Sideswipe: July 18th: Weird reads

"Saw this in the local Caltex petrol station," writes Matthew. "Do your readers have any other examples of weird magazines?"

Cinemagoer's plea: Turn it down

"I took my two boys to see Despicable Me 2 last week at Events movie theatre in Albany," writes Sophia Sharpe. "It was so loud that my ears hurt. The boys spent the movie with their fingers jammed in theirs. All the movies I've seen there lately have been ear splittingly loud. My mother said that when she complained about a movie's noise level recently she was told they couldn't turn it down because movies arrived preset. Then the boys and I saw Epic at Takapuna (Hoyts). The movie was at a normal decibel level so the earplugs I had brought weren't needed. Why do movie theatres keep cranking up the sound? Are they all deaf already?"

Unnecessary items for the great outdoors

Chris Thompson of Rothesay Bay writes: "A few years ago some friends were cruising round Hauraki Gulf on a yacht. Three of them asked to get dropped off on one side of an island and meet the boat on the other side where it would be moored up for the night. Darkness started falling and they soon realised they were lost. In unfamiliar terrain they decided the only option was to hunker down and wait for daylight. Pulling out the contents of their bags, they each nominated their most useless item in the current situation. The first item was a cheque book. The next a can of deodorant. However, the winner had the full score to the opera Tosca - the owner was to be singing in the chorus the following week."

Modesty offenders will be punished

This was the best sign I came across while we were living in Singapore. And, if you didn't know what an "outrage of modesty" was, there was a helpful little leaflet (top left of sign). It's normally when someone has groped or touched a woman, not like an assault, more like a cheeky grope in a nightclub, but it also refers to anything that might have insulted the modesty of a woman, rude words or hand gestures.

Understanding triggers and timers

A reader writes: "Traffic lights in Auckland have a combination of triggers and timers that are used at different times - during rush hour, timers are generally used, and at other times, the under-road triggers are used. Some traffic lights will only have timers, others only triggers. The triggers are generally an inductive loop: a set of wires embedded in the surface of the road which generates a magnetic field - you can generally see the cutouts where they have been inserted. When enough metal is on top of them to change the inductance the light is triggered. When I used to ride my motorbike, some don't have enough metal in them to trigger the sensors and you'd be stranded until a car turned up."

Trolls: Nice comeback...

Celebrity real estate agents: Earlier this week we found Sandra Bullock, Liz Hurley selling houses in the Auckland region and now Jamie Oliver and this guy's tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried...

Video: What do you want for dinner tonight?

Got a Sideswipe? Send your pictures, links and anecdotes to Ana at ana.samways@nzherald.co.nz