens, walking on
stage. The chickens wore amazing costumes that with time became more
and more fantastic and beautiful in my dreams: Some of them were
dressed like go-go dancers, some like famous historical characters,
some like clouds and others like famous buildings or books or
both. The chickens would begin their show, dancing in wonderous
formations and patterns and I would guide them wearing my big, white
toothpaste smile and a sceptre and make-up and lip gloss. And of
course the other thing on my mind was how to bring this vision to
life.

I had almost given up. 4 days till the first gig and counting. Waking
up early in the morning to the noise from the little ones I looked
around and my apartment was a TOTAL mess, would you believe it! Can't
say I ever was the overly tidy sort of person but this was quite,
well... disgusting to tell you the truth. The chickens seemed happy,
though.

Then, right there as I was lying on the shit sprangled wooden floor in
the hostile olfactory cocktail of chicken debris and my own repulsive
body odors, I got an idea. I would give up all hope of ever making
these chickens dance. I would just make it LOOK as if they were
dancing. The plan assembled in my head like rain in the gutter: I
would lay out some kind of metal mesh on the stage floor and have
electricity running through it. I would have a remote-control switch
concealed on my body. And I would then be able to control the, well,
overall movement of the chicken herd. I figured this would save me and
perhaps I could even make a few bucks out of it.

In order to make the chickens relax, I would smoke a bit of grass with
them and listen to old 70's "woah, let's get stoneeeeed he he he" music.

The day came and I went on stage, pretty stoned myself, not at all 
nervous, convinced my trick would work.

It did.

The crowd went crazy. The crowd went wild. They cheered and cheered
and I gave them all the peace sign and said to them 'cool, wow, cool,
yeh' and so forth. I since did a lot of gigs and have become immensely
rich and I must remember to send you some of all that money but
anyway: I bought a new house because the old apartment was beyond
repair and after having lived there for a few days (doing nothing but
smoking grass with the chickens and groupies) I got up at night to go
to the bathroom and I took a wrong turn which would have been a right,
safe turn in my old apartment... and I fell down the stairs to the
basement with all the chickens and I landed directly on top of the
poor sleeping things (never knew what hit them though, I keep telling
myself) killing 10 or 12 right then and there. BUT: 7 of them stuck
on me when I got up. Little sharp beaks buried deep in my flesh, the
yellow chicken down drowning in my red blood. I dared not pull them
out fearing the gaping wounds would pour the blood so quickly I would
die - so, naked, with chickens hanging limp and bloody from my body, I
walked to the street and got myself a taxi to the hospital from which
this letter is written.

They say I am recovering and can resume my work in a couple of days.

Yours,

Johan