I'M RICH. YET AGAIN.

Periodically someone will write to me telling me I've won hundreds of thousands of dollars. I think I am probably the luckiest person on the internet. To date, my net worth is over two billion dollars. You'd have thought I was rich enough - but good fortune has smiled on me yet again, and this time I've won the Ontario Lottery (even though I never entered it). Naturally, I wrote back quickly in case they decided to email someone else and offer them the $800,000 in exchange for their bank details ...

Dear Mr. Howard,

OMG! I received your email last night but have only just stopped shaking enough to reply. I’ve never won anything before – and believe me, I’ve tried. Lottery tickets, scratch cards, greyhound racing, slot machines – I’ve (frequently) tried the lot. I even put £300 down on the no.5 crab during a crab race in St. Lucia eight years ago. Unfortunately, he was beaten ‘by a claw’ by a rather sprightly no.8 crab. I still say drugs were involved (the winning crab just looked too ripped for it to be natural) but go prove it.

Anyway, I am beside myself with joy that the one time I haven’t actually entered a competition/placed a bet, I’ve WON! And not just a tenner on the scratchies – it’s a whopping $800,000 this time. I’ve just worked it out and that’s 509,252.74 GBP (the exchange rate isn’t as good as it could be, but I can’t complain).

I know they say you shouldn’t count your chickens until they’ve hatched, and my wife has told me to calm down and not make any plans until I have the money in my bank account – however, I do feel a small celebration is in order. I have, therefore, planned a little party for this weekend. I’ve hired a stately home and will be laying on limos for all my mates. I’m ordering in 158 crates of Pol Roger Champage and have booked One Direction to play. They’re looking in their diary and are going to get back to me – although if they can’t make it, I have heard that Jedward are free.

So, just to check – when will the money get into my bank? I’ve already gone quite overdrawn paying for the Champagne, and I believe both One Direction and Jedward require paying up-front (I suppose they don’t want to risk people dancing all night to I Want Candy and then legging it five minutes before they finish their set).

Anyway, please let me when I will be receiving my $800,000 (I’m so excited). In the meantime, here are the details you require.

Full Name: Ewan Ouzarmi

Country: United Kingdom

Country of Resident: England

Age: 48

Gender: Male

Telephone no: 0773957323

Occupation: Bank teller

THE GIFT THAT KEEPS ON GIVING

Looking for a gift for that someone special in your life? Difficult isn't it. How can you convey the love, adoration and admiration you have for a friend/partner/spouse with exactly the right present? By getting them a pair of pigeon feet of course! When my friend put this up on FB, I knew (yes, knew –more than I’ve ever known anything in my life) that this is what had been missing from my gift-giving repertoire for years.

If only they'd painted his toenails, I'd have doubled my bid

What says ‘I love you mum’ on Mother’s Day more than a pair of gnarled bird feet? And not just any  old bird’s feet – they’re the tiny toes of what’s generally considered to be flying vermin, making them an extra-special keepsake.

How can you tell your other half that they mean the world to you? You could buy them a gold Rolex and a bottle of Shipwrecked 1907 Heidsieck Champagne (at £165,000 a pop. Quite literally). Or, you could present them with this money-can’t-buy pair of feel-good feet. Actually, money can buy them – the starting bid was 99p. They are described as being ‘New’ which, according to eBay, means they are a ‘brand-new, unused, unopened and undamaged item’. I think the pigeon to which they were formerly attached might have something to say about that. He would probably argue that they’d been well used, gripping many a window ledge whilst he shat profusely on members of the public down below. He’d probably also view them as now being slightly damaged – but I like to think he’d be happy that they’ve been so artfully displayed against the backdrop of beige polypropylene carpet.  

If you’re not someone who likes to buy the first pair of pigeon feet you see though, don’t worry. There’s also a pair of feral pigeon feet for sale (I'm not quite sure what makes one pigeon any more wild than the other. Maybe it’s whether he’s dead or alive when his legs are chopped off). There’s also a pair of magpie phalanges for true connoisseurs (one for sorrow, two for joy – although, in this instance, I doubt the magpie in question was that joyful when he lost his second foot).

So, now you’ve seen them, I bet you can’t wait to put in a bid and present them to someone special next birthday.  After all, nothing quite conveys your love more than two tiny, disembodied bird parts.