Sideswipe: A bite and a hurrah

Spotted at the Tikipunga Countdown in Whangarei: 'Whatever have we been buying up to now?' asks Tim Scripps. 'The concept of buying 'old' chicken, for me, is too fowl to contemplate.'

Bridge dwellers joined the great and the good at a civic spread of cakes and savories put on by the Auckland City Council yesterday morning. The council invited all Grafton residents who had been disrupted by major works on the bridge over the last 12 months to join them for a bite and a hurrah - grandchildren of early Auckland mayor Charles Grey who opened the bridge in 1910 were there as well as the homeless to whom it provides a roof overhead. "I noticed a few had a bit of a handful so I guess they'll eat well tonight," councillor Ken Baguley said.

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A bemused new arrival spotted a fellow Jetstar passenger crawling through the rubber flaps of the conveyor belt to speed up his service when Auckland Airport baggage handlers failed to keep up with the airline's snappy flight schedule. The passengers were treated to an on-schedule arrival from Christchurch to Auckland just before midday yesterday, but their happy traveller grins faded as they waited for handlers to hand out each individual piece of luggage when the belt failed.

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Cross-legged, grimacing passengers shalt not board an All Nippon Airways plane ... staff are asking passengers to relieve themselves beforehand. In a bid to reduce carbon emissions the airline has started positioning staff at boarding gates reminding passengers to politely visit the ladies and gents if they need to, reasoning that empty bladders means lighter passengers, which in turn means lighter aircraft and lower fuel use. It hopes that the weight saved will lead to a 5-tonne reduction in carbon emissions over the course of a month. Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

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Here's a new website to add to your favourites: www.runpee.com. The site lists movies showing in cinemas and recommends the best time to dash to the toilet. And for added convenience the site is now available for download on iTunes - the most updated edition, due soon, will have a vibration alert a few minutes before "it's time" just in case you forget. You'll just have to hope that everyone else is not also consulting runpee when you slip out at 69 minutes 32 seconds.

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A 21-year-old woman was hit with hard-line Tesco store policy when she was asked to show her ID to buy a packet of teaspoons. The British supermarket recently rolled out a "Think 25" campaign asking customers to show their ID when buying certain items if they look under 25 after it was fined for selling alcohol to minors ... and it seems one checkout worker was taking the policy seriously. Tesco apologised for the customer's embarrassment, saying some utensils, such as knives, would sound that "Think 25" alert ... and sure, we can understand a bit of an intervention at the checkout if a 5-year old turned up with a steak knife but find it hard to conjure up a frightening scenario involving a bunch of wee sugar stirrers. Source: www.myfoxdfw.com

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View today's Herald cartoon

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Ana Samways is away. Today's Sideswipe was compiled by Jacqueline Smith.