h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In certain rural (backward) parts of the United States, they play a game called "Cow Pie Bingo" in which organizers place a numbered grid over a large field and sell chances for each block on the grid. The person who owns the block on which the cow makes a pattie wins a prize with the group or organization which is running the game keeping the remainder of the cash! A great, if messy, way to raise funds in a pinch -- all you need is a cow, a field and some slips of paper!

Wow! I didn't know we had such stupid people in this country!

That's nothing really. In Pennsylvania there is a town which (until this year) made the killing of pigeons an annual event. The locals of the town of Heigins decided it would be a neat idea to blast pigeons with shotguns in the town park with each shooter paying a fee for the privilege of firing away. The event drew about 50 shooters, about 100 protestors who felt the idea of shooting birds was cruel, and about 500 people who wanted to watch crazed animal rights activists going head-to-head with armed rednecks. All paid an admittance fee which netted the borough about $30,000 annually!

And while this may seem sporting, consider that the pigeons were raised with the sole purpose of becomign cannon fodder in adulthood. Also consider that these birds have spent their entire lives in captivity and lacked the sense to fly away when released from the traps -- this leads to a situation where locals standing 10 paces away blasted these clueless birds as they walked about on the ground looking for lunch. And in cases where the shooters failed to kill their quarry with two shots, local youths were hired to run onto the field (presumably between shotgun blasts) to break the necks of the wounded birds with their bare hands. The most sporting aspect of the entire day occurred when animal rights activists would race the local youngsters to the wounded birds - the protesters carrying little first aid kits for the wounded birds and the children carrying little crazed expressions.

So to sum up, in this state, we still have about a dozen of these shoots going on where people can pay for th eprivilege to shoot stupid birds. And we have yokels who bet on where a cow will defecate in a field.

All this fun in the name of charity!!

Put the shooters one one side of the field, the activists on the other, and give them all lots of firearms and ammunition.

Then release the birds in the middle.

I'd pay to see it.

What about the cows?!

Don't be absurd. Cows don't have any pockets to keep money in. We'd have to let them in for free.

We do that in the country (ie: dull) parts of the UK. We call it 'Spot the Plop'. Oh, and it gets fun if the cow isn't interested in doing some buisness. I think a high fibre diet helps!