Not the best thing to welcome you home on a Friday night. Open the living room door to find one dead magpie lying on the chair and another one scrambling up the bay window beside it.
I have heard of small birds sparrows and the like coming down a chimney, but not 2 magpies, this was bizarre. I managed to pick the dead one up by the tail and get it out the back door without too much problem.
Now I am not sure iof everyone feels the same about flapping birds in confined spaces, Rebecca doesn't, she wasn't here. I hate the bloddy things, those beady eyes, sharp beak and panicky movements, and the horrible noise they make as they flap and contort. The noise was amplified as it battered against the window.
So I managed to grab the magpie around it's wings, at which point the phone rings, I try to hold the bird with one hand, whilst answering the phone. the thing about holding a bird is that they are delicate, you don't want to squeeze them too tightly. Just as I answer the phone, one wing gets lose, and the maggin starts flapping, it's Rebecca on the phone to ask me about my day, as you can imagine I was a picture of cool and calm as I exchanged pleasantries and discussed my day. ;-)
So with the conversation over, it lasted 10 seconds I think, I made a grab for the magpie, he got away and crapped another few times over the furniture. He started climbing the window, the top of the bay is about 10 feet off the ground, so I lunged at the tail. Running for the backdoor, tail feathers in hand as the magpie tries to fly, panicking in case the tail feathers come out in my hand, I just make it to the back door and off she goes over the back trees.

I had a look at the damage when they had departed and couldn't believe my luck, the dead magpie must have flown straight in to the bay window and dropped in to the chair which sits there. The other magpie must have decided to stay close by and proceeded to spend it's time flying in to the window to try to get out. The chair which they crapped on was leather, the birds had flown over a cream sofa and 6 cream dining room chairs to get from the chimney to the window, not a drop on the cream, only on the wipe clean chair.
There is a floor lamp which one had perched on and crapped over the shade, I removed the shade and vanish took care of that. It had also crapped down the light bulb and in to the fixture, so that had to be removed and cleaned with cotton buds to get the last of it out.
The house has now been scrubbed and disenfected, and the chimney sweep is arriving on Monday morning to fit cages. Luckily they came down the chimney that is open to the house, the other chimney has two fireplaces, one upstairs and the other in the living room, both are plastered over.