Team bonding at the BBC lends a fresh perspective to the term "dumbing down". This month 200 staff from all over the country spent the day wandering round the BBC's White City offices cradling robotic plastic babies and sidling up to strangers whispering: "I've got something for you." The babies, loaned from BBC3's teen show the Baby Borrowers , were programmed to scream and wet themselves. ( Of course I'm not making it up. You couldn't, could you?)

According to Ariel, the BBC's house magazine - sent to me under plain cover by a despairing insider - those present included Alan Yentob, the BBC's creative director, and Adrian Chiles, presenter of The One Show on BBC1. Unwisely, perhaps, both allowed themselves to be photographed holding a baby. In between cuddling the damp, howling little robots, they had to undertake a sensory assault course. This involved "wading through pools of raspberry jelly and autumn leaves blindfolded". Everyone who took part was asked to wash their colleague's feet afterwards.