Faithful readers of this column will remember Petey the Wunder Chicken's first appearance in these pages a little less than a year ago, when he wound up in the stocks at a Renaissance Faire. Since then, Petey has been busy with movie deals, book signings, drug rehab, jail and his well-publicized romance with Paris Hilton. I caught up with him again this last Saturday, when we found ourselves at the same Cinco de Mayo party.
Cinco de Mayo is the annual (the 5th of May comes only once a year, ya know) celebration of the Mexico's defeat of the French back in 1862. The reason people celebrate this north of the border is because …
Erm …
Uh …
Apparently (and this is after exhaustive research) the Mexicans defeated the French by luring them to Tijuana to drink barrel after barrel of tequila. Somebody came up with the idea that they should throw in a couple of lime trees into the mix; the maragarita was born and the French, used to drinking only fine wines from the Bordeaux region, surrendered immediately.
In the U.S., then, we honor the Mexican's courage, sacrifice, stand-up-ness, and ability to use lime trees in armed conflicts. Plus they gave us Latin Pop Star Ricky Martin, whom they also use in armed conflicts. (Note: "Latin Pop Star" is not a term that can be applied to just any Latino or Latina. To qualify, you have to be able to make twenty million dollars just by standing on a stage and gyrating your hips. Thus, Shakira counts, but Ray Romano, who is of Italian descent anyway, doesn't).
This was Petey's view of the whole Cinco de Mayo phenomenon. But keep in mind that he'd had a few too many cervesas by this point, if you know what I mean.
Still, when I asked him how things had been going, he was sober enough to answer.
"So, how have things been going?" I asked.
"Cluck, cluck, BAACAAAAWW!" he said.
"Interesting. I heard you were dating Paris Hilton?" I asked.
At this, Petey seemed to become paranoid. He looked around with his beady, rubber chicken eyes, as if Paris might be lurking behind the tiki bar or under the inflatable palm tree. Then he told me a long, sad tale of woe and desperation that I didn't understand a word of because he was slurring all of his consonants.
I think it involved a poodle and a high-speed car chase, though.
After waxing melodramatic for several minutes, Petey bounced back (he's a rubber chicken, after all) and insisted that we rejoin the party. I was glad to see that Petey was getting along in the world. Rubber chickens often have a hard time of it. Most are doomed to being cheap props in Monty Python movies, degraded by slapstick humor in stand-up comedy routines, or accidentally cooked for supper (grilled rubber chicken is toxic; I can't recommend it).
Petey began hitting on all the single girls and the last I saw him that night, he was dancing around the living room with a lampshade on his head, leading a conga line and lip synching Ricky Martin songs.
Which, you'll have to admit, is pretty impressive, since rubber chickens, like the regular variety, don't have lips.
Petey's adventures can be followed via his publicist's blog at www.goblinbrook.net
