Sideswipe: August 12: 80s Soap nostalgia

"Cleopatra. A new soap sumptuous as a cream, sensual as a perfume," cooed the TV ad. The soap was developed in France in the 1960s. The shape of the bar was carved to fit the hand and make it easier to hold, it was also stamped with the Cleopatra logo. Here it was packaged in elegant gold-coloured cartons to bring it an air of affluence and to set it apart from other soaps on the market, rather than the simple paper packaging it had in France. In New Zealand it was huge in the 80s. "As kids we used to get a jug and pour the bath water like the ad did and feel like an Egyptian Goddess," recalled one Kiwi on nostalgia Facebook page @nz80s.Another remembered this: "The label always amazed me how it stayed on till the very end."

How to fill your working day with pointless messy drama

Is your working environment calm, serene and productive? Well according to The Daily Mash you can add panic and stress to everyone's working day with these tips:
Always enforce process
In a position that's really stupendously unimportant? Make yourself universally loathed by setting up a formal process for everything from dentist visits to replacing a laptop cable. No, you can't grant that request because it isn't in writing from your line manager. It's not you, it's the process.
Get in a flap about minor things
You asked everyone not to modify cells A-H of the Excel budget spreadsheet, but someone's edited it. Phone your busiest boss, then call a meeting about it, then schedule individual refresher training sessions on editing the spreadsheet reinforcing that no-one should do it ever, unless they are a) you or b) God.
Transmit panic effectively
With a little bit of effort you can convey panic via emphatic use of all three alarm-inducing tactics: exclamation marks, capital letters and bold font. Mark everything urgent for good measure. If you can find some bizarre Outlook setting that also turns the message preview red, you can retire happy.

Woman buys car for bananas price

In 1965 Bernice Wyszynski saw a brand-new Pontiac sedan advertised for "1395 bananas". So she tried to take the dealer up on that offer. However, the dealer insisted that the car actually cost $1395. "Bananas", he said, was a vernacular term for dollars. Wyszynski threatened to sue him for false advertising, and eventually he relented, selling her the car in exchange for 1395 bananas. I can buy five bananas at the supermarket for $1. Which means that, in present-day money, Wyszynski got the car for around $280. That's a pretty good deal. Bernice Wyszynski died in 2003, and the banana incident made it into her obituary.

Bi Robin

A comic book superhero rescued someone, then the two decide to go on a date. Batman's affable sidekick, Robin, appears to have come out as bisexual, Entertainment Weekly reports. In comic Batman: Urban Legends #6, Tim Drake, in his guise as the latest Robin, saves an old friend, Bernard from a Chaos Monster. Later, dressed in his civilian clothes, he stops by his friend's house. "I've been doing a lot of thinking about that night and I — I don't know what it meant to me. Not yet," Tim/Robin says. His friend helps him out: "Do you want to go on a date with me?" The news arrives just five months after Marvel introduced the first gay Captain America with the new character, Aaron Fischer. Tim's Robin now joins an already established list of LGBTQ superheroes: Kate Kane (Batwoman), Bobby Drake (Iceman), Loki Jean-Paul Beaubier (Northstar), Billy Kaplan (Wiccan) and Hulkling, Midnighter and Apollo.