Sideswipe: June 27: Results in bad decisions . . .

Meanwhile, in rural Jammu, India. Photo / Supplied

Breakdancing closer to locking in Olympics spot

Breakdancing moved a step closer to the 2024 Olympics in Paris this week, and now organisers can look to book a street venue. Called "breaking" in Olympic circles, its medal debut was last October at the Buenos Aires Youth Summer Games.

The street dance competitions will have 16 athletes in each of the men's and women's medal events in France.

International Olympic Committee members formally endorsed requests from Paris officials in February and their own executive board in March to provisionally add breakdancing to the programme, pending a final decision in December 2020.

Paris wants to add four sports to its programme, though the other three — skateboarding, sport climbing, and surfing — will make Summer Games debuts in Tokyo next year.

'Onerous' insurance

Landlord Paul phoned an insurance company for a quote on a tenanted property and, as part of the approval process, had to agree to seven conditions. "One of these insisted that every three months I visit the property and take photos of its condition taking care to respond to any damage identified.

"Having been a landlord for a number of years I really took issue with this condition insisting that I intrude on their space so regularly. In the event their quote was 30 per cent higher than the alternative proposal so I avoided the obligation, but I wonder whether I'm alone in finding their requirements unduly onerous."

Those pesky fast walkers in Auckland's eastern suburbs. Photo / Supplied

Chance meetings, small world

"I arrived in Christchurch in the mid 70s," writes Barbara Bradbury. "It was a quiet sort of place after life in London and then I found myself pregnant. I wasn't ready to become absorbed into the rules and regulations of the national hospital system and was given the name of a female doctor who had her own birthing home. On my first visit she asked all the questions including some about my birthplace, my mother and her birth experience.

"She asked if I knew the name of my mother's doctor — I did. Turned out she was an intern working with that doctor in that hospital during that time I was born and would most definitely have been at my birth. It was a great bond!"