How Rizla thin the veneer of civilisation. Just how far have we really crawled from the primordial ooze? How rapidly would we revert to the brutish, blood soaked ways of the Cro magnon; flint marks on bones, body parts sizzling on the fire.

I recently asked the local butcher if he could get me a deer’s head with the antlers. I fancied nailing one to a tree in the garden to freak the foxes out, or do I mean the neighbours?

He matter-of-factly pondered my request, then said he would have a word with his game distributor. After all, the heads have to go somewhere don't they? Had I considered that it would still have the flesh and fur on it? How would I get it back to the bone? I might need to boil it in a big pot for a couple of days. 'Goat’s head soup,' he laughed. 'Chuck in a couple of onions,' I said, adding that I wanted a deer not a goat and that I’d look on the Internet.

A subsequent visit to the butcher threw up this bit of dialogue, which was ear wigged by those in the queue behind me, two genteel ladies and a rather impatient trendy looking chap.

Butcher: Did you get anywhere with your head?


Me: You can get them on Ebay.

Butcher: That would save you boiling it

Me: Absolutely, I didn’t want the wife catching me boiling heads

Butcher: You can get anything on that Ebay

Me: Not entirely. I did think that if it was that easy to get a stag’s head, then I’d try and get a human head

Butcher: A human?


Me: Well, the skull. I don’t really want a head, you know with a face. I wouldn’t want to get caught boiling that on the cooker

Butcher: And can you?

Me: No, you can’t get human heads; I meant a skull

Butcher: It’s probably not allowed

Me: That’s probably a good thing, I mean that you can’t get body parts on Ebay

Butcher: I saw a programme the other day and this bloke in a laboratory was getting a skeleton. I always thought they were plastic but it was a real one.

Me: Where did he get it from?

Butcher: Bangla Desh I think. It was a little one

Me: What? Was it a child?

Butcher: Think so

I thanked him and paid for my sausages and left the shop passing the three customers who had all gone very still and recoiled from me in horror as I made for the door.