This Is Probably Like Giving My Thin Inner-Elbow Blood To A Vampire...

Tuesday morning, I had a couple of hours to kill before my optometrist appointment, so I put a dozen eggs on to boil. I like having a carton of them ready to go. Quick breakfast, or 1/7 of a 7-layer salad, or a component of tuna or chicken salad.

I can't boil the eggs from our very own yard chickens. Well. Nothing physically prevents it. But the peeling of the boiled home-eggs dissuades me. The fresher the egg, the harder to peel. So I bought these at Save A Lot on Monday. I always open the carton to make sure I'm not buying broken eggs. They checked out, so I put them on the bottom shelf of Frig II when I got home.

As I was putting those 12 eggs into the water in my large copper-bottom pot for boiling, the next-to-next-to-last one was stuck. You know what that means. There was a crack in it, and its albumin had leaked out. I pried it loose. It still looked okay, so I put it in the water with its 11 buddies. Almost immediately, the water developed a foam on top. I skimmed a bunch of it off, but it kept coming back. There was one egg floating at the surface, so I took it out. The foaming stopped. But then started again with a vengeance within a minute. Sweet Gummi Mary! Only Mrs. HM can buy a dozen eggs and get 10.

I found the other bad egg after scooping out more foam, because it had a regular ribbon of egg white flowing from it. You could see the shell expanding like the Earth's crust at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. I put it in a bowl with the other bad egg, planning on a treat for Puppy Jack and Juno later in the day.

That's right. I planned to give my dogs a treat of eggs, while expecting them to leave alone the eggs our chickens lay wherever they feel the urge.

"Pony, take these eggs out to the dogs. That one cracked open with the white bulging out is for Jack, and the whole one is for Juno. It's not cooked much, so don't drop it on the porch. Do you think I should peel Jack's egg so he doesn't eat the shell?"

"Nah. Juno always eats the shell when she gets the eggs out of the yard."

 Probably not the best of ideas, giving Puppy Jack a taste.