Sideswipe: February 1: 'Hotel Rena'

A Waikato youth construction company completes "Hotel Rena" on time, and within budget, at beautiful and isolated Orokawa Bay.

Kiwifruit con

A reader writes: "While running a backpackers in Auckland 25 years ago we told a group of tourists from Sweden - who were off to find work as part of their Kiwi experience, in a kiwifruit orchard in Hawkes Bay - that they would most likely be given jobs as 'shavers'. We said it was a little known fact that the fruit grew with long hair on them and this had to be shaved off before they could be packed and sold. On the backpackers' return to Auckland we heard how the owners of the orchard were in hysterics when our tourists arrived and while on a tour of the orchard asked if the fruit had been shaved already."

Uggs banned at US school

The sheepskin-lined Ugg boots made famous Downunder have become popular with pre-teens and teens in the United States in recent years. So much so that a Pennsylvania Middle School is banning them because students have been stashing cell phones and snacks in the open-topped foot warmers.

What we believed as kids

1. When I saw a big truck and trailer full of sheep, I asked my father where they were going. He used to tell me that the farmer was taking the sheep on a sightseeing trip because they had been good.

2. When camping our dad said it was time for bed when the first morepork call was heard. He'd wander off and make the "morepork call" himself. (It still works well on the next generation of young campers.)

3. I asked my father, known for his joking around, where "snot" came from. He told me that during the night moths fly in and "poo" up your nose and that's where it comes from. I slept with my head under the covers for years and could never understand how the "snot" kept turning up! When, in my 20s, I told my father about the effect it had on my sleeping habits, he was mortified!

4. My friend told her toddler twins that if you pick your nose your arm will "drop" off. Well, the next day the meter reader turned up and he had just one arm. The twins stared at him wide-eyed, jaws on the ground, and asked him the obvious question.

5. We were driving up Mt Eden one night, when my girlfriend aged 24 said: "Isn't it funny how the meteorite hit the hill right on the top." It nearly caused me to drive off the road with laughter. Apparently her dad had told her that's what the crater was caused by!

6. ... that gherkins were crocodile poo.