They sprang up around West Auckland like a plague. Colour-coded and smiling. Except for this one, with the furrowed brow of Sam the Eagle, watching us from the roadside.
Keep calm - you've got a heart-stress test
Anne Martin, of Helensville, writes: "My friend in England was driving her husband to the hospital for a heart-stress test, before which, it had been emphasised, he had to be calm and stress-free for at least 15 minutes. On the way, Sandra realised she had left her purse at home containing the money for the hospital car park. They stopped at a cash machine and Bob put his cash card in but the screen read, "This machine has developed a fault." They had no option but to proceed to his appointment, and settled down in the waiting room. Then the fire alarm went off and they were herded out with a dozen other patients in various stages of treatment until it was confirmed that it was a false alarm. Bob was eventually being examined when another alarm sounded, but this was quickly found to be due to a button pushed in error and he finally had his test. So much for calm and stress-free! Fortunately, the test went well, and they were able to scrape together enough coins for the car park."
Haven't got a glue what password is
A reader writes: "I had an epic fail on all my accounts: Yahoo, Gmail, Facebook and Westpac logins. Every attempt to enter the correct password failed and I thought I had had my PC data-mined for passwords. Putting on my glasses (it kinda helped) and the fault was finally located on the keyboard where the V and the B keys had been super-glued together: I used a B as part of the passwords.
Parking drives us crazy
A reader would like to plead guilty to the practice of footpath-parking in the leafy 'burbs. "However, I think your readers might like to know why so many people park on the footpath leading on to their drive. I recently had my car stolen from outside my house while it was parked kerbside on the road. When I informed the police the vehicle had been stolen they informed me I should ALWAYS park in or on my drive as even if there is only a little bit of the car on the drive it is still safer than on the road! Apologies to all of those we offend by our inconsiderate parking."
