Sideswipe

Disgruntled Alex of Mt Roskill writes an open letter to Co-op Taxis: "Well, thanks very much for stuffing up my Saturday night! If at 11.45pm when I was still sober you'd told me that your service was overloaded I would have driven myself into town, caught a cab home and picked up my car later when I was legal. Instead I put faith in your promise that you'd get me into town, and here I am, two hours 20 minutes later, too pissed to drive and going absolutely nowhere. The first time I called (to ask if you were still coming), all I got was Robbie Williams singing 'when we come we always come too late'. Wake up and see the sarcasm in my eyes. Really cool music you've got. I could have grooved all night. Still waiting at 2.25am, I was wondering if perhaps I should call 111 or start walking."

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Two observations from a regular reader: "An advert in the East & Bays Courier looking for an Assistant Banana Ripener. I presume he works alongside the Chief Ripener in the ripening room which is next to the bending shed. And the School Uniform Shop in Remuera has a display of various styles of shoe for schoolchildren. Among these is a clumpy lace-up for girls called the Tart Black."

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At the MTV Europe Music Awards in Lisbon last week, Madonna opened the show with her song Hung Up and emerged from a giant mirrored ball wearing a purple, vintage '80s leotard and $20,000 of diamonds on her eyelashes. Robbie Williams couldn't resist a backhander ... "I watched with my mouth open all the way through her performance. She's an absolute legend and she makes us all look like amateurs," he said, adding, "I can't believe she's 89 and looks like that." Hosting the event was spoof Kazakh television presenter Borat, a guise adopted by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen (aka Ali G), whose opening one-liner was a stinger ... "It was very brave of MTV to start the show with a transvestite," he said after Madonna performed.

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Leo Molloy is opening a new bar, called Cowboy, on behalf of investors. He is not allowed to trade on his own account after his former bar, Cardiac, er, arrested. So a Herald reporter, who has never before spoken to Molloy, rings him for the low-down, thinking readers might be quite interested in the latest addition to Auckland's night life as well as Molloy's return. The conversation deteriorates rapidly: "You always turn on me like mongrel dogs. You've got a culture at the New Zealand Herald of being absolutely f****** low-lifes to me. I loathe you all. I'll be getting toilet paper with New Zealand Herald on it so each time someone wipes their arse they wipe it on the New Zealand Herald, which is what you lot deserve." Cowboy will apparently be classy and chic, in a camp Ralph Lauren kind of way.