![\"Gull](\"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Gull.jpg\")
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News item<\/a>: \u201cDrunk gulls found ‘stinking of alcohol’\u201d<\/p>\n A couple of years ago, inspired by gull-related BBC stories, I wrote two pieces about a Mr. and Mrs. Gull. In the first<\/a> one, I portrayed Mr. Gull as a beer-drinking, curry-loving, amoral, red-necked gull. In the second<\/a> one, he met his demise while playing chicken with a lawnmower. A kittiwake named Kyle subsequently shacked up with Mrs. Gull and helped raise her eggs.<\/p>\n It struck me that the drunk gulls in this latest BBC story might well have been the fruit of Mr. and Mrs. Gull\u2019s loins. (Do birds even have loins?)<\/p>\n Gary Gull (\u201cGazza\u201d to his newly-acquired drinking buddies) was feeling under the weather. Fact is, he was scared of heights and therefore reluctant to fly above<\/em> the weather.<\/p>\n But Gary (I\u2019m not one of his drinking buddies, so I don\u2019t call him \u201cGazza\u201d) was also feeling hungover. He and several other gulls had discovered a skip (dumpster) containing brewery waste and had partaken.<\/p>\n With gusto. (If there\u2019d been pizza available, they would have partaken with that, but gusto was all there was.)<\/p>\n At first, he hadn\u2019t liked the taste of the brewery waste. When he was a teenager he hadn\u2019t liked the taste of his first beer either, but like most teenagers, he\u2019d persisted until he enjoyed it. He therefore assumed that his taste buds would acclimatize to the brewery waste.<\/p>\n And they did. Either that, or they upped and died.<\/p>\n Anyhow, after a bellyful of brewery waste, he was pretty sure he shouldn\u2019t be flying, so he and his buddies set off on the waddle to the landfill. He wasn\u2019t entirely sure what his Mum and stepfather would say when he showed up with five drunken friends, but it\u2019s amazing how brave and uninhibited a gull could be on a skinful.<\/p>\n When they finally reached the oil drum that served as home to the Kittiwake-Gull family, there were approximately one-and-a-half fewer drunkards in tow. Two of their number had got hit by a car on the way, and opportunists that they are, the survivors, who really fancied a kebab, decided that gull pancakes would be a good second best. But their hearts weren\u2019t in it (they\u2019d stuck to the tread of the tires) so they\u2019d picked at the food a little, found they\u2019d lost their appetites, and moved on.<\/p>\n They announced their arrival with singing and belching. Mrs. Gull looked over her pince-bec<\/em> glasses at the silhouettes in the entrance, shook her head and returned to her painting. To those who didn\u2019t know her, the picture looked like a poor attempt at splatter paint art, but her confidantes all knew that since her husband’s demise at the blades of a lawnmower, she had developed an obsession for recreating the death scene\u2014tens of similar paintings adorned the wall of the oil drum.<\/p>\n In the corner (and if you\u2019ve ever spent time inside a topless oil drum, you\u2019ll know there\u2019s only one corner), Gary\u2019s stepfather fumed.<\/p>\n He took his pipe out of his beak, set it on the upturned soup can end table, and surveyed the scene.<\/p>\n \u201cJust like your father,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cNow, now, Kyle,\u201d said Mrs. Gull. You promised you\u2019d never compare Gary to his father. He never met him, and I\u2019m pretty sure drunkenness isn\u2019t passed on in the genes.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHow much did you drink, son?\u201d asked Kyle.<\/p>\n \u201cNothing, I swear!\u201d replied Gary.<\/p>\n In the background, his new buddies, sensing disharmony in the drumhold, were slowly losing their enthusiasm to continue the party chez-Gazza.<\/p>\n \u201cDon\u2019t lie, Gary dear,\u201d clucked Mrs. Gull. \u201cIt\u2019s obvious that you and your\u2026 friends have over-indulged in something alcoholic. And it was the death of your father.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo it wasn\u2019t, Mum! It was a bloody lawnmower that killed him!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLanguage! I won\u2019t have you swearing in front of your mother like that. And yes, while it was a lawnmower that finished him off, it was the booze that got him in front of the lawnmower in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJust tell us how you got in this state, dear,\u201d cooed Mrs. Gull, adding pigeon to the list of birds she could imitate.<\/p>\n \u201cWe found this skip with a bunch of wet barley and hops and stuff on the top. It smelt like beer, but we thought it was just a different kind of muesli.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh Gary, that was brewery waste,\u201d said Kyle. \u201cThat\u2019s what they make beer from.\u201d<\/p>\n Gary turned to his buddies. \u201cDid you know what we were eating?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCourse we did,\u201d said one. \u201cYou don\u2019t think we\u2019d willingly eat muesli otherwise, do ya?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think your friends should leave now,\u201d said Kyle, moving out of the corner and into the light. (Actually it was merely less shadow\u2014gulls aren\u2019t capable of rigging up electric lights.) Despite the silvering of the feather tips, he was still a fearsome sight with his long, rapier-like beak.<\/p>\n \u201cEff me, it\u2019s a kittiwake!\u201d mocked the largest of Gary\u2019s buddies. \u201cCome on then, Grandad, make us leave!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI should warn you that I\u2019m a black collar karate expert,\u201d said Kyle.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s true,\u201d confirmed Mrs. Gull. \u201cYou should go, if you know what\u2019s good for you.\u201d<\/p>\n Kyle moved to the entrance and looked the loudbeak in the eye.<\/p>\n \u201cGo. Now. If you know what\u2019s good for you.\u201d<\/p>\n The drunken gull lurched forward in an attempt to head-butt the kittiwake, but Kyle easily dodged it, and ten seconds later, there were pieces of gull strewn all over the area in front of the drum. The stink of semi-digested alcoholic muesli wafted in. Of the other \u201cbuddies\u201d there was no sign.<\/p>\n \u201cWow! That was amazing!\u201d said Gary.<\/p>\n \u201cThey didn\u2019t call me \u2018The Karate Kit\u2019 in my younger days for nothing,\u201d said Kyle.<\/p>\n \u201cKyle the Karate Kit kittiwake,\u201d sighed Mrs. Gull. \u201cMy hero.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShall we eat?\u201d said Kyle.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think so,\u201d replied Gary. I think I\u2019ll go bed with a cup of water and a Tylenol.<\/p>\n \u201cSorry dear, there\u2019s none left,\u201d said Mrs. Gull.<\/p>\n \u201cWhy not?\u201d asked Gary.<\/p>\n Kyle and Mrs. Gull looked at each other and smirked, then said in unison: (If you don\u2019t understand the punch line, look up the name for acetaminophen in most of the world outside north America.)<\/p>\n [* This article was originally titled “Gulls’ Night Out”. It was renamed as the Gullsville series developed. I can\u2019t claim originality for the original title. It was an RSPCA officer, Clara Scully, who came up with the pun.]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" News item: \u201cDrunk gulls found ‘stinking of alcohol’\u201d A couple of years ago, inspired by gull-related BBC stories, I wrote two pieces about a Mr. and Mrs. Gull. In the first one, I portrayed Mr. Gull as a beer-drinking, curry-loving, amoral, red-necked gull. In the second one, he met his demise while playing chicken with a lawnmower. A kittiwake named… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1253,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[181,487],"tags":[591,592,593],"class_list":["post-1251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fake","category-stories","tag-drunken-gull","tag-kittiwake","tag-paracetemol"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1251"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1251\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reggothard.com\/kelvin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\n\u201cBecause the parrots ate \u2018em all!\u201d<\/p>\n