Flat Earth: Bird-brained

A GRIM week for pigeons. First there's Alan Bennett, most gentle of our playwrights, telling his diary how he hit one over the head with an axe. Then the Swiss Army decides to decommission 30,000 messenger pigeons, with no mention of their fate. What can a pigeon of a certain age and military bearing do once it's been thrown on the scrap heap? Worst of all, however, the news from Iran, where 12,000 pigeons that had been fouling the domes and minarets of the holy city of Qom have been beheaded. Now we know the mullahs of Qom are a touchy lot, and that to mess with them, so to speak, is pushing your luck. But beheading? I don't know, it just sounds so . . . complicated. You can almost see the 12,000 little blindfolds before your eyes . . .