‘‘Today I bought a Peppa Pig cutlery set for a three-year-old’s birthday,’’ reports Mary McNamara, of West Ryde. ‘‘The back of the package says ‘WARNING. Choking hazard. Not for sale to persons under 18 years.’ I guess I’ll have to find a 19-year-old who wants to use small, blunt cutlery and who won’t try to stick it down their throat.’’

‘‘Is there a name for those annoying little ovals of plastic that appear on your kitchen floor when you do the wrong thing and bring your supermarket shopping home in plastic bags?’’ asks Tony Bracken, of Toowong. ‘‘No doubt the little devils are plastic analogues of the ‘chads’ made infamous during voting in Florida for the 2000 presidential election, but surely they deserve their own name.’’

‘‘I do recall being astonished on the day I was told by that exempted juror ‘It’s all your fault!’ writes David Lennon (marrying a judge just to get out of jury duty, Column 8, Monday). ‘‘However, more importantly, I then realised that my responsibilities, as Sheriff of NSW, were far greater than just law enforcement.’’

‘‘The advice on packets of Arnott’s Vita-Weat used to say ‘open here to get the goodness’,’’ writes David Morrison, of Springwood. ‘‘The instruction has now changed to ‘open to positive eating’. My problem is working out how to eat positively. Is it a question of how one eats, how much, how often, with whom, with what, all of these, none of these, or other factors which escape me?’’

‘‘I am not at all surprised that young people asked Robyn Lewis’s husband if he’d fought at Gallipoli,’’ writes Bill Hardy, of Glenmore Park (Column 8, Tuesday). ‘‘When I tell people that my dad fought on the Western Front in World War I, they often ask if he was killed. I respond that ‘I’m only 77, how old do I look?'’’

Column8@smh.com.au

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