P-p-p-piss off a penguin

A traumatic day for the missus.  The office intern had upset her with a terrible tale of student hi-jinks.  She clutched my arm.  "You. Will. Not. Believe this."

The story concerned the university rugby team.  My ears pricked up.  Having spent two years sharing a house with the rugby team's formally elected Funnel Master (tasked with jamming a hose down the gullett of anyone who quailed at a dirty pint), I know the depths to which these toddler-hulks can descend.

"Ok, so they went to the zoo together" - hmmm, not what I was expecting - "and they stole a penguin".  Ah.  "So they took the penguin out with them, but a bouncer wouldn't let him into a nightclub, so they left him in a kebab shop with a kebab, and HE DIED".

I sat back and considered this.  It's hard to know where to start.  A dozen thugs standing in a nightclub queue, whistling innocently while a penguin wearing sunglasses and a tie flaps unhappily at their feet.  The penguin resting his weary, dehydrated head on a formica table in the kebab shop, pitta bread slipping from his flippers.  The paramedic tucking a sheet over his chilli-smeared beak.

The story is total bollocks, of course.  A child could see that.  A baby penguin could see that.  Not my future wife, though - she believes every word and is distraught.

"Maybe they exaggerated", I suggested.  "Maybe he actually got into the club and they just popped him in a sink and he had a great time".

"Yeah, maybe he did get into the club" she said, brightening up.  Then her eyes misted over.  "Aaaargh - HIS POOR EARS!"