I thought that one of the craziest decisions that  I ever made was to procure my horse Fabio, a retired and compromised polo champion as  I like to remind people.  At one time this horse was quite the athlete and at 26 years of age, he remains the Jack Lalanne of  horses. After Fabio became part of the family, my head count for caretaking became  two female adolescent humans, five unsavory cats and one high-maintenance dog in an 1100 square foot house; and then, came the five chicks.

So who can I blame for this one? Martha of course! Many years ago, Martha Stewart put on the newstands one of her most inspiring editions of Martha Stewart Living Magazine that was all about chickens and heritage poultry and I have never let that fantasy of having a flock of my own dissipate.  So years later while raising two little girls, I made the mistake of sharing my farm-life fantasy with the mini-mees and then it began: “Mommy, when can we get chicks, you said legally, we are allowed 5 hens in the City of Los Angeles.” Their father is a lawyer. Over and over and over I was reminded. At this point, I realized, I’m sunk. Being a 21st Century mother, which entails blocking every possible disappointment that I can for my offspring in order to mitigate the costs of future psychologist’s office visits when they are adults, I ordered 5 chicks from MyPetChicken.com.  So if you too are being drawn in by this backyard chicken phenomenon as I was, you will enjoy one of the funniest and most well-written articles on this subject by Susan Orlean:   http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/28/090928fa_fact_orlean

I was very happy with the selection, service, helpfulness and knowledge  at My Pet Chicken and highly recommend this site to order chicks: http://www.mypetchicken.com/