Judging from this T-shirt on sale, some weighty claims are being asked at the Coatesville Market.
Killer pine cones
A council in eastern Victoria, Australia, has issued a warning about potentially dangerous pine cones falling from a tree in the town of Warragul. The Baw Baw Council says pines fromthe 120-year-old heritage-listed bunya pine at the Courthouse Hotel weigh up to 10kg each. Mayor Diane Blackwood says the cones are potentially lethal. "They are the size of a watermelon, falling literally out of the sky from potentially 20m high. So you wouldn't want to be under one, I tell you." (Source: ABC News)
Parking injustice
A reader writes: "Walking along Morningside Drive on Saturday afternoon, I saw a parking warden ticketing a car in a side street. 'Oi,' says I, 'on what grounds are you doing that? All the special signs in the side streets are closed.' [ The street has hinged signs which, when open, show you have to display a parking permit.] Apparently parking restrictions - because of the cricket ODI - had been announced on the radio, but the signs remained closed all day. I checked on my way back and the poor bugger now had TWO tickets. ... Maybe this is Mayor Len's way of funding his grandiose schemes."
A reader writes: "First the Salem witch trials, then Senator McCarthy's 1950s inquiry into 'UnAmerican activities', and now ... A Westmere resident wins the Weekend Herald's 'Letter of the Week' for suggesting Kim Dotcom needs to lose weight, mow his own lawns and ditch the nanny if he wants to be a real NZer. Despite being born and raised in Napier, I guess I'm not a real Kiwi either, since I am guilty of the same crimes. Can Sideswipe readers enlighten me as to what other activities are 'UnKiwi' so I can be truly reformed?"
