Dorothy

I was remembering our time in Central Otago this morning, and started thinking about my friend Dorothy. Dorothy was the best chicken in the world. She turned up on our doorstep one morning, after rambling through an orchard filled with peaches, nectarines, apricots and other goodies...She was the biggest chicken I'd ever laid eyes on. She was a friendly chicken, you could pick her up & give her a pat, she'd sit beside me outside in the sunshine & keep me company when I was home & Shane was at work.

Her visits became more frequent. Each morning we'd get up, go out to the lounge of our dilapidated cottage, and see her silhouette lurking on the other side of the frosted glass front door. We'd open the door, and in she'd waddle, gobbling up the crumbs from our toast. (she was a good chicken & never left a mess of any sort!).

The day before we left town, she came down as usual, came inside, and laid the biggest egg I've ever seen in the corner of the lounge. A special parting gift. We ate it on the beach in Amberley as we camped our way up to the North Island...it was so big it wouldn't even fit in the egg carton, and as yellow as the sun.

Lovely...