It’s days like these that make being a vegetarian worthwhile.
You know – days of reports of diseased livestock from around the world.
There’s a cow in British Columbia with Mad Cow disease and there’re confirmed cases of Bird Flu in Ghana.
The CFIA maintains that no part of the diseased dairy cow entered human food or animal feed chain.
Apparently milk from cattle with Mad Cow is considered safe by WHO – I don’t know much about communicable deadly diseases of the nervous system but I doubt anyone will voluntarily want to drink milk (albeit pasteurized) from a cow with Mad Cow disease.
I’ve unsuccessfully tried to give up diary for almost a year now. I switched to almond milk which is great but the milk alternative in coffee shops is soy (which I abhor) so I end up drinking milk, almond milk ice cream tastes like some kid’s experiment and I don’t even want to try faux cheese.
Headlines from Ghana this morning was about the discovery of the bird flu virus. The first thing that came to mind was my mother’s chickens. My mother raises free-run chicken in her backyard – if you hear her talk about them you’d think she’s the crazy chicken lady. She raises them for personal consumption but lately I think she consumes them less and thinks of them more as pets, which is scary but we indulge her.
I’ve had hour long conversations with my mom about her chickens; there was the time when she needed “an innovative design†for a bigger coop. A couple of months back the chickens started to act out because of the long harmattan weather. The chickens don’t like leftover microwave popcorn kernels. I’m not making these things up.
There’s one chicken (I think the oldest) that misses her so much when she travels that it sulks when she gets back. Speaking of travel, my mother is possibly the only person who has somehow managed to sneak eggs past US customs (please don’t ask why she travels with eggs – she believes her hens lay the best eggs ever!) but of course no one touches them because we find the deep yellow hue unnatural. Ironic isn’t it?
I sent my mom a message this morning and the chickens are ok.
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