Mike is alive and well, and everywhere

THROUGHOUT my life, it’s been my head that has been giving me a rough time.

At first, before I even got to school, it was too big and I kept bumping it, causing bumps and knobs and booboos. Also, because of its size, I acquired the unfortunate nickname of “Spyker”, because a nail has a big head and a thin body.

But it didn’t end there. When I was at school, the thick tuft of fur on top of this lump would often misbehave, no matter how much I brushed it, making me look “uncool”. Later, after I discovered Brylcreem and a swirlkous, the fur started greying; very soon thereafter, the grey strands started dropping off onto the shower floor … making me uncool again!

But the fur patch was the least of my worries. I had to contend with acne, headaches, toothaches, earaches, eye-strain, and ingrown beard hairs. Don’t get me started on ear and nostril hairs and dry, chapped lips … 

Oh, here’s a free tip: If you want a remedy to stop that dry feeling on your lips, stop licking them. Saliva contains enzymes that help break down food, and those enzymes can irritate the thin skin on your lips, so when it evaporates, it takes the natural moisture with it.

But chapped lips, by the way, don't come close to my current “head woes”, and here I mean the puffy eyes and these darned wrinkles that seem to have come out of nowhere!

Sigh … What a problem this head has been!

I wonder if I would have been happier without it. After all, Mike was perfectly fine minus his head.

If you haven’t heard of Mike, Wednesday, September 10 marked the 80th anniversary of Mike’s beheading, which occurred back in 1945. After his decapitation, Mike lived on until March 17, 1947, earning his owner, Lloyd Olsen, the equivalent of R1,102,500 a month during this time.

Mike, better known as Mike the Headless Chicken, survived his beheading because Olsen’s swinging axe left most of his brain stem intact, and a blood clot prevented him from bleeding out. He simply got up, darted around for a while, and then continued on with his life. He wasn’t beautiful, but he was functional.

Olsen would feed him with an eyedropper and syringe.

Mike’s story helped me make sense of a few things. For instance, I now understand how organisations produce forms where the box for your initials is the same size as the one for your e-mail address. Clearly, a Mike Head was behind that.

It also makes sense how people can walk into a neighbourhood, open up neatly closed garbage bags, rummage through them, and leave rubbish strewn in the street, and why others drop wrappers, take-out boxes, and bottles in the street … They’ve got Mike Heads.

I’ll bet they don’t even get migraines, too, the lucky devils!

So, if ever you feel tempted to ask why someone is acting like a buffoon, just think of the rooster who became Mike, the Headless Chicken.

Yes, I know you’re wondering, and the answer is that Mike died after choking on a corn kernel while he was on tour in Phoenix, Arizona. Apparently, Olsen couldn’t help Mike, as the farmer had left his “headless chicken kit” at the sideshow they’d attended that day.

Just goes to show that my grandma was right when she said, “Lelik is niks, maar DOM …”