Picking your ducks, and picking your battles

There's not too many country-ass expressions I'm unfamiliar with, but recently I had to ask myself WTF does "pick your ducks" mean.  And I found the answer.

Before (Phil) Robertson issued these disgusting immoral words, I knew what 'picking ducks' meant. My Mama had told me a story that illustrated what a nasty task this was.

Chickens, ducks, and other birds have to be picked of their feathers before they are eaten. This is not an easy task. I have picked chickens and that's enough for me. The big feathers you see are the easy part. The real work begins when you remove the pin feathers. They are the tiny new feathers just breaking through the skin. You can torch them with a brûlée torch, use hot wax, or just pull them out with pliers one by one.

Ducks are especially hard to pluck because of the number of pin feathers. Once the larger feathers are removed, the duck is basically covered with down. Those are the pin feathers you have to get rid of. They are endless. The story my Mama told me involved a lot of these elements.

The first thing you need to realize when reading this is that my Grandmama didn't cuss. She wasn't a goody-two-shoes, but cussing was just not in her repertoire. I never heard her cuss and none of the relatives I grew up with had either. That made it all the more remarkable when she did.

One summer, my Mama, her sister, and my Grandmama were on the back stoop of the house picking chickens. Of course they gossiped the entire time and it was not such an unpleasant task. They had finished picking the chickens, and were beginning to clean up the area.

My uncle appeared at this moment and dumped 6 ducks he had killed on the back stoop. The three women just looked at a pile of hours that had been added to their day.

This is when my Grandmama uttered her immortal words. She looked at that pile of ducks for a looooong time. Then she said "I'll be shot with shit and killed for stinking." The other women were now in complete shock after hearing her speak.

So 'picking ducks' was a bad enough task that my Grandmama cussed about it. That's what Robertson meant. Marry the girls young before they realize what a nasty task it is. They'll be more pliable about doing it and a lot of other things.

Since Robertson has added 'pedophile' to his resume' alongside 'racist' and 'homophobe', it's safe to say that this culture war is on for 2014.  So with that, let's all get ready to welcome the Fucked-Up Dynasty crew to Houston this spring.

Stars from the hit A&E reality television show "Duck Dynasty" are coming to the Bayou City in March.

Northland Christian School is bringing the famous family to Houston for a special event called "Dynasty Forever." It will be hosted at Champion Forest Baptist Church.

The main event will feature testimonies from Willie and Alan Robertson. They will be joined by Willie’s wife Korie, their teenagers Sadie and John Luke, and Alan’s wife, Lisa. All six family members will take part in a Q&A session led by event emcee Mark Lanier of the Lanier Law Firm.

The event is scheduled for March 22.

I picked this off of Ray Hill's Facebook feed, and he has some choice words for those who may or may not be planning a protest... that will surely gain momentum now.  Hill also has a piece in the Chron with greater elaboration (link to come).

I hope HPD's equestrian brigade gets plenty of rest before spring break.