Sideswipe: Crappy seats

Fans aren't the only ones who need to clean up their act at Eden Park. Photo / Supplied

Our seats in the West Stand at Eden Park for the Kiwis vs Kangaroos game on Saturday were kinda shitty," says Brad Alcorn. "A staff member helpfully explained the stadium has a pigeon problem and promised to send a cleaner in 5 to 10 minutes. Forty minutes later, a cleaner turned up. Unfortunately, he had only a mop and bucket, which meant that most of the droppings ended up at our feet. It seems the pigeons became as uninterested in the game as the rest of the crowd and, not being able to throw bottles, decided to throw the only thing they could, which ended up in our laps. While this is often considered good luck, it was the Kiwis and not us who needed it. It's not just the sports fans who have to clean up their act.

Too toasty for catnap

After midnight on Sunday, Lois Lund was woken by a loud popping sound in her house in Port Townsend, Washington state, and found her kitchen ablaze. Fire investigators determined a toaster oven had been turned on by the family's 10-year-old cat, Osiris, who had taken to sleeping on top of it. (Source: Peninsula Daily News)

Bad customer service

"A friend of mine had an everyday account blocked by his bank, ASB, without notice, as punishment for late payment to his MasterCard," writes a reader. "All his earnings go into this account and he can't transfer money to his credit card, or pay rent or groceries. The bank requests urgent payments into the credit card account but refuses to unblock the everyday account. It's been going on for about a month now."

Messing with telemarketers

Darren Jones loves telemarketing calls. His favourite responses are: "I'm sorry it's not a convenient time to talk, can you please give me your number and I'll ring you back round dinner time? No? ... I guess that would be really annoying eh?"; or "Hold on. I'll just get someone who is interested." Then I rest the phone on the table and ignore it for 10 minutes; or I simply wait for the sales pitch to finish then politely ask, "What are you wearing?"