Sideswipe: Where everyone gets a bargain

Shona was in Newmarket, in the carpark by The Warehouse. She came back from shopping and had this "parking breach notice" under her wiper with a demand to pay $0.

A step too far

A reader sent in the following, from an email all employees received regarding health and safety policies. "I take this opportunity to remind everyone of the following rules in regard to Safety On Stairs:

* Use the hand rail.

* One step at a time.

* No conversations.

* No mobile phone use.

If an employee is not abiding by these rules I expect you to immediately raise the issue with the person and request that they refrain from the observed unsafe act." Policies gone crazy perhaps?

Dreaming of a white carrot

More mystery veges. Bill stopped a young staff member and asked where the parsnips were. He said he didn't know. Bill spotted them and said: "There they are." The young staff member looked where Bill indicated and said: "Oh, you mean the white carrots."

An eggplant by any other name ...

Debbie went to Countdown Westgate a few months ago and had two checkout operators trying to figure out the mystery vegetable she was buying. They ignored her when she told them it was a butternut squash, and decided for themselves that it must be an eggplant. It was the one and only time she's put "eggplant" into a vegetable soup!

One Governor-General out

The visitors' centre in Paeroa features two photos in its reception area of the day a Governor-General visited the district and partook of its wonderful mineral water. The caption refers to the G-G as Sir Denis Blundell (the first New Zealand resident to be appointed Governor-General). But it's his predecessor, Sir Arthur Porritt, the London-based royal surgeon who between 1967 and 1972 served as our first New Zealand-born royal representative. .

By George, he's got it

Former PM Helen Clark is in Cancun for a climate convention, looking at key issues like increasingly erratic climate changes. In her Facebook feed on this, a comment by Paul Madan stood out to a reader. Paul says: "President Bush has a plan. He says if we need to, we can lower the temperature dramatically just by switching from Fahrenheit to Celsius."