The Fancy Fowl Poultry Show in Monroe, Georgia

Alright, are you ready for this???

Let me start at the beginning. I finally got to sleep Friday night around 10:30 or 11:00 pm. It is hard for me to go to sleep when I am anticipating the excitement of the coming day. I had set the alarm for 3 am, but woke up at 2:30. Too excited to go back to sleep I layed their contemplating the coming day. At almost 3 I got on up and showered, got my lucky shirt on of course...and ohhhh it is so lucky. :) Rain had been predicted for overnight so I had put RainX on the trucks windshield. Lucky for me I didnt run into much more than a light rain. Most of the time it was just a light drizzle. Still, it was dark and it was wet, so I was extra careful. I got out of the house around 4:50 am. Dwain had called the night before and wanted to go also so I was going to be meeting him off an exit off of I20 coming through Atlanta. I met up with him at a Walmart and he parked and rode the rest of the way with me.

I had an interesting time in those five minutes I was waiting on Dwain. I hadnt even gotten into the parking lot good and some guy backs up in his PT Cruiser and rolls his window down. I just look at him. I roll my window down a little and say to him "YES???" He says back in a slurry voice (its 6 am on a Saturday morning, I am assuming this guy has been out all night partying and cruising) "HEYYY babeee...I was just wanting so say hello to you and tell you how beautiful you are." I just looked at him and said..."OOOOkay!!!" and rolled the window back up and drove on past. I decided it would be better to park and turn off my lights so I wouldnt draw anymore unwanted attention. Nope. I didnt even get parked good to take my foot off the brake so the lights were not showing and some woman pulls up in her SUV and waves enthusiasticly with this big smile on her face like we are old friends. Oh boy, here we go...she rolls her window down, I roll mine down and she says to me. "I need to ask you something, but before I do I want you to pray about it." I just nodded my head with an absurd look on my face. Then she says something about she was low on gas, and she wondered if I could follow her over to the gas station and pay for her some gas..that she wasnt going to make it home...then it all went in one ear and out the other. So...not being the sucker I used to be...I replied to her with this..."Well, you know what, these big vehicles these days sure do take a lot of gas dont they, and as a matter of fact I dont have any money on me at all and I am waiting on a friend to come and meet me here so he can buy me some gas." SHE LOOKED DUMBFOUNDED...LOL. She didnt know what to say to that. Then after a few moments of silence she came back with this..."Well do you think your friend could help me out?" I said "No, I dont think so, he is just bringing enough for me." More dumbfounding looks...and then finally she said Okay..and went on her way.

Now I have no doubt that there are people in need out there. Don't drive up to my in your expensive SUV and tell me you need gas in your vehicle at 6 am on a Saturday morning and expect me to believe that you dont go around getting people to pay for your gas all the time, cause I have been dupped before when I was younger and I dont fall for that crap anymore.

Dwain got there and I told him about my parking lot adventures. He apologized saying he didnt know he was sending me into that kind of activity. I told him that was alright, I used to live in Forest Park, and I ain't scared. ;)

So we got on the road and it wasnt really that much further and we got to the area a lot earlier than I expected, but that was a good thing, seeing as we couldnt seem to find the place from the directions on the show pamphlet...lol. It said to pass a church and then the road we were looking for, Criswell Road, would be next. Never mind that we passed a hundred churches in the stretch of a mile! We did finally find it. I almost turned around, but Dwain said go just a little further and just around the corner there was our road! The church they spoke of passing was way before the road. Nevertheless, we made it.

Soon as we got there we got Babe and Buckbuck tested. Their legs are so heavily feathered the test person couldnt get the bands on so I pocketed them. As long as I have the test paper verification and the bands to match we are good. I found the coops and got them in their holes. We went back out and got the other four birds, the Polish and got them cooped in, but we were short one hole! Brian, the head of the Fancy Fowl Poultry Club just put two of his show birds into one coop and made room for one of mine. He said it didnt matter anyway, seeing as those were his birds and technically since its his show, he just has them there to look at, not to win anything. Brian kept saying I was going to be going home with some plaques. I wasnt so sure. We would just wait and see. I didnt want to get overconfident. Dwain and I went about browsing looking at all the other entries and taking pictures of them. He had already found a pair of Old English he loved and bought them. He ended up leaving with those and some fantail pigeons. This was the first poultry show he had ever been to and I think he thought he had died and gone to heaven. Heaven for us chicken fanciers anyway. ;) I saw a lot of folks and introduced Dwain to folks and he actually jumped right in there and was right at home in no time talking to all sorts of folks about all sorts of birds. He is going to be hooking one guy up with about fifteen Seramas from a friend of his that is looking to get into D'Uccles and out of Serama.

We had us a sausage and egg biscuit for breakfast there at the counter and they had all sorts of food cooking in pressure cookers and crock pots on the counters. Later we got us a BBQ sandwich and it was pretty good too! The food at these shows is never disappointing. After lunch we noticed that they were starting to judge the large fowl. They always do the large fowl last, but it doesnt matter because I am there for the duration anyway. Its just proper to stay the whole show if you are showing birds, even if you dont win anything. I cant stand to look. I go outside pacing around nervously...talking to folks til I cant stand it and I tell Dwain I am going in to peek. He stayed outside talking to folks. I went in and they had finished judging...and my eyes popped out of my head. I think they did anyway. My face got hot and I was getting really excited as I went down the row. Later I would get even more excited as Brian set out the plaques and trophies on top of all the cages of the birds that won. The plaques were very exciting, but the Large Fowl and Reserve Large Fowl Champion had not been chosen as of yet, until Brian placed that trophy on top of Babes pen. I lost my mind for a minute I think. I was so happy, I just can't begin to tell you how happy. You see, I am fourty years old, and never in my whole life have I taken home a trophy for anything...not even as a kid. Yes, I took dance and all that, but this is real, this was IT man, this was MY time to shine. I had Champion birds, and I had awards coming to them left and right. So let me show you some pictures now and stop yapping....First, the awards, then the birds with their awards...















and so...I came home very PROUD of my CHAMPIONS. :) It took me four years of doing this to figure out what I was doing, but I think I know what I am doing now!

Next weekend is the Chattahoochee Valley Poultry Associations show in Newnan, Ga. I will be there, along with Dwain, and Karen is going too. Of course Buckbuck, Babe, Kuckoo, Coco, Laverne and Shirley will all be there shining like the champions they are. Everyone has won something now except Buckbuck. Maybe the Newnan show will be his day to shine. :)

The rest of this week I will be busy as a bee. I want to get Phoenix's outfit done for this coming weekends show so he can hang out with me and draw a lot of attention with his cute John Deere chicken diaper outfit. ;) I will make at least one more entry, probably two showing picture of a lot of the birds that were shown at this show.

Ray (from the poultry show)...if your reading this, I did in fact take a super shot of one of your sons birds. I think it was Clyde. :) I also have pictures of both the campines and your daughters silkies she showed. I will post them tomorrow morning during my quiet and coffee time.