Oh hello there. How was your holiday? Wonderful, glad to hear it. Mine was swell, except for being jarred awake at 5:30 four mornings in a row by a FUCKING ROOSTER CROWING ON MY PARENTS’ PATIO! Just to be clear: My folks do not live on a farm or practice voodoo. Their house is in a pleasant, middle-class neighborhood and is situated on less than an acre of land. So how did they end up with a year-old domesticated fowl? I’ll tell you…

My mother is kind and selfless to a fault and decided saving an aging, prize-winning hen from the slaughter was worth the entire neighborhood’s sanity. Some time later the little lady laid some eggs, a few chicks hatched, opossums ate two of them a week later, and Mom just couldn’t part with the sole surviving birdie.

My little sister thought it was a girl and named the thing Chiquita Banana for whatever ridiculous reason. Unfortunately, a few months later, throbbing red wattles and a big ol’ cock-dick emerged from those purdy yellow feathers. Now the little fuckface spends his days eating, shitting (like mountains of it), “protecting” the hen, and cock-a-doodle-dooing his goddamn head off every sunrise and sunset. The neighbors have asked my parents to do something about it, but my dad is the type of guy who, when I was a baby, saved my dirty diapers for a week so he could stack them at the very top of the garbage can as a penance for the trash collectors who missed ONE pickup. In other words, he hates the thing too but would rather be responsible for a perpetual frown across Mrs. Demico’s fat, nosy face than get a good night’s sleep.

The last day I was home, I heard the first inklings of the cockerel’s morning throat-clearing routine and completely lost it. I ran into the kitchen, grabbed the biggest butcher knife I could find, and stormed outside to give a whole new meaning to red dawn. I chased the thing for a good 15 minutes to no avail and eventually tried to go back to bed. I faintly remember dreaming about plucking the feathers off its lifeless corpse, cramming it full of some kind of stuffing, throwing it in the oven, and eating the entire thing in one sitting. That bastard is very lucky I’m not shitting him out at this very instant. Another day of it and I would’ve found my dad’s gun.

So, what is the moral of this holiday tale? In Florida you can Baker Act people you suspect of being mentally unsound, and, as much as I love my parents, I’m seriously thinking of getting them thrown in the bin for a few days. So, guys, if you happen to read this, please get rid of that fucking thing before the men in white come and whisk you away to crazytown.

ROCCO CASTORO