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Warning: This is a banned column

Vic Barlow
20/ 6/2007

FOR A decade Barlow's Brief has appeared in your Express, 52 editions every year without a break, not even for weddings and funerals but the mould has been broken.

This week there will be no Barlow's Brief…nothing…not a word. The page will be blank.

On Monday agents from the Department of Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) descended on our farm bedecked in white anti-bacteria jump suits.

"Sorry you're too late," I explained.

"Too late for what?"

"ET."

They gave me a puzzled look.

"He's gone home."

"Are you trying to be funny?"

"He got fed up trying to get through on the phone."

The DEFRA boys were not amused. "We are here to examine your poultry."

Apparently they'd tracked down someone who'd bought chickens from Chelford Market and sold some to us.

Mrs B took the Ghost Buster Team into the paddock and returned looking ashen…our chicks were under house-arrest until blood samples had been analysed. We were under strict observation for Avian Flu.

"Ish a shame about dem chicks," I snuffled the following morning over breakfast.

"Pardon?" replied Mrs B.

"Dem chicks aaaaaashoooooooooooooo!"

"Good God!"

"What's up wid you? Aaaashooooooo!"

"You've got bird flu."

"It's only a code, aaaashooooooo!"

"Right, that's it," said Mrs B. "You're grounded."

Terrified I might have avian flu Mrs B is monitoring my every move. I swear to God she's checking under the bed in case I've laid any eggs. I'm not even allowed to wave at the postman through the window unless I wear rubber gloves.

I'm not allowed to use the phone and she seems to think I'll contaminate everyone who reads my column so she's confiscated my keyboard. For the first time in ten years there will be no Barlow's Brief.

• THE VIEWS EXPRESSED ON THIS PAGE ARE VIC BARLOW'S AND NOT NECESSARILY THOSE OF THE EXPRESS

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