Three snippets from the “Feedback” column of this week’s New Scientist. Some people really do have no sense of the ridiculous.

“Generations of medical students and doctors have been taught to tell their patients to ‘never put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear’,” Michael Glanfield, himself a doctor, assures us. The Asda supermarket chain has clearly taken this advice to heart. The warning on its own brand “D” battery, which has a diameter of 3.3 centimetres, states “…if swallowed or lodged in the ear or nose seek prompt medical attention”.

Geoffrey Hardman is grateful to transportdirect.info for warning him: “Certain combinations of outward and return journeys would result in you needing to leave your destination before arriving at it”.

“By now you will have noticed that the sole purpose of our exotic expeditions is to gather gems for Feedback,” says regular contributor Jenny Narraway. Her latest is the multilingual wording on a waste bin seen on a walking holiday in the Azores. It said: “Lixo Indiferenciado” for Portuguese speakers, “Poubelle Indiferencie” for French speakers and, for the English, “Undistinguished trash”.

Why is the waste bin on a walking holiday, one wonders?