It all started with a campaign by owls to secure extended rights for night workers, including enhanced rates of pay, regular meal breaks and assurances that they would not be penalized for refusing to work overtime. Some employers tried to get owls in trouble in certain parts of country. They did this by contacting their local branches of Health and Safety Department and complaining about owls' unsavoury habit of regurgitating their food where it could be likely to cause contamination. But after a long court battle owls won on a technicality.

Union activity has become increasingly important for birds. A landmark ruling has seen a Bill of Rights for chickens and turkeys become law in England and Wales. This will ensure enforcement of

1) The right to be anaesthetised (or preferably deceased) when plucked and 2) The right to be cooked at correct temperature as well as more controversial 3) Right not to be covered in grease and sold in truckers' cafés.

Pigeons have been keen union activists for a long time. Six years ago they broke away from birds' Musicians Union claiming that other birds (and approximately 90% of humans) were discriminating against them. Things came to a head after a series of complaints about pigeons' monotonous calls (we are not allowed to refer to these calls as birdsong as this has been outlawed under an adaptation of human "Trades Descriptions Act"). Larks and warblers and others calling themselves "proper" songbirds managed to put together a large petition calling into question pigeons' status as musicians and insisting that their rights and privileges be renegotiated. The "proper" songbirds described pigeons' calls as "nothing more than cheap and repetitive sampling which contributes nothing to music industry . . ."

Seagulls are being seen in greater numbers these days in some of our more inland towns and cities. This is because, due to dramatic fall in fish stocks in North Sea, many seagulls have been decommissioned. The gulls who have remained in industry have found their activities severely curtailed. A major contributory factor to gulls' problems has been unfair competition from human fishing "trawlers" which are equipped to handle vast quantities of raw fish. A spokesman for Seabird Federation said:

"We have passed point of no return. Young birds have seen problems their parents have had to face. They have decided not to go into fishing. It's very sad. They just spend all day walking round town centres eating out of discarded fish and chip wrappers. . ."

Firstly I decide to confine my researches to three types of fan:

i) Electric fans ii) Cricket and/or football fans (depending on which one is in season at time) and iii) Hand held fans i.e. Of kind which is fluttered by demure young ladies in period dramas

Secondly there was a need to be able to grade various kinds of shit according to size, weight, malleability and viscosity. This required use of expensive scientific instruments and so I equipped myself with -

electronic scales, a pestle and mortar, an engineer's measure, a sieve, packet of rubber gloves shower cap and safety glasses (call me a fashion victim if you like. It's my choice.)

I set up a standard desktop fan (this one had a safety grille which, although removable, I chose to leave on for purposes of experiment). I then ate six cans of a discount brand of baked beans and sat down to watch some old Boris Karloff movies. The horror films had desired effect and within ten minutes I was shitting myself with fear (OK so I'm a scaredy cat too, so what?). Shortly thereafter I was busy gathering what we shall term "material" in readiness for experiment numero uno.

The fan was switched onto its highest setting (moderate breeze or number one on Beaufort scale for any budding meteorologists reading this). I rolled first turd* and verified its weight as 200 grammes or about half a pound if you are still using NASA units of measurement. I then fired missile from a distance of ten feet using a modified crossbow (patent pending) designed by yours truly (talented or what?). The "chocolate cannonball" hit fan absolutely dead centre. Approximately twenty percent of its mass clung to outside of safety grille. Eighty percent reached blades.

And a staggering one hundred percent was flung off into office where tests were being conducted. I apologised to executives in immediate vicinity and retired for a shower.