The way our neighbours might be living

There was a conversation at my dinner table the other night about home visits made by (broadly) social services professionals. The winning tale came from an old friend who's an educational psychologist. He tells of a house where there was a parrot flying around indoors, and he watched as it crapped on a plate of uncooked sausages. (Oh says the child's mother, it's poo'd on me dinner). His other prize vignette concerned a motorbike on a bed and a dead goat hanging in the hallway. It sounds like an image coughed up by Tom Waits.