Cleaning Chickens

"Late again," the third-grade teacher said to little Sammy.

"It's not my fault, Miss Crabtree. You can blame this on my Dad. The
reason I'm three hours late is because my Dad sleeps naked."

Now Miss Crabtree had taught grammar school for thirty-some years.
She asked little Sammy what he meant, despite her mounting fears.

Full of grins and mischief, and in the flower of his youth, little Sammy
and trouble were old friends, but he always told the truth.

"Miss Crabtree, at the ranch we have a coyote. The
past few nights it ate hens and killed Mom's best milk goat.
Last night, when Dad heard a noise out in the chicken pen,
he grabbed his gun and said to Mom,
"That coyote's back and I'm going to get him!"

"Stay back, he yelled to all us kids!"

He was naked as a jaybird, no boots, no pants, no shirt!

He crawled right up and stuck that double barrel through
the window of the coop. As he stared into the darkness
with the coyote on his mind, our old hound dog, Zeke,
woke up and snuck up behind Daddy.

Then we all looked on helpless as old Zeke stuck that cold nose in Dad's crack!

"Miss Crabtree, we been cleaning chickens since three this morning!"