Sideswipe: Sympathy bid a bit of a stretch

Sympathy bid: Perhaps a bit of a stretch

Wine me, dine me ... decline me?

Sanjay Deshpande writes: "On Valentine's Day we went for dinner at an upmarket Indian restaurant. Service and food was good, however, when it came to paying the bill, the manager refused to accept our Entertainment Book voucher for a discount (it would have given us a $25 discount), saying they would not accept it as today was Valentine's Day ... Has any one experienced such a thing?"

Rush - carefully - to the rescue

Paramedics in Edmonton, Alberta, were advised by Alberta Health Services that drivers should "respond within the speed limits even when responding with lights and siren". AHS wrote: "Our job is to save lives, not put them in jeopardy." Drivers interviewed by Canadian news organisations say police have been stopping and issuing tickets to drivers on emergencies if they speed. (Source: News of the Weird)

Stumbling on the generation gap

Brian Leybourne of Birkdale was giving his daughter (2.5 years old) her bath and was singing to her ... "Do you know the muffin man, the muffin man, the muffin man, who lives on Drury Lane" ... Suddenly, she burst into tears and was inconsolable for several minutes. "When I finally calmed her down enough to talk, I asked her what was wrong. Sobbing, she said 'Because I don't know the muffin man!'"

Hanging on his every upload

Social media factoid: After Justin Bieber wrote (rather unimaginatively) "Happy Valentine's Day" on his Facebook wall on Monday, nearly 70,000 people clicked like and 15,000 commented ... many with a trail of love hearts.

Hidden costs know no bounds

"Since you're asking 'What other industry could get away with adding 40 per cent to their headline price?' may I suggest the ticket agencies in this country," writes Steve. "Very often you can't even specify which seats you want (aisle, middle of the row, near the back/front, etc) and then they add things like booking fees and courier fees to the prices. They even charge if you want to print off the tickets yourself." Or how about the "Variable Fuel Surcharge" added on to inter-region courier deliveries? suggests another. "Airlines aren't unique in adding random unannounced charges to their pricing. (Besides, the airline's price was guaranteed to have an asterisk beside it!)"