Sunday, July 09, 2006

The Happy Dirty Ducks get a Bath

Once upon a time, there were four eggs. Those eggs were sitting in an incubator in a big hatchery.

After sitting in the hot, humid incubator for a long time, the eggs started to rock and peep. They would rock and rock, then they would stop for a while because they were tired.

But soon, they were rocking again. The little eggs started to crack. Then, a little beak appeared on one egg. There was a bump on the top of the beak. This is called the egg tooth, and it helps the little duckling get out of his egg.

Little beaks appeared on the other eggs, too. They rocked and struggled and struggled and rocked and went peep! peep! peep!

Finally, the little ducklings broke out of their eggs and flopped down on the wire screen of the incubator. The little yellow ducklings were wet and exhausted.

After a little while, they dried out. Then, a huge monster grabbed them and put them into a dark box with a bunch of other ducks.

They rode for a long, long time, until finally, another monster opened the top of the box and put them all into a big tub at the farm store.

In that big tub, they ate and drank, but couldn't swim in the water. They wanted to swim, but the best they could do is get water all over the place. The dirty ducks worked really hard to get water all over the place. When the silly monsters took out all their nice, soggy wood chips and put in yucky dry ones, the dirty little ducks pooped oin them and splashed more water.

Soon, mean farmer Ray came by with his three boys. The three boys said "Hey Dad! I want a duckling!"

Mean farmer Ray said "Sure! Peking ducks make really good duck a l'orange."

So the four dirty little ducks were stuffed into another dark box for a long, long time.

Then mean farmer Ray opened up the box and put the ducks into a little red tub. He had the same yucky dry wood chips on the floor, and a big warm bright lamp.

But the little ducks grew, and got too big for the tub.

So, mean farmer Ray put them in a big gray tub. It had more of the yucky dry wood chips in it. The dirty little ducks tried and tried to splash water on the dry wood shavings, but mean farmer Ray had put the duck waterer in a bowl on a strainer, so the dirty little ducks couldn't do much more than splash water into the bottom of the bowl, where they couldn't get at it.

Mean farmer Ray had to keep filling the duck waterer. He would fill it, and the dirty little ducks would splash it all into the dish, then be out of water. After a while, they would start to complain. When mean farmer Ray talked to them, they started peeping excitedly because they were sure that he was going to give them more water to splash and maybe even drink.

But most of it still ended up in the bottom of the dish.

Then the ducks got bigger and stronger, so they could splash the water farther. They also ate more food and made more poop. Soon, mean farmer Ray was putting down new wood shavings every day.

Then, it got a little warmer outside. Mean farmer Ray took some ducks outside to see if they liked it. Mean farmer Ray wants the ducks to be happy because happy ducks make better duck a l'orange.

The dirty little ducks followed mean farmer Ray because they didn't know what else to do. They followed him right into the hen house, complaining all the way. This upset the whole hen house. Buck buck buckACK! the hens yelled.

Finally, mean farmer Ray gathered the chickens' eggs and lead the dirty little ducks back to the house. He put them back in their soggy little tub, and gave them food and water. This made them happy. Happy ducks make better duck a l'orange.

Later, mean farmer Ray dug a hole in the rabbit pen and put the top of his boys' plastic sandbox in the hole. He filled the hole up with water. Then, he got the dirty little ducks and put them in the pen.

As soon as one of them saw the water, they all ran to it as fast as they could. They hopped into the cold water and went peep! peep! peep!

But these were happy peeps.

Mean farmer Ray wanted to make sure the ducks could get out of the water, so he chased them. They complained at him and got out. But, when he walked away, the ducks went back to the water. They didn't even bother with the dish of food that mean farmer Ray had left for them.

"These dirty little ducks are happy," said mean farmer Ray. "That is good, because they'll make better duck a l'orange when they're happy."

1 Comments:

Blogger Melanie Rimmer said...

Love the stories. When my rugrats wake up I'll read them to them (it's 10:33pm here) and see what they think. I'll have to explain what duck a l'orange is though.

4:38 PM  

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