Sideswipe

Can anyone help identify this machine that was found in High St. We'd like to know its real purpose ... turning the wheel presses the screw down on to a blade at the bottom. Any ideas?

Ted Dewan was tired of cars zooming down his street in Oxford, England, so he designed a series of "DIY traffic-calming happenings", including setting up a living room in the middle of the road. These "happenings" are described by their creator as "roadwitches" and have also included a 3m-high rabbit, a big bed (for a sleeping policeman) and a fake crash scene for Halloween. "There's an element of fun and mischief, but underneath is the ambition to encourage people to re-examine how roads are used," says Mr Dewan. "With the living room, it was the most direct way of saying 'We live here. This is our living space'." As expected, some road users weren't happy at being inconvenienced. "A driver of a 4x4 seemed to be made psychotic by the idea that roads could exist for anything other than him to drive on," he says. (Source: BBC Online)

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A reader writes: "We noticed that while visiting our house in Mt Roskill this week you took all our holiday money, $5000 in Japanese yen, and some precious pounamu crafted by my own dear father. So much for our holiday, and the pounamu can never be replaced. We conclude that our guard dog was of little use in deterring you. You should be aware that she was labelled a menacing dog by the Auckland City Council after being accused of biting someone, falsely, earlier in the year. By the way, you left your sunglasses behind. If you want to call by and collect them I am sure we can negotiate a deal. We all hope you have a merry old Christmas. Signed Rob & Mitsuko."

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In a September road-rage incident in Salt Lake City, a woman sped by in a blocked-off lane to get around a 25-year-old motorist on the motorway, then rolled down her window and screamed at him. The man, according to the Deseret Morning News, made an "obscene hand gesture", and the woman responded by pulling out a .357-calibre revolver and shooting off the tip of his middle finger. She sped away but later crashed into a barricade.