Sideswipe: September 19: Memorial left wanting

A reader was mortified to stumble across the memorial for Queen Elizabeth II outside the Auckland Town Hall this week. "A small notice held on the window with cable ties indicated the purpose of the shabby tableau to the right. It looked like a messy sheet draped over a podium or office chair, with a picture of Queen Liz, not even in, but bluetacked onto the front of a frame - neither straight nor in the centre of the frame. A handful of flowers had been laid in front of it, obviously by some desperate mourners looking for somewhere to acknowledge the passing of such a significant figure. Surely we can do better? Let's just hope the international media don't include this in a montage of remembrance spots around the Commonwealth in an upcoming broadcast."

Introverts' nightmare

"Meeting a co-worker that you don't know very well on the train, locking eyes, and having to engage in conversation for the next 30-40 minutes. All you want to do is read your book, but there's no way out, and you decide to put up a brave front. They're not thrilled to see you because you already have a reputation for being kind of weird. The more you talk, the weirder they think you are. You can see it in their eyes. Already, you can hear the office gossip in your head: 'Oh my God, guess who I was stuck on the train with…' Nightmare fuel. Work from home was a blessing."

Disappointing Pizza

"Decided to order pizza after a long day at work - it arrived an hour later..."

Three-car convoy

Peter and his wife drove south from Auckland on the Waikato Expressway in the early morning last Wednesday and back late the same evening. "By chance, in both directions, we encountered in front of us a slightly unusual 'convoy' of three vehicles in line, consisting of two police cars with a van in between them. The interesting thing was that at expressway speed (110 km/h), the van and the rear police car maintained a minimum separation distance from the vehicle in front, which looked to be no more than a car's length. Hardly the type of speed-driving technique that would normally be advocated! In addition, the trio of vehicles clearly had a rehearsed technique for changing lanes, designed to prevent any other cars from intervening. One assumes that the contents of the van posed some unusually serious security risk to warrant such driving, but I would be interested to know whether any Sideswipe readers can further explain the phenomenon."