Birdshot - no - bird shot.

Last year, in the northern Netherlands city of Leeuwarden, employees of television company Endemol NV set a Guinness world record by knocking over 3,992,397 dominoes. This year the employees have worked for weeks setting up 4,321,000 dominoes in an attempt to break their own record. The dominoes are set up in an auditorium where, unfortunately, the windows are left open.

The vicious flying monster you see pictured on the left, no, your other left, is a song sparrow that inadvertantly flew through one of those open windows. The attacking bird managed to knock down more than 23,000 dominoes before all of the screaming and shouting and cursing (presumably things like "Gottern Dammit!" and "Schidtt!" and "Kil der baschdart!" frightened the pictured sparrow into a corner.

The only thing that saved the record attempt from disaster was 750 strategically placed breaks in the lines of dominoes. Those breaks would have been filled in with dominoes just prior to the televised world record attempt.

The panicked employees called upon this man, one Aans Christienn Handerssohn, to do battle with the run amok song sparrow (actual size - about 5 inches in height). Warrior Handerssohn, undaunted by the ferocity of the bloodthirsty flying relative to the dinosaurs, dispatched it with a single shot from his trusty blunderbuss "Bessy" air rifle as the panting, dominoe slaying winged beast cowered in a corner.

TAGS: Netherlands, dominoes, song sparrow