Morgan Delaney

Dark, strange and fantastic fiction

The Plenum

10 Superstitions About Chicken Feet From Around The World

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Sketch of chicken feet
Photo from Depositphotos

Welcome!

I’ve written 12,817 of the 50,000 words I need to complete NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month. Actually NoWriMo for non-Americans, as the “National” refers to the US), and I’ll be going in again as soon as I finish this newsletter.
So let’s quickly answer that question you want to ask me.
“Have you any tips for me about how to not sound like a tourist when I visit Georgia. My Georgian is not as good as I’d like it to be!”
Absolutely! To sound like a Georgian, you just have to learn the word “ara” and say it as much as you can. It’s written არა, and means “no”.

Everybody says it here all the time. I have seen Georgians walk up to other Georgians on the street and start a conversations with “Ara…”

And you can find out more about other cultures in this week’s Main Feature!

Enjoy!

Killer List: 10 Superstitions About Chicken Feet From Around The World

  1. Wearing a necklace of chicken feet around your neck will prevent a wrinkly neck in Malaysia.
  2. Hanging a chicken foot from your assault rifle in Florida is the best way to “own the Libs,” as they all now identify as animals according to a very reliable source on social media.
  3. If a chicken walks through wet concrete, then walking over the imprints of its feet will make you impotent in Australia.
  4. The best way to get rid of a banshee is to summon it by poisoning a family member until they are on the brink of death, then leave a sackful of chicken feet on your neighbour’s property to lure them away (Ireland).
  5. In Antarctica, chicken feet are left outside throughout the day, then licked as a savoury dessert in the evenings. However, licking all three “toes” in one go is said to cause blindness.
  6. Chicken feet are regarded as the ultimate sign of the devil in Italy, as three feet can be overlaid in such a way as to create an inverted pentagram.
    During the height of the wave of kidnappings in the 1970s, some people even resorted to wearing t-shirts printed with chicken feet to scare away superstitious members of the Mafia.
  7. Children in Canada bury chicken feet between Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve, from which, they believe, the following year’s Christmas tree will grow.
  8. In Haiti, dead bodies are buried with chicken feet mixed into the earth of the grave to protect against witch doctors who might seek to turn the deceased into their zombies. The feet are believed to latch onto the fingers of grave robbers in an unbreakable grip, allowing the family to identify the witch doctor and demand the spell be broken.
  9. A chicken foot with a middle toe which has curled into a circle is said to bring a long life in Nepal.
  10. In 17th-century England, it was claimed that if a woman swallowed a whole chicken foot before intercourse, it would improve fertility and guarantee a boy.
    In 21st-century England, it is said that if a man inserts a whole chicken foot into himself before intercourse, it will somehow increase his pleasure.

What I Discovered This Week

Read!
I finished Hydra, the second book in Matt Wesolowski’s Six Stories series. The series is about a true-crime podcast, raking up old murders and trying to get a better idea of what really happened by piecing together the stories of six of the people involved. It’s very well-written and hard to put down if you’re in the mood for a true-crime style mystery.

Read!
I also finished re-reading Dorothy L. Sayers’ Whose Body? which is 99 years old this year, and still great fun. If you don’t know it, it’s like if Bertie Wooster was pretending to be Sherlock Holmes. FREE via Project Gutenberg.

Listen!
Find of the week has to be this band with a very rude name, and weird music video. This is exactly what I like: a band playing music like nothing I’ve ever heard before, but it just sounds right.
Erm, if you want more from them, then use the links under the video. Depending on your search engine settings you might get difficult to explain search results if you just type the band name in and hit “search”

#askthemanwhofoundoutthehardway

(Excerpted from my newsletter dated 05th November, 2022. Sign up for the full, up-to-date experience!)

10 Street Accidents You Don’t Need To Worry About Any More

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Photo by Library of Congress on Unsplash

We’ve had a grim couple of years, what with Boris Johnson’s ongoing Billy Bunter impression, then Covid, followed by Putain’s bloody, bungled war.

But things aren’t all bad.

And I can prove it with this week’s Killer List: 10 kinds of accident, once common, now practically extinct!

In chronological order!

(And a special offer at the bottom of the post.)

Enjoy!

1. (11th century, England) Rioting caused by gallant knights.

The knights’ paths have crossed in the middle of the village’s main thoroughfare (there is only one thoroughfare, so it is the main one). They are now stuck, as neither will move first, as both wish to prove that they are more gallant than the other.

The village’s peasants are unconstrained by the knight’s code and after several days of this mediaeval gridlock, they are also starving and dozens die in the ensuing riot.

(The knights have snacks in their saddle-bags.)

Once the riff-raff are dead, the king commissions a statue to the “perfect knights.”

2. (late 13th century, England) Being miraculously cured of leprosy by a travelling monk then dying of peritonitis, knocking over a display of oranges as you fall, because it was your appendix and not your leprosy you required help with. (There’s a reason some of these monks are forced to travel. Always ask to see references.)

3. (14th century, Europe) Getting into a fender-bender when the cart in front of you suddenly stops to watch a barrow of mostly dead bodies be dumped into a plague pit at the side of the road.

4. (15th century, Europe) Being crushed to death by a maddened horse fleeing the foul odour of its rider. The rider believes that a good stench keeps the demons of ill-health away, and the horse can no longer bear the thought of having the filthy, stinking man sitting on its back.

5. (16th century, England) Being brained by a loaded bedpan on a frosty morning as it slips out of the emptier’s hand onto your head as you pass underneath the window they are attempting to empty it from.

6. (16th century, France) Being burnt alive as you attempt to walk home from the pub. The court jester was trying out some edgy political stuff for his routine for which the king set him on fire. The fire quickly spread, destroying the entire village.

7. (Early 17th century, Germany) Sudden death caused by spontaneous lynching when you are overheard on a street corner musing whether to “poppe over to gette some Milke”, having forgotten that it is a Sunday. Only witches buy milk on a Sunday.

Milk from the Devil’s bottom, probably.

8. (17th century, America) Whistling and then being stoned to death for having “lippes possess’d bye Thee Deville”.

9. (18th century, Europe) A massive traffic pile-up caused by a gust of wind which blows the white face powder worn by fashionable lords and ladies across the street, blinding everyone.

10. (late 19th century, America) Your train being derailed because a moustache-twirling scoundrel has tied a lady to the tracks to convince her she should marry him.

(The thinking behind this type of situation still exists, but everyone has beards these days*. They are harder to twirl.)

Paul Tremblay’s Disappearance at Devil’s Rock is available for $1.99 for a limited time only, so grab it quickly!

I’ve included the link to HarperCollins, you can navigate to your preferred ebook store from the links down the right-hand side of the page there.

(I went to Kobo and grabbed Jonathan Sims Thirteen Storeys for $2.99 and Ryan Leslie’s The Between for $0.99 while I was there.)

*Everyone has beards?

That’s right.

We’re pretty sure that’s not true.

I said “everyone” and I meant everyone. You have beards.

That’s true. A repellent sound like young chickens being softly plucked can be heard as thickly curled beards are fingered covetously. But you don’t—

Look! A single-origin Latte Crappacini!

Where? Where?

10 Ways a Leprechaun Will Kill You

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An upside down photo of a woman walking through a very green field
Photo by Matthew Henry on Unsplash

Move with the times, they said. Be more modern, they said. So I did. I am. This week’s post is a list. The internet loves lists!

You’ve messed up the picture, though. Or is that “modern,” too?

It’s upside-down on purpose. To make things seem weird and unsettling.

Do you think I’m going to turn my computer upside down, just so I can look at the picture the right way up?

Well. Just the monitor, perhaps?

Yeah, right!

You could read it on your phone with auto-rotate turned off. But it’s supposed to be upside down.

Read it on my phone? How the hell should I read it on my phone? Do phones have pictures over where you are? Over there in, in, in… in the future? Is it on the telly with the Jetsons you live, is it? Ha!

*Morgan turns to you and winks* Sounds like I’m not the only one who needs to move with the times, eh, reader?

1. Leprechauns are small, but heavy (leprechauns are small because they are heavy). Avoid passing under trees where a leprechaun might be intending to jump onto your back. Leprechauns are really heavy.


2. If you do catch a leprechaun, let him go as quickly as possible. They are radioactive.


3. Do not offer to dance with a leprechaun. Leprechauns love to dance. They will continue to do so, long after you have expired from exhaustion, twirling your battered body until your soul seeps out through the cuts in your skin. The leprechaun will then use it to form a piece of his gold.


4. Never date a leprechaun’s sister, never whistle at a leprechaun’s dog, never cross the road in front of a leprechaun. According to their code of honour, these things are punishable by death. The last thing you see will be a leprechaun sitting on your chest, crushing the life out of you. (Leprechauns are heavy.)


5. Leprechauns are composed of iron. Avoid carrying powerful magnets in densely populated areas.


6. Never use a leprechaun’s gold to bribe a banshee: it’s a con. They are all in it together, and you will only draw attention to yourself.


7. Avoid swimming after a leprechaun has been in the water: they leak and are noxious to humans.


8. Never touch a leprechaun’s hat. Like dogs, leprechauns seldom look up, so he will bite first and ask questions later.


9. Never enter a rainbow. Although they look pretty, you don’t know where it’s been, or who was in it last. Ask the leprechaun to move the pot of gold out of the rainbow before touching it.


10. Do not make love to a leprechaun. Their idea of love differs drastically from yours. (And if it doesn’t: they are very heavy.)

Forces

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Painting of two ladies whispering beside a sleeping man
Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash

To introduce this week’s flash fiction, I’m going to paraphrase the beloved English poet, Mick Jagger:

You can’t always get what you want, but sometimes you get what you deserve.

What (the hell) am I talking about?

Read on!

It came from the girl. The pull was irresistible. She shifted position in her cage, and the chains she wore for market auction clinked.

Kat pressed up to the cage’s bars and stared, drinking in the lank hair, the dusty face and worn clothing of a labourer. The girl’s mouth moved, as if reciting something.

This was the first time Kat would buy servants for her family’s household. It was her present on her 16th birthday, she could by whoever she wanted.

More than anything, she wanted this girl. The handler opened the bidding at 100, half what Kat had, and she needed to buy half a dozen servants. Then the handler, with a quick look over his shoulder, corrected himself: 20. She waited, made herself wait, for the handler to start cajoling. When he was almost pleading, she lifted her purse. He pointed, confirming the offer. The girl’s eyes were on her, her mouth moved. The need pouring off the girl was magnetic. She’d likely not last long. She was barely 10 or maybe 12 under the dirt, but she was her present. Sweat coated her nervous hands when the handler released the girl. Kat took her with her as she bid on the other servants they needed: a man for outside, two girls for the kitchen, a woman for laundry, and a boy to serve her father, who hated that women so outnumbered him in his own home. The girl would be Kat’s servant once she’d find out how to stop the girl’s move mouth moving. The girl stood respectfully behind Kat. The breath from her mouth made Kat uncomfortable.

Her family remarked on the similarity between the servants Kat had bought, and congratulated her, like she had displayed great judgement in purchasing a matching set. And there was something forceful about them. They would last a long time.

If only they’d stop whispering.

See you next wee—

You’e back to the weird stories again, are you?

You found it weird?

We found you weird!

Thank you! That’s probably because you’re normal.

That wasn’t a compliment.

Correct! See you next week.

(Both parties exit the stage, muttering under their breath)

Corruption

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A piece of sacking
Photo by Alona Po on Unsplash

I don’t even remember writing this one, that’s the great thing about writing every day (it probably helps that I write them first thing in the morning, when I’m not always properly awake—)

Yes, well, that certainly helps explain things!

BUTANYWAYSHUTYOURFACE! and I hope you enjoy it!

The last delivery of the day, and his favourite. But when he dropped the bag of corn outside the chicken coop and knocked on the door for Mrs Byrne, she had no kisses or tender words for him. She was in a right state.

The thing was, he liked their little arrangement, how they went back to their families afterwards. She hadn’t said that with her husband dead, she’d expect him to marry her. But you couldn’t run a farm without a man. Even the chickens would get uppity, if there was no man about.

And here he was, carrying the man of the house over his shoulder to his cart.

He had enough sacking to cover it, and he ki-yahed the horses until he got to the river. He let them graze along the banks. The back of the cemetery lay through the trees on the other side. He was lucky. There was nobody else there, though it was a popular spot on nice evenings like this. He wouldn’t even need to think up an excuse to tell his wife. She knew he came back late on Fridays. He was just missing out on Mrs Byrne’s affections. Oh well, nothing came for free.

He flipped back an edge of sacking. Mr Byrne’s face was bruised and blood caked his lips. She’d really given it to him this time. Poor bugger, he’d never known how to handle his wife. Not the way she liked.

He hefted the body over his shoulder. Once he had dropped it over the wall into the cemetery, it would no longer be his problem, the priest would have to take care of it. He’d hide it under the coffin next time someone was being buried, same as usual. There was sometimes such a stink with so many bodies in one hole!

He decided to stop off at Mrs Byrne’s place on the way home. She might need some comforting. He certainly did. And he could stay as long as he liked, now that there was no chance of her husband coming in and finding them.

Her lights were off. That was no good. She should keep up the pretence that everything was normal until her husband was found. That was the way things were done. He tripped over Mr Byrne’s boots in the dark hallway.

“Annette?” he called. She was crying in the bedroom, snuffling. He made his way towards the sound. There she was, wrapped up in her blanket in the dark. “All taken care of,” he said.

The priest threw back the covers, and whanged his head with a shovel.

He woke when his body dropped into the narrow hole, landing on something soft: Mr Byrne. He turned and opened his mouth to ask for help. The priest threw a handful of dirt into it, choking him. Annette started shovelling dirt while the priest put his arm around her. It looked like he knew how to handle her.

Lying

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Yellow corn stalks against the sky
Photo by Kristen Colada Adams on Unsplash

I mentioned The Yellow Wallpaper in my latest newsletter. It’s easy to see the influence of it on this story. Still, at least we’re out in the fresh air. Enjoy!

No roads, just yellow stalks waving around me. The trail peters out after a few meters. The field closes up around me. Crickets rub their legs at the base of the corn.


I follow the sun because there are no other features. The field goes on and on, nothing to aim for. Then I realise the sun moves. I think I’m heading north. North is cooler than South, and the sun has baked the sweat out of my skin, and made my clothes itchy. I duck down and tunnel through the corn to get away from it. Crickets rub their legs around me.
I know I’m hallucinating when a chicken darts in front of me. Getting hungry, I suppose. I want to chase it but I need to keep to my path. There’s a system in the field. It’s not obvious, but I need to go left around this next corn and right around the one after that. I need to stay on my path. I wonder if the chicken is doing the same. The thought blows my mind. I get back on my knees and crawl. Right around the next stalk, twice anti-clockwise around the next, and left around the one after that. Got to stay on course.


I love it down here. I can barely see the sky. Crickets rub their legs above me.


The way. Is the goal.
That keeps going around my head. The field goes on forever.
I’ve seen more chickens. I saw a rabbit. There are mice, too. I ate one. Ha ha! I’m not chasing mice, I’m not crazy! It was dead already.


The crickets rub their legs. Night is drawing in. Cold. I keep going. Forward. And down. I pull up the dry earth. It’s soft and warm. The field goes on forever in front and behind. But if I go straight down? It’s hard. The roots are thick and it’s hard to tell if I’m on course. But the way is the goal.
I can’t hear the crickets, just the patter of loose soil spilling over me as I head into the ground. Away from the sun, away from the field. It’s nighttime and I’m ready to rest.


Violet is a mile from town when she finally gets reception on her phone. She calls the garage. She calls the police, David has been gone so long. Their car broke down near a cornfield. He said there was someone in it. He got out of the car. The figure ducked down. Then David ducked down.
They find the field with their car beside it. The farmer gives permission to search, but there’s no sign of David. No sign of anyone. She stands at the roadside.


The car has been repaired, and the crickets rub their legs. She hopes against hope that David will come back. She gets in the car.
Wait.
There!
Someone is in the field, waving. She gets out of the car.

That wasn’t too bad, actually.

Oh, thanks!

Yes, we were surprised.

Hrmph. Thanks.

Just one thing, though. What was wrong with the car?

I don’t know…the carburettor?

What was wrong with it?

It was…empty?

You haven’t a clue, do you?

It’s not about the car!

If you respected your readers you’d have researched that, though.

I did. A little yellow light came on and they kept going instead of taking it to the garage, which they should have done.

Was it the oil light?

No, it was the engine check light. And if they’d taken it to the garage they’d have found out it was error code P0217 signalling an Engine Over Temperature fault.

So they were driving a Suzuki, were they?

That’s right. And I’ve established that it was a hot day in the story so they really shouldn’t have been driving with a fault like that.

Well, they didn’t know, did they?

No.

A lot of people don’t understand enough about cars. They’ll drive them, of course!

Yes.

And this mechanic in the middle of nowhere just happened to have the spare parts for a Suzuki handy, did he?

No. But it was only a small coolant leak. He patched that up, topped it up and that did the trick. Violet will have to take it to an authorised Suzuki dealer when she gets home, of course.

Of course. Good story!

Thanks!