Many people out there would probably agree to the premise that you don’t kill anything unless you intend to eat it. Certainly never for fun. Mrs J never killed for fun in her life, but she can’t claim to be unable to hurt a fly. She hurts flies. Slugs. Wasps, too. And before you get any unpleasant ideas, it’s not to eat them, either.

Today she killed a snake. In self-defense.

Well, in defense of a cat. But that’s almost the same.

She certainly didn’t enjoy it. She screamed through the whole thing. She had to have a lie down afterwards. There are definitely no pictures.

But being capable of self-and-cat-defense doesn’t mean that she wouldn’t be in grave danger of starving to death on a deserted island populated by an army of chickens. There is just no way she’d ever hurt a chicken.

Mrs J is able to fish for food, but that’s definitely where it ends. Provided with a fishing pole she might still have a shot on that deserted island. Let’s hear it for sushi!

Human beings have eaten meat for quite a while. This is at least a facet of the historical survival of the human race. It may not be a biological necessity, but then again neither is shampoo.

Mrs J doesn’t have a problem with carnivores. Or vegetarians, for that matter.

But she might be a meat-eating-hypocrite.

Let’s face it, most of us don’t live on deserted islands. Most of us never come close to having to hunt for food. When Mrs J goes to the supermarket she doesn’t think of buying cuts of chicken or any other meat as any different to buying vegetables or fruit. Mrs J would wager she’s not the only one who’s totally in denial.

Maybe one day she’ll have to face up to the fact that chicken doesn’t grow on trees and that there is no such thing as a beef bush. And that chances are good she would never eat meat or chicken again if she had to do what’s necessary to produce those cuts of meat herself.