The Frankenfowl Follies

Yesterday evening, DH worked late to make up for missing time in the morning when we took Patrick to his first day, so I decided that we would have a picnic at the park for dinner. I packed up some sandwiches, Cheezits, and strawberries, and off we went with our ice water in hand.

After eating and playing for about an hour, we walked over to another, smaller playground in the same park. There were a couple of other people there, but basically it was just us in the area we were in. The kids climbed on the upside-down bird nest thing, whatever that thing's called, and I walked over to a bench to sit down.

That's when I saw them. Two of the Frankenfowl that have taken up residence at the pond, chasing each other around in circles.

Now, let me explain the Frankenfowl. First of all, their real name is the Muscovy Duck, but they are no ordinary duck. They are not descended from a mallard, and look more like the product of a chicken who got busy with a goose. They have claws on their webbed feet, their faces are covered in bumpy, red squishy-looking flesh that resembles a rooster's comb, and they have pointy bills. The two I'm going to be talking about look like this, except they were uglier because their feathers were white streaked with brown (brace yourselves, and stop eating if you don't want to snarf):


Looks kind of like the Joker would if he was a duck, right?! You can't tell from the picture here, but they're the size of a Canadian Goose. I went back today to try and take a picture of the two I actually saw, but they were hiding out, probably because of the horror show I'm about to describe.

Anyway, the two unlovelies were chasing each other around, which was kind of funny, so I watched. Then, one caught the other one and started pecking it.

Then the Peckee crouched down on the ground.

Unbelieveably, the Pecker (pun intended) got on top and started *gag* doing what I will call the Frankenfowl Fornication Frenzy.

At the park.

In my shock, I stared. I mean, I could barely tear my eyes away. I was the grossest thing!!! I started praying under my breath to please, PLEASE not let the kids notice what was going on, oh, pleeeaazzzzzz..

'Mommy? What's that duck doing to the other duck?!' from Josie.

Oh, sweet Jesus. Do I tell the truth? I mean, it's the circle of life, even if they ARE ugly, and it's perfectly natural so I should really just say

'I don't know honey, maybe they're doing a dominance thing like the dogs do sometimes.' Well, I couldn't tell the truth, for chrissakes, I mean, LOOK AT THEM, please let her buy this and not attract Patrick's attention to this debacle which is - holy crap- STILL going on, how can duck sex last longer than any sex I can remember

'Oh.... well, OK' said my trusting little Josie doubtfully, and finally turned away.

PHEW. That should be that, right? I've had enough trauma for one day?

Um, no.

Enter Drunk Guy. Oh, yeah. Every story about the park playground should have a drunk guy in it. I mean, you can't have frankenf*cking frankenfowl without the drunk guy, can you?!

So, Drunk Guy, who is holding a travel mug that I'm pretty certain probably doesn't have a steaming brew of joe inside, strides over to the ducks (who are STILL going at it, like they've been watching the Olympics on TV too and figured, hey, if they think table tennis is a sport, wait'll they see THIS), and begins berating them. Loudly. And waving his arms. The Madly Copulating Muscovys pay him no mind. He begins to nudge at them with his foot, still irate with them for having the nerve to Get It On in his park, pushing them harder and harder. The ducks hold on.

FINALLY, after what seemed like an eternity of duck-f*cking and drunken one-sided conversation, the Pecker duck leaped off with a great show of wingspan and quacking. The Peckee duck waddled away much less grandly, leaving me to wonder if she wasn't a bit...um, sore. Drunk Guy followed along after them, presumably to make sure they stopped getting more action than he probably does.

As soon as they left, I announced that it was time for us to GO. I mean, I couldnt' very well try and get the kids to leave during the debacle, since that would only have drawn their attention to it more, but I certainly wasn't going to wait for the duck version of 'Another 9 1/2 Weeks'.