The weather has again been up in the nineties today and I'm beginning to observe the madness this causes in the U.K. We just aren't good at keeping it together in this heat, our brains boil in our little red sunburnt skulls inducing extreme behaviour and irritability. I would suggest we are safer staying indoors if the thermometers go above seventy degrees.

I have also been guilty of  overreacting and behaving out of character. My flip top rubbish bin was kicking up a terrible smell on Monday night, every time I flipped the top to feed it more scraps, the emanation was a cross between an abattoirs and warm rotting brussel sprouts with a potent fish sauce. The rubbish is collected on a Tuesday so I carefully triple bagged it while gagging and heaving and put it on the street. After all this effort I let the tap run for a while, treated myself to a tepid glass of water and heard the rustling of my rubbish bag outside the window.  A huge seagull was beginning to slice his way through my triple layers. Without thinking, I dashed down three flights of stairs and ran towards him, 'OI! WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING!', he didn't move and gave me a supercilious look. I saw red as in my mind he should have flown away screeching with fear. 'OI! PISS OFF', he was now through to the rubbish and tugging at an old chicken carcass so I began stamping my feet and waving my arms. My foot slipped (honest) and I landed him a beaut in his seagull reproductive organs and he walked away, but very slowly which really got to me. I began chasing him around a nearby car park,  shouting abuse at him until he flew off, done a circuit and arrived back at my rubbish.

Ashamed with my behaviour I looked at a gathered audience and tutted, 'Bloody Seagulls' but no one offered any support, not even counselling. By now tea bags, embarrassingly cheap empty bean cans and debt collectors final demands were visible for all to see. The Seagull did not stop, I had tried to reason with him to no avail so I went upstairs to think again.

Some time ago a client of mind told me a tale of how he used to entertain himself on the pier. He was not proud of this but evidently if one soaks a little bread in a strong mixture of Bicarbonate of Soda it has adverse effects on the Gull if digested. As a child he would throw the doctored bread to the unassuming Seagulls and as they flew off a strange chemical reaction would happen and they would explode. I made my way to my food cupboard and found some baking powder, I tried not to think of the consequences, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, or my happy moments spent bird watching in the countryside. The heat had got me, there was no going back, and my little dough balls of Gull death were ready. As sweat dripped from my brow I walked downstairs back to the rubbish and made sure no one was watching, I threw them near the sack and ran upstairs to observe the outcome.

It took some while for him to go for the little experiment I had prepared for him and during this time I began to change my mind, yes it was cruel, almost barbaric. I was going to turn him into a feathered suicide bomber. As he went for a dough ball I screamed 'NO!, NO!', too late. I'd frightened him with my shouting and off he flew across the road, pirouetted around the chimney of a nearby house and headed straight towards my window, BANG! up he went, total disintegration apart from a little yellow beak which hit the ground and got scrunched by a passing car.

I have been living with guilt for the past three days and I'm awaiting some Hitchcock like bird  retaliation. The flat is even hotter now due to closed windows and I'm afraid to go out. Yes it was abominable behaviour, I regret ever going that far, my only solace is that I'm English and can't function in sustained heat. I wish this weather would stop.